• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SP
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• v.48 no.2
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• pp.65-73
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• 2011

In this paper, we present a novel digital multifocusing approach using adaptive region-based histogram equalization for the multiple color-filter aperture (MCA) system with insufficient amount of incoming light. From the image acquired by the MCA system, we can estimate the depth information of objects at different distances by measuring the amount of misalignment among the RGB color planes. The estimated depth information is used to obtain multifocused images together with the process of the region-of-interests (ROIs) classification, registration, and fusion. However, the MCA system results in the low-exposure problem because of the limited size of the apertures. For overcoming this problem, we propose adaptive region-based histogram equalization. Based on the experimental results, the proposed algorithm is proved to be able to obtain in-focused images under the low light level environment.

• IEIE Transactions on Smart Processing and Computing
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.8-16
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• 2012

An image obtained from a low light environment results in a low-exposure problem caused by non-ideal camera settings, i.e. aperture size and shutter speed. Of particular note, the multiple color-filter aperture (MCA) system inherently suffers from low-exposure problems and performance degradation in its image classification and registration processes due to its finite size of the apertures. In this context, this paper presents a novel method for the color enhancement of low-exposure images and its application to color shift model-based MCA system for image refocusing. Although various histogram equalization (HE) approaches have been proposed, they tend to distort the color information of the processed image due to the range limits of the histogram. The proposed color enhancement algorithm enhances the global brightness by analyzing the basic cause of the low-exposure phenomenon, and then compensates for the contrast degradation artifacts by using an adaptive histogram specification. We also apply the proposed algorithm to the preprocessing step of the refocusing technique in the MCA system to enhance the color image. The experimental results confirm that the proposed method can enhance the contrast of any low-exposure color image acquired by a conventional camera, and is suitable for commercial low-cost, high-quality imaging devices, such as consumer-grade camcorders, real-time 3D reconstruction systems, digital, and computational cameras.