Petite size image processing engine

Details Petite size image processing engine Petite size image processing engine

2000-11-03

2004-10-12

Boudreau, Leo (Department: 2621)

Image analysis

Image transformation or preprocessing

Changing the image coordinates

C382S172000, C382S260000, C382S264000, C382S293000, C382S298000, C382S299000, C345S698000, C358S451000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06804418

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to the field of digital image processing, and more particularly to methods for producing very low resolution, low bit depth images.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It would be desirable to display consumer images on the display panels of cellular telephones and personal digital assistants (PDA's). Unfortunately, the displays on currently available cellular telephones and personal digital assistants have a very low resolution (e.g. 95×45 to 302×98 pixels) and low bit depth (e.g. 1 bit). A digital image of a high resolution (e.g. 1536×1024 pixels) and a high bit depth (e.g. 24 bits) can be produced by a digital camera or by scanning a consumer film. If it is subsampled to the resolution of the small display and halftoned to produce a 1-bit depth binary image, the features in the resulting image are rendered indistinctly.
One approach to producing a low resolution, low bit depth digital image is to first reduce the bit depth of the image using the “stamp filter” available in Adobe Photoshop™, and then sub-sample the image to reduce the resolution. It is believed that the stamp filter employs a rank order filter and a thresholding operation to reduce the bit depth of the image. The resulting images, when displayed on a cellular telephone or PDA, tend to have too much dark areas, obscuring details in these dark areas.
There is a need therefore for an improved method of processing digital images to produce low resolution, low bit depth images.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The need is met according to the present invention by providing a digital image processing method for generating a low resolution, low bit depth digital image from a higher resolution, higher bit depth input color digital image that includes the steps of: generating a gray scale image from the input color digital image; generating a low resolution sketch image from the grayscale image; generating a low resolution halftone image from the gray scale image; and combining the low resolution sketch image and the low resolution halftone image to form the low resolution, low bit depth digital image.
ADVANTAGES
The present invention has the advantage of producing a low resolution low bit depth digital image that is recognizable for its scene/event content on a mobile device with limited display area and bit depth.


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