Chapter Overview: Point Operations!

  Relating gray values to brightness!

  Gray value quantization!
  Weberʼs Law!
  Gamma characteristic!
  Adjusting brightness and contrast!
  Gray-level histograms and histogram equalization!
  Point operations for combining images!
  Averaging!
  Subtraction!
  The need for image registration!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 1!

 Quantization: how many bits per pixel?!
8 bits
5 bits
4 bits

„Contouring“

3 bits
2 bits
1 bit

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 2!

 How many gray levels are required?!

  Contouring is most visible for a ramp!

32 levels!

64 levels!

128 levels!

256 levels!

  Digital images typically are quantized to 256 gray levels. !

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 3!

 Brightness discrimination experiment!

  Can you see the circle?!

I + ΔI

Note: I is luminance,
125!
126!
128!
129!
130!
127!
I measured in cd m 2

  Visibility threshold!
„Weber fraction“!
ΔI I ≈ KWeber ≈ 1…2% „Weberʻs Law“!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 4!

 Contrast ratio without contouring!
  Luminance ratio between two successive quantization
levels at visibility threshold!
I max N −1
= (1 + KWeber )
I min
I max
  For! KWeber = 0.010.02 N = 256 = 13156
I min
  Typical display contrast ratio!
  Modern flat panel display in dark room 1000:1!
  Cathode ray tube 100:1!
  Print on paper 10:1!
  Suggests uniform perception in the log(I) domain
(„Fechnerʻs Law“)!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 5!

 Gamma characteristic!

  Cathode ray tubes (CRTs) are nonlinear!

Luminance!
I!
I ~ Uγ
γ = 2.0 . . . 2.3!

Voltage U!

  Cameras contain γ-predistortion circuit!

U ~ I1 γ

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 6!

 log vs. γ-predistortion!

U

U ~ log(I )

U ~ I1 γ

Imax
= 100
Imin

  Similar enough for most practical applications!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 7!

 Photographic film!
Hurter & Driffield curve (H&D curve)!
for photographic negative!

slope -γ! Luminance!

2.0
shoulder!
I = I 0 ⋅10 − d
= I 0 ⋅10 −( − γ log E +d0 )
density d

„linear“ region!
1.0
= I 0 ⋅10 − d0 ⋅ E γ

toe! log E

0

d0
E is exposure

  γ measures film contrast!
  General purpose films: γ = -0.7 . . . -1.0!
  High-contrast films: γ = -1.5 . . . -10!
  Lower speed films tend to have higher absolute γ!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 8!

 Brightness adjustment by intensity scaling!

Original image! Scaled image!

f [ x, y ] a ⋅ f [ x, y ]

Scaling in the γ-domain is equivalent to scaling in the linear luminance domain


γ γ
I ~ ( a ⋅ f [ x, y ]) = aγ ⋅ ( f [ x, y ])
. . . same effect as adjusting camera exposure time.!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 9!

 Contrast adjustment by changing γ!

Original image! γ increased by 50%!

f [ x, y ] γ
a ⋅ ( f [ x, y ]) with γ = 1.5

. . . same effect as using a different photographic film . . .!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 10!
 Contrast adjustment by changing γ!

Scaled ramp 2γ0!

Original ramp γ0!

Scaling chosen to!

approximately preserve!
brightness of mid-gray!
Scaled ramp 0.5γ0!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 11!
 Gray level histograms!

  Distribution of gray levels can be judged by measuring a


histogram:!
  For B-bit image, initialize 2B counters with 0 !
  Loop over all pixels x,y!
  When encountering gray level f [x,y]=i, increment counter #ι

  Normalized histogram may be thought of as an

empirical probability distribution.!
  You can also use fewer, larger bins to trade off amplitude

resolution against sample size.!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 12!
#pixels! Example histogram!

Cameraman!
image!
gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 13!
#pixels!
Example histogram!

Pout!
image!
gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 14!
 Histogram equalization!

  Idea: find a non-linear transformation!

g=T(f)
!to be applied to each pixel of the input image f [x,y], such

that a uniform distribution of gray levels in the entire range

results for the output image g[x,y].

  Analyse ideal, continuous case first, assuming!

  0
≤ f ≤ 1 0 ≤ g ≤1
  T(f) is strictly monotonically increasing, hence, there
exists!
f = T −1 ( g ) 0 ≤ g ≤1

  Goal: pdf pg(g) = 1 over the range !0 ≤ g ≤ 1

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 15!
 Histogram equalization for continuous case!

  From basic probability theory!

⎡ df ⎤
pg ( g ) = ⎢ p f ( f ) ⎥
⎣ dg ⎦ f =T −1 ( g )
  Consider the transformation function!
f
g = T ( f ) = ∫ p f (α ) dα 0 ≤ f ≤1
0

  Then . . . ! dg
= pf ( f )
df
⎡ df ⎤ ⎡ 1 ⎤
pg ( g ) = ⎢ p f ( f ) ⎥ = ⎢ p f ( f ) ⎥ =1 0 ≤ g ≤1
⎣ dg ⎦ f =T −1 ( g ) ⎢⎣ p f ( f ) ⎥⎦ −1
f =T ( g )

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 16!
 Histogram equalization for discrete case!

  Now, f only assumes discrete amplitude values f0 , f1 ,, fL−1!

!with empirical probabilities!
L−1
n0 n1 nL−1
P0 = P1 =  PL−1 = where n = ∑ nl
n n n l =0
f
  Discrete approximation of! g = T ( f ) = ∫ p f (α ) dα
0
k
gk = T ( fk ) = ∑ Pi for k = 0,1..., L − 1
i=0

  The resulting values gk are in the range [0,1] and need to

be scaled and rounded appropriately. !

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 17!
 Histogram equalization example!

Original image Pout! Pout!

after histogram equalization!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 18!
 Histogram equalization example!
Original image Pout! . . . after histogram equalization!
#pixels!

#pixels!
gray level! gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 19!
 Histogram equalization example!

Original image Cameraman!

Cameraman! after histogram equalization!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 20!
 Histogram equalization example!
Original image Cameraman! . . . after histogram equalization!
#pixels!

#pixels!
gray level! gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 21!
 Histogram equalization example!

Original image Moon! Moon!

after histogram equalization!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 22!
 Histogram equalization example!
Original image Moon! . . . after histogram equalization!

#pixels!
#pixels!

gray level! gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 23!
 Contrast-limited histogram equalization!

Equalization with!
original histogram!

Output gray level!

#pixels!

Equalization with!
clipped histogram!

Histogram Clipping!

Input graylevel!
gray level! Input gray level!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 24!
 Adaptive histogram equalization!
  Apply histogram equalization based on a histogram obtained
from a portion of the image!

Sliding window approach:
 Tiling approach:


different histogram (and mapping)
 subdivide into overlapping regions,

for every pixel! mitigate blocking effect by smooth blending

between neighboring tiles !

  Must limit contrast expansion in flat regions of the image,


e.g. by clipping individual histogram values to a maximum

(CLAHE - “Contrast-limited adaptive histogram equalization”)!
[Pizer, Amburn et al. 1987]!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 25!
 Adaptive histogram equalization!

Original! Global histogram! Tiling
 Tiling


8x8 histograms! 32x32 histograms!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 26!
 Adaptive histogram equalization!

Original image Dental Xray! Adaptive histogram equalization, 16x16 tiles!

Dental Xray after 


equalization of

global histogram!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 27!
 Adaptive histogram equalization!

Original image! Global
 Adaptive histogram!

histogram equalization

equalization! 8x8 tiles!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 28!
 Point operations for combining images!

  Image averaging for noise reduction!

  Combination of different exposures for

high-dynamic range imaging!
  Image subtraction for change detection!
  Accurate alignment is always a requirement!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 29!
 Image averaging for noise reduction!
1 image 2 images 4 images!

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/image-averaging-noise.htm!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 30!
 High-dynamic range imaging!

16 exposures, one f-stop (2X) apart!

[Debevec, Malik, 1997] ! Combined image!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 31!
 Image subtraction!

  Find differences/changes between 2 mostly identical images!

  Example: digital subtraction angiography!

- +

Contrast!
enhancement!

http://www.isi.uu.nl/Research/Gallery/DSA/!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 32!
 Video background subtraction!
New Frame! Background Frame! New Frame! Background Frame!

+! -! +! -!

Abs(.) > θ ?
Abs(.) > θ ?

Update: Background[t] := α Background[t-1] + (1- α) New[t]

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 33!
 Image subtraction example from IC manufacturing:

die-to-die comparison of photomasks!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 34!
 Where is the defect?!

Image A (no defect)! Image B (w/ defect)!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 35!
Absolute difference between two images!

w/o alignment! w/ alignment and thresholding!

Bernd Girod: EE368 Digital Image Processing! Point Operations no. 36!