High-Luminance Region Expansion for Image Reflection Emphasis
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing image processing techniques struggle to effectively emphasize light reflection in images, as high-luminance pixels become saturated, making it difficult to enhance the appearance of reflective areas.
Innovation Solution
An image processing apparatus that extracts high-luminance regions, expands surrounding pixel values to match those of high-luminance pixels, and outputs the expanded region, thereby increasing the luminance and thickness of high-luminance pixels to enhance the appearance of reflective areas.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Illumination intensity
If pixel values of high-luminance pixels are increased to emphasize light reflection, then the emphasis effect is achieved, but the pixel values become saturated making it difficult to further enhance reflection
Solution Approach 1:
The patent transitions from adjusting luminance values in one dimension (pixel intensity) to expanding the spatial dimension of high-luminance regions. By extracting high-luminance pixels and expanding their spatial coverage through surrounding pixel assignment, the invention bypasses the saturation limitation of individual pixel values and achieves enhanced reflection emphasis through increased region area rather than higher intensity.
2Illumination intensity
If pixel values are increased to enhance reflective areas, then the reflective appearance is improved, but the processing becomes ineffective when original pixel values are already high
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by treating high-luminance regions differently from the rest of the image. Through extraction of high-luminance pixels based on luminance thresholds and subsequent selective expansion of only these extracted regions, the invention applies enhancement processing locally to reflective areas without affecting other parts of the image, thereby maintaining effectiveness regardless of original pixel values.
3Ease of manufacture
If tone curves are applied to change pixel values, then the processing is simple to implement, but the effect is limited when high-luminance pixels are saturated
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the image processing into distinct steps: extraction of high-luminance pixels based on luminance thresholds, determination of surrounding pixels, and assignment of pixel values. This segmented approach replaces the single-step tone curve method, providing more reliable light reflection emphasis while maintaining reasonable implementation complexity through systematic processing stages.
Data Source
AI summary
There are provided an image processing apparatus and a control method for controlling the image processing apparatus. The control method includes extracting a high-luminance region including a high-luminance pixel having a higher luminance than a predetermined luminance included in received image data, expanding the high-luminance region by setting pixel values of pixels configuring a surrounding region of the high-luminance region determined based on an area of the high-luminance region to the same pixel value as the high-luminance pixel, and outputting image data having the expanded high-luminance region.