• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SD
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• v.47 no.6
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• pp.22-34
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• 2010

Existing image scalers generally adopt simple interpolation methods such as bilinear method to take cost-benefit, or highly complex architectures to achieve high quality resulting images. However, demands for a low power, low cost, and high performance image scaler become more important because of emerging high quality mobile contents. In this paper we propose the novel low power hardware architecture for a high quality raster scan image scaler. The proposed scaler architecture enhances the existing cubic interpolation look-up table architecture by reducing and optimizing memory access and hardware components. The input data buffer of existing image scaler is replaced with line memories to reduce the number of memory access that is critical to power consumption. The cubic interpolation formula used in existing look-up table architecture is also rearranged to reduce the number of the multipliers and look-up table size. Finally we analyze the optimized parameter sets of look-up table, which is a trade-off between quality of result image and hardware size.

• 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.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information Security & Cryptology
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.1171-1179
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• 2021

Image forensic is performed to check image limpidness. In this paper, a robust scheme is discussed to detect median filtering in low quality images. Detection of median filtering assists in overall image forensic. Improved spatial statistical features are extracted from the image to classify pristine and median filtered images. Image array data is rescaled to enhance the spatial statistical information. Features are extracted using Markov model on enhanced spatial statistics. Multiple difference arrays are considered in different directions for robust feature set. Further, texture operator features are combined to increase the detection accuracy and SVM binary classifier is applied to train the classification model. Experimental results are promising for images of low quality JPEG compression.

• Journal of the Korea Computer Graphics Society
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.11-19
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• 2024

Demand for small biomimetic robots that can carry out reconnaissance missions without being exposed to the enemy in underground spaces and narrow passages is increasing in order to increase the fighting power and survivability of soldiers in wartime situations. A small compound eye image sensor for environmental recognition has advantages such as small size, low aberration, wide angle of view, depth estimation, and HDR that can be used in various ways in the field of vision. However, due to the small lens size, the resolution is low, and the problem of resolution in the fused image obtained from the actual compound eye image occurs. This paper proposes a compound eye image quality enhancement algorithm based on Image Enhancement and ESRGAN to overcome the problem of low resolution. If the proposed algorithm is applied to compound eye image fusion images, image resolution and image quality can be improved, so it is expected that performance improvement results can be obtained in various studies using compound eye cameras.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Medical Physics Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.38-41
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• 2002

Mammography is considered the single most important diagnostic tool in the early detection of breast cancer. Today's dedicated mammographic equipment, specially designed x-ray screen/film combinations, coupled with controlled film processing, produces excellent image quality and can detect very low contrast small lesions. In mammography, it is most important to produce consistent high-contrast, high-resolution images at the lowest radiation dose consistent with high image quality. Some of the major technical development milestones that have let to today's high quality in mammographic imaging are reviewed. Both the American College of Radiology Mammography Accreditation Program and the Mammography Quality Standards Act have significant impact on the improvement of the technical quality of mammographic images in the United States and worldwide. A most recent development in digital mammography has opened up avenues for improving diagnosis.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.19-25
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• 2023

In this paper, we propose a method for improving raw images captured in a low light condition based on deep learning considering the image signal processing. In the case of a smart phone camera, compared to a DSLR camera, the size of a lens or sensor is limited, so the noise increases and the reduces the quality of images in low light conditions. Existing deep learning-based low-light image processing methods create unnatural images in some cases since they do not consider the lens shading effect and white balance, which are major factors in the image signal processing. In this paper, pixel distances from the image center and channel average values are used to consider the lens shading effect and white balance with a deep learning model. Experiments with low-light images taken with a smart phone demonstrate that the proposed method achieves a higher peak signal to noise ratio and structural similarity index measure than the existing method by creating high-quality low-light images.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.60-67
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• 2015

This paper proposes an image-dependent color image enhancement method that uses adaptive luminance enhancement and color emphasis. It effectively enhances details of low-light regions while maintaining well-balanced luminance and color information. To compare the structure similarity and naturalness, we used the tone mapped image quality index (TMQI). The proposed method maintained better structure similarity in the enhanced image than did the space-variant luminance map (SVLM) method or the adaptive and integrated neighborhood dependent approach for nonlinear enhancement (AINDANE). The proposed method required the smallest computation time among the three algorithms. The proposed method can be easily implemented using the field-programmable gate array (FPGA), with low hardware resources and with better performance in terms of similarity.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.569-576
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• 2012

This paper presents an x-ray medical image panorama system which can overcome the smallness of the images that exist on a source computer during remote medical processing. In the system, after the standard medical image format DICOM is converted to the PC standard image format, a MSR algorithm is used to enhance X-ray images of low quality. Then SURF and Multi-band blending are applied to generate a panoramic image. Also, this paper evaluates the proposed SURF based system through the average gray value error and image quality criterion with X-ray image data by comparing with a SIFT based system. The results show that the proposed system is superior to SIFT based system in image quality.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.47 no.1
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• pp.39-48
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• 2024

In this study, we optimized the FNLM algorithm through a simulation study and applied it to a phantom scanned by low-dose CT to evaluate whether the FNLM algorithm can be used to obtain improved image quality images. We optimized the FNLM algorithm with MASH phantom and FASH phantom, which the algorithm was applied with MATLAB, increasing the smoothing factor from 0.01 to 0.05 with increments of 0.001 and measuring COV, RMSE, and PSNR values of the phantoms. For both phantom, COV and RMSE decreased, and PSNR increased as the smoothing factor increased. Based on the above results, we optimized a smoothing factor value of 0.043 for the FNLM algorithm. Then we applied the optimized FNLM algorithm to low dose lung CT and lung CT under normal conditions. In both images, the COV decreased by 55.33 times and 5.08 times respectively, and we confirmed that the quality of the image of low dose CT applying the optimized FNLM algorithm was 5.08 times better than the image of lung CT under normal conditions. In conclusion, we found that the smoothing factor of 0.043 among the factors of the FNLM algorithm showed the best results and validated the performance by reducing the noise in the low-quality CT images due to low dose with the optimized FNLM algorithm.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.21 no.11
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• pp.1271-1278
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• 2018

The NDT using ultrasonic is largely divided into A-Scan and C-Scan methods. Since A-Scan method is subject to subjective judgement by trained personnel, C-Scan method has been introduced, which presents the weld area in two dimensions by placing the transducers two dimensionally used in the A-Scan method. Therefore, it is necessary to develop equipment that can provide weld quality without the help of a welding expert and the presentation of effective C-Scan images. Thus, in this paper, the algorithms that express a low resolution 2-dimensional gray image formed by C-Scan method as a high-resolution color C-Scan image and automatically determine the weld quality from the generated C-Scan color image. The high resolution color C-Scan images proposed in this paper allow the exact shape of the weld point to be expressed, and an objective algorithm to use this image to automatically determine weld quality.