A two pass Zone Of Influence (ZOI) creation method creates a Zone Of Influence (ZOI) image. The two pass ZOI creation method performs a first pass scan to create a first pass intermediate distance image and a shortest distance component label image. It then performs a second pass scan using the first pass intermediate distance image and the shortest distance component label image to create a background distance transform image and a updated shortest distance component label image. An adaptive image region partition method allows distance lengths of the two pass adaptive ZOI creation method depend on their associated component labels.