User-interactive reduction of scene balance failures

Abstract

A photofinishing image processing operator detects failures in the performance of a scene balance mechanism on a digitized image and enables a photofinisher to interactively correct for such failures before the failed image has been processed and an unacceptable output image printed. Whenever a failed image is identified, one or more reasonably low resolution versions of the image as processed by the scene balance mechanism are displayed to the photofinishing operator, together with a request for image adjustment information that is used to modify or correct the color balance of the image. In response to this user input information, the image processor adjusts color balance parameters of the scene balance mechanism, so that the digitized image processed by the modified scene balance mechanism will yield a print of acceptable color balance quality. This interaction of the photofinishing operator with the image processing system may be accomplished by way of several modes, including displaying differently processed versions of the image, or a single version of the image processed by the scene balance mechanism, together with a question regarding the type of image. The failure detection mechanism preferably employs a non-linear discriminator, such as a neural network.