Eastman-kodak Company

Other

Robert T Gray

Jiebo Luo

David R Cok

Andrew Charles Gallagher

Edward B Gindele

Jay S Schildkraut

Tomasz A Matraszek

Patrick A Cosgrove

Paul J Benati

David Lynn Patton

Majid Rabbani

Rajiv Mehrotra

Amit Singhal

Wei Zhu

Matthew R Boutell

George E Sotak

A system and method for automatically altering an image having pixels is disclosed. An image is segmented into regions and various features of the regions are extracted and used to calculate a confidence factor, or belief value, that a particular region is a main subject of the image. The belief values are assembled into a belief map that is used to define how pixel values are to be altered. Various color and appearance values of the pixel are altered in a predetermined way to emphasize the main subject of the image. The emphasis is applied in a binary fashion or as in a gradient of values. Either the main subject can be emphasized, or the secondary or background subjects can be de-emphasized. The system can be implement on a variety of computer systems.

Digital image processing system and method for emphasizing a main subject of an image

A method for improving scene classification of a digital image comprising the steps of: (a) providing an image; (b) systematically recomposing the image to generate an expanded set of images; and (c) using a classifier and the expanded set of images to determine a scene classification for the image, whereby the expanded set of images provides at least one of an improved classifier and an improved classification result.

Method for using effective spatio-temporal image recomposition to improve scene classification

A method for processing a digital color image includes the steps of: providing a subject matter detector for distinguishing between target and background subject matters; applying the subject matter detector to the image to produce a belief map indicating the degree of belief that pixels in the image belong to target subject matter; providing an image enhancement operation that is responsive to a control signal for controlling the degree of image enhancement; and applying image enhancement to the digital image by varying the control signal according to the belief map to produce an enhanced image.

Method and system for selectively applying enhancement to an image

A method is disclosed for providing photofinishing services for images having a main subject and background, comprising the steps of producing a digital image of a customer's photographic image; producing a main subject belief map from the digital image; employing the main subject belief map to produce a modified digital image; producing a print of the digital image; producing a print of the modified digital image; and delivering both prints to the customer. The step of employing the main subject belief map to produce a modified digital image includes zoom and crop steps that maintain a main subject within a resulting cropped image. The step of employing the main subject belief map to produce a modified digital image may include a subject emphasizing step. The emphasizing step may include the step of maintaining the main subject in color and the background in black and white, the step of altering the background by reduced brightness to produce a spotlight effect on the main subject, and/or the step of altering the background with reduced sharpness. The step of employing the main subject belief map to produce a modified digital image may include the step of altering pixel values that are a part of the main subject and/or altering pixel values that are a part of the background.

Doubleprint photofinishing service with the second print having subject content-based modifications

A system and method for determining image similarity. The method includes the steps of automatically providing perceptually significant features of main subject or background of a first image; automatically providing perceptually significant features of main subject or background of a second image; automatically comparing the perceptually significant features of the main subject or the background of the first image to the main subject or the background of the second image; and providing an output in response thereto. In the illustrative implementation, the features are provided by a number of belief levels, where the number of belief levels are preferably greater than two. The perceptually significant features include color, texture and/or shape. In the preferred embodiment, the main subject is indicated by a continuously valued belief map. The belief values of the main subject are determined by segmenting the image into regions of homogenous color and texture, computing at least one structure feature and at least one semantic feature for each region, and computing a belief value for all the pixels in the region using a Bayes net to combine the features. In an illustrative application, the inventive method is implemented in an image retrieval system. In this implementation, the inventive method automatically stores perceptually significant features of the main subject or background of a plurality of first images in a database to facilitate retrieval of a target image in response to an input or query image. Features corresponding to each of the plurality of stored images are automatically sequentially compared to similar features of the query image. Consequently, the present invention provides an automatic system and method for controlling the feature extraction, representation, and feature-based similarity retrieval strategies of a content-based image archival and retrieval system based on an analysis of main subject and background derived from a continuously valued main subject belief map.

System and method for determining image similarity

A method of producing a compressed image from a full resolution sparsely sampled extended dynamic range image produced by a sparsely sampled extended dynamic range image sensing device having fast photosites with a predetermined response to a light exposure for producing fast pixel values and slow photosites with a slower response to the same light exposure for producing slow pixel values, including the steps of: providing a full resolution sparsely sampled extended dynamic range image; separating the full resolution sparsely sampled image into a fast image comprising only fast pixel values and a slow image comprising only slow pixel values; and separately compressing the fast image and the slow image.

Method for compressing an image from a sparsely sampled extended dynamic range image sensing device

A method and computer program/system for cropping a digital image includes inputting a belief map of a photographic image, (a belief value at a location in the belief map indicates an importance of a photographic subject at the same location in the photographic image), selecting a zoom factor and a crop window, clustering regions of the belief map to identify background portions, secondary portions and main portions, positioning the crop window such that the crop window is centered around a main portion having a highest belief value, moving the crop window such that the crop window is included completely within the image, moving the crop window such that a sum of belief values is at a maximum, and cropping the image according to the crop window.

Method for automatically creating cropped and zoomed versions of photographic images

A method of producing an image of least a portion of a photographic image onto a photographic receiver including receiving a digital image corresponding to the photographic image, the digital image comprising pixels, and locating the relative optical position of a photographic image, the lens, and the photographic receiver in response to pixels of the digital image and illuminating a portion of the photographic image of high subject content to produce an image of such portion onto the photographic receiver.

Producing an image of a portion of a photographic image onto a receiver using a digital image of the photographic image

A computer program product for detecting eye color defects of a subject in an image due to flash illumination comprises: a computer readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon for performing the steps of detecting skin colored regions in a digital image; searching the skin colored regions for groups of pixels with color characteristic of redeye defect; and correcting color of the pixels based on a location of redeye defect found in step (b).

Computer program product for redeye detection

A method and apparatus for editing continuous tone digital images representing pixels in which regions containing defects, called 'defect regions', are unnoticeable or less visually discernible. Corrected pixel data for pixels in the defect region, called defect pixels, in the digital image are provided while data representing non-defect pixels outside of the defect region are not altered. These digital images may have one color channel (gray side) or multiple color channels. The apparatus and method includes a computer system which operates according to a set of instructions.

Method and apparatus for correcting pixel values in a digital image

A computer program product for locating first and second objects each having substantially the same physical characteristics, and the ratio of the distance between the first and second objects and the size of each object is substantially invariant, the computer program product comprises: a computer readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon for performing the steps of: displaying a digital image on a graphical user interface; inputting to the interface an approximate position of each object for forming initial input positions; determining an estimate size of each object based on the distance obtained from the initial input positions of the first and second objects; forming a first searching window for the first object; the center of the first window is determined by the input position of the first object and the size of the first window is determined by the estimate size of the first object; reiteratively positioning a template on the first search window for determining a location that gives a best match of the first object relative to the template; forming a second searching window for the second object; the center of the second window is determined by the input position of the second object and the size of the second window is determined by the estimate size of the second object; and reiteratively positioning a template on the second search window for determining a location that gives a best match of the second object relative to the template.

Method and system for locating objects in an image

Computer program product for locating objects in an image

A method of correcting one or more defect pixels in a defect region of a source image, which image has both the defect pixels and non-defect pixels each of which is represented by at least one defect pixel signal and non-defect pixel signal, respectively. The method comprises:

Growing community of inventors

Rochester, NY, United States of America

Robert T Gray