Observing and evaluating print defects represents a major challenge in the area of print quality research. Visual
identification and quantification of these print defects becomes a key issue for improving print quality. However,
the page content may confound the visual evaluation of print defects in actual printouts. Our research is focused
on banding in the presence of print content in the context of commercial printing. In this paper, a psychophysical
experiment is described to evaluate the perception of bands in the presence of print content. A number of banding
defects are added by way of simulation to a selected set of commercial print contents to form our set of stimuli.
The participants in the experiment mark these stimuli based on their observations via a graphical user interface
(GUI). Based on the collection of the marked stimuli, we were able to see general consistency among different
participants. Moreover, the results showed that the likelihood of an observer perceiving the banding defect in
a smooth area is much higher than in a high frequency area. Furthermore, our results also indicate that the
luminance of the image may locally affect the visibility of the print defects to some degree.
KEYWORDS: Visibility, Digital imaging, Image quality, Printing, Process modeling, Visual process modeling, Image processing, Image segmentation, Quantization, Visual system
Banding is a well-known artifact produced by printing systems. It usually appears as lines perpendicular to the
process direction of the print. Therefore, banding is an important print quality issue which has been analyzed
and assessed by many researchers. However, little literature has focused on the study of the masking effect of
content for this kind of print quality issue.
Compared with other image and print quality research, our work is focused on the print quality of typical
documents printed on a digital commercial printing press. In this paper, we propose a Masking Mediated Print
Defect Visibility Predictor (MMPDVP) to predict the visibility of defects in the presence of customer content.
The parameters of the algorithm are trained from ground-truth images that have been marked by subjects. The
MMPDVP could help the press operator decide whether the print quality is acceptable for specific customer
requirements. Ultimately, this model can be used to optimize the print-shop workflow.
KEYWORDS: Modulation transfer functions, Modulation, Contrast transfer function, Scanners, Direct methods, Imaging systems, Cameras, Point spread functions, Reflectivity, Convolution
The modulation transfer function (MTF) is a fundamental tool for assessing the performance of imaging systems.
It has been applied to a range of capture and output devices, including printers and even the media itself. In this
paper, we consider the problem of measuring the MTF of image capture devices. We analyze the factors that
limit the MTF of a capture device. Then, we examine three different approaches to this task based, respectively,
on a slant-edge target, a sinewave target, and a grill pattern. We review the mathematical relationship between
the three different methods, and discuss their comparative advantages and disadvantages. Finally, we present
experimental results for MTF measurement with a number of different commercially available image capture devices
that are specifically designed for capture of 2D reflection or transmission copy. These include camera-based
systems, flat-bed scanners, and a drum scanner.
Periodic clustered-dot screens are widely used for electrophotographic printers due to their print stability. However,
moir´e is a ubiquitous problem that arises in color printing due to the beating together of the clustered-dot,
periodic halftone patterns that are used to represent different colorants. This beating or interference phenomenon
introduces spurious low frequency (large period) patterns in the printed output that are very objectionable to
the viewer. The traditional solution in the graphic arts and printing industry is to rotate identical square screens
to angles that are maximally separated from each other. For example, the classic three-color screen set rotates
three identical square screens to the angles 15°, 45°, and 75°, respectively. However, the effectiveness of this
approach is limited when printing with more than four colorants, i.e. N-color printing, where N >4. Moreover,
accurately achieving the angles that have maximum angular separation requires a very high resolution plate
writer, as is used in commercial offset printing.
In this paper, we propose a systematic way to design color screen sets for periodic, clustered-dot screens
that offers more explicit control of the moir´e properties of the resulting screens when used in color printing. We
find a general concept for moir´e-free screen design that is called lattice-based screen design. The basic concept
behind our approach is the creation of the screen set on a 2-dimensional lattice in the frequency domain and
then picking each fundamental frequency vector of the individual colorant planes in the created spectral lattice
according to the desired properties. The halftone geometry of a screen set is the set of angles and frequencies
in units of lines per inch (LPI) of each screen plane. The lattice-based screen design offers more flexibility in
designing N-color screen sets with different halftone geometries, and all of them are guaranteed to be all-orders
moir´e-free. For example, by creating a square lattice in the frequency domain, square N-color moir´e-free screen
sets that consist of N rotated square screens can be achieved. The proposed approach maintains the advantage
of square clustered-dot screen design and is based on low addressability of digital printing. We also propose
several symmetry measures, and use them to compare the proposed 4-color square screen set and the screen
sets based on a previous moir´e-free N-color non-orthogonal approach. The proposed screen set is shown to have
better symmetry properties.
KEYWORDS: Prototyping, CMYK color model, RGB color model, Printing, Signal processing, Curium, Principal component analysis, Modulation, Calibration, Scanners
Print defects like banding from a digital press involve not only luminance variation, but also chrominance
variation. As digital presses place one color separation at a time, the contrast and spatial pattern of the print
defects are color-space dependent. Characterizing the color-dependent features of the banding signal enables us to
simulate the banding on natural document images in a more accurate way that matches the characteristics of the
banding generation mechanism within the digital press. A framework is described for color-dependent banding
characterization including the following steps: printing and scanning uniform patches that sample colorant
combinations throughout the input document sRGB color space, extracting banding signals in the CMYK color
space of the target device, and modeling the banding features in a perceptually uniform color space. We obtain
a full banding features LUT for every color point in the input sRGB space by interpolating banding features
extracted from measured color points. The color-dependent banding simulation framework is developed based
on the banding features LUT. Using the information contained in this LUT, a single banding prototype signal is
modulated in a color-space-dependent fashion that varies spatially across the natural document image. Proper
execution of the framework of banding characterization and simulation requires careful calibration of each system
component, as well as implementation of a complete color management pipeline.
Digital halftoning provides a mechanism for rendering continuous-tone images on devices such as printers. With
electrophotography, the deposition of toner within the area of a given printer addressable pixel is strongly
influenced by the halftone values of the immediately neighboring pixels. To account for these effects, it is
necessary to embed a printer model in the halftoning algorithm.
In our previous work, we used an efficient strategy to account for the impact of a 5x5 neighborhood of pixels
on the central pixel absorptance. Now we examine the potential influence of a much larger neighborhood (45x45)
of the digital halftone image on the measured value of a printed pixel at the center of that neighborhood. The
experiment shows that the extended model yields a significant improvement in the accuracy of the prediction of
the pixel values of the printed and measured halftone image.
Most halftoning algorithms assume there is no interaction between neighboring dots or if there is, it is additive.
Without accounting for dot-gain effect, the printed image will not have the appearance predicted by the halftoning
algorithm. Thus, there is need to embed a printer model in the halftoning algorithm which can predict such
deviations and develop a halftone accordingly.
The direct binary search (DBS) algorithm employs a search heuristic to minimize the mean squared perceptually
filtered error between the halftone and continuous-tone original images. We incorporate a measurementbased
stochastic model for dot interactions of an electro-photographic printer within the iterative DBS binary
halftoning algorithm. The stochastic model developed is based on microscopic absorptance and variance measurements.
We present an efficient strategy to estimate the impact of 5×5 neighborhood pixels on the central
pixel absorptance. By including the impact of 5×5 neighborhood pixels, the average relative error between the
predicted tone and tone observed is reduced from around 21% to 4%. Also, the experimental results show that
electrophotography-model based halftoning reduces the mottle and banding artifacts.
A novel method for resolution enhancement of Electro Photographic (EP) printers is presented. The proposed method is applicable for laser printers that have a partial-pixel exposure capability such as Pulse Width Modulation (PWM). By coupling partial exposure with anti-aliasing rendering, the proposed technology enables practically continuous addressability, namely, placement resolution. Using this
technology we can show significant print quality improvement, such as the ability to render lines with arbitrary width and location. This would allow printing smooth line art at any angle with a relatively
coarse pixel grid. The proposed method will thus provide better print quality compared to post process type resolution enhancement alternatives used today. The method has been tested theoretically using a Liquid EP (LEP) model, and experimentally confirmed.
In this paper we propose a method to speed up Retinex-type algorithms, consisting of a computationally intensive nonlinear
illumination estimation module followed by a relatively simple manipulation module. Speed up is obtained by way
of computing the illumination on a sub-sampled image. The challenge is to interpolate a piece-wise smooth low
resolution image. We present and analyze the trade of between two types of interpolation methods. On one hand, regular
illumination interpolation, which preserves the Retinex-type output quality, however may result in artifacts. On the other
hand a detail preserving interpolation which removes artifacts, however may compromise the output quality.
Clustered dots screens are widely used in digital printing. Our research focuses on irregular cluster-dot screens. Irregular screens are appealing since there are many more irregular screens than regular ones. As a result, they provide a larger set of multi-separation screen combinations for avoiding interaction between screening frequencies of concurrent screens. Their down side is that they often have harmonic artifacts. Our design challenge is to reduce these artifacts' visual impact. We present frequency-domain based methods to reduce these artifacts' visual impact. State-of-the-art
screens incorporate many, predominantly spatial domain, design considerations which we cannot ignore. Accordingly, the proposed methods are designed to introduce minimal modifications to given screens. The proposed methods eliminate, or reduce the few artifacts visible in a set of irregular screens. This work can be generalized to other printing technologies, and to screen design.
In this paper we propose a simple method to obtain a Cartesian color dither-screen from a given monochrome dither-screen. The monochrome dot placement pattern (e.g. cluster or scatter), as well as its frequency domain features are maintained, while optimizing for color quality. Color quality is measured against the Minimal Brightness Variation Criterion.
Retinex theory addresses the problem of separating the illumination from the reflectance in a given image and thereby compensating for non-uniform lighting. This is in general an ill-posed problem. In this paper we propose a variational model for the Retinex problem that unifies previous methods. Similar to previous algorithms, it assumes spatial smoothness of the illumination field. In addition, knowledge of the limited dynamic range of the reflectance is used as a constraint in the recovery process. A penalty term is also included, exploiting a-priori knowledge of the nature of the reflectance image. The proposed formulation adopts a Bayesian view point of the estimation problem, which leads to an algebraic regularization term, that contributes to better conditioning of the reconstruction problem. Based on the proposed variational model, we show that the illumination estimation problem can be formulated as a Quadratic Programming optimization problem. An efficient multi-resolution algorithm is proposed. It exploits the spatial correlation in the reflectance and illumination images. Applications of the algorithm to various color images yield promising results.
Monochrome dither halftoning is a gray-scale image rendering procedure where gray-levels in an image are compared against a periodic threshold array, placing a Black dot in every location whose gray-level is smaller than the corresponding threshold value. Current generalization to color printing result in Cartesian thresholding procedures, namely RGB values are compared component-wise to trivariate thresholds. In this report we develop a color dithering framework based on a non-Cartesian coordinate system. To this end we generalize multidimensional dithering in a non-separable manner, and define it only as a space-varying point- operator. Three dithering methods are proposed within this framework. The main advantage of simplex dither over the traditional Cartesian dither is that it allows the rendition of solid color patches while using no more than a preselected quadruple of colors, thereby enabling a reduction in halftone noise.
Image watermarking concerns embedding information in images, in a manner that does not affect the visual quality of the image. This paper focusses on watermarking of dither halftone images. The basic idea is to use a sequence of two dither matrices (instead of one) to encode the watermark information. Analyzing a specific statistical model of input images, leads to an optimal decoding algorithm in term of the rate- distortion trade-off. Furthermore, we characterize optimal dither matrix pairs (i.e.: dither matrix pairs whose use results in the most favorable rate-distortion). Finally, the results are demonstrated in a synthetic example. The example is synthetic in the sense that it does not resort to printing and re-scanning of the image.
KEYWORDS: Halftones, Diffusion, RGB color model, Solids, Visualization, Visual system, Quantization, Color difference, Human vision and color perception, Binary data
Error Diffusion is a high-performance halftoning method in which quantization errors are diffused to 'future' pixels. Originally intended for grayscale images, it is traditionally extended to color images by Error-Diffusing each of the three color planes independently. In this paper we show that augmenting the Error Diffusion paradigm with a simple design rule based on certain characteristics of human color perception, results in a novel color halftoning algorithm named color diffusion. The output of color diffusion is of considerable higher quality compared to separable error diffusion. The algorithm presented requires no additional memory and entails a reasonable increase in run-time.
The medial axis transform (MAT) of a shape, better known as its skeleton, is frequently used in shape analysis and related areas. In this paper a new approach for determining the skeleton of an object, is presented. The boundary is segmented at points of maximal positive curvature and a distance map from each of the segments is calculated. The skeleton is then located by applying simple rules to the zero sets of distance maps differences. A framework is proposed for numerical approximation of distance maps that is consistent with the continuous case, hence does not suffer from digitization bias due to metrication errors of the implementation on the grid. Subpixel accuracy in distance map calculation is obtained by using gray level information along the boundary of the shape in the numerical scheme. The accuracy of the resulting efficient skeletonization algorithm is demonstrated by several examples.
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