Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SP (대한전자공학회논문지SP)

The Institute of Electronics and Information Engineers (대한전자공학회)
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An Error Diffusion Technique Based on Principle Distance

주거리 기반의 오차확산 방법

  • Gang, Gi-Min (Dept.of Electronics Engineering, Inha University) ;
  • Kim, Chun-U (Dept.of Electronics Engineering, Inha University)
  • Published : 2001.01.01
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Abstract

In order to generate the gray scale image by the binary state imaging devices such as a digital printer, the gray scale image needs to be converted into the binary image by the halftoning techniques. This paper presents a new error diffusion technique to achieve the homogeneous dot distributions on the binary images. In this paper,'the minimum pixel distance'from the current pixel under binarization to the nearest minor pixel is defined first. Also, the gray levels of the input image are converted into a new variable based on the principal distance for the error diffusion. In the proposed method, the difference in the principal distances is utilized for the error propagation, whereas the gray level difference due to the binarization is diffused to the neighboring pixels in the existing error diffusion techniques. The quantization is accomplished by comparing the updated principal distance with the minimum pixel distance. In order to calculate the minimum pixel distance, MPOA(Minor Pixel Offset Array) is employed to reduce the computational loads and memory resources.

디지털 프린터와 같은 이진 출력 장치에서 영상을 표현하기 위해서는 연속 계조 영상을 이진 영상으로 변환하는 해프토닝 기법이 요구된다. 본 논문에서는 이진화 된 영상에서 균일한 도트들의 분포를 얻기 위하여 새로운 오차확산 방법을 제안한다. 제안하는 방법에서는 먼저, 현재 이진화 하려는 화소와 이미 이진화 된 소수화소(minor pixel)들간의 최소거리를 '최소화소거리(minimum pixel distance)'라 정의한다. 또한, 오차확산방법에의 적용을 위하여 계조값을 새로운 주거리 기반의 변수로 변환한다. 기존의 오차확산 방법에서는 이진화에 따르는 계조값의 차이를 주위 화소들에 전파하는데 반하여 제안하는 방법에서는 주거리상의 차이가 전파된다. 이진화 과정에서는 최소화소거리가 문턱치로 사용된다. 본 논문에서는 최소화소거리를 계산하는 방법으로 'MPOA'(Minor Pixel Offset Array)를 제안한다. MPOA는 이미 이진화 된 영역의 이진 화소의 종류와 2차원상의 위치를 1차원으로 표현하는 기법으로서 최소화소거리의 계산에 필요한 메모리와 계산량을 크게 감소시킨다.

Keywords

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