IMPROVEMENTS RELATED TO LOW LIGHT LEVEL IMAGING DEVICES

摘要

Described herein is a method and apparatus for enhancing regions in a low light level image (60) which includes a plurality of bright regions (62, 64, 66) and a person (100) in a region which has low light levels. The image (60) has a gain profile applied to it to compensate for the bright regions (62, 64, 66) and/or to enhance the person (100). The gain profile is derived from the image (60) itself and is chosen to reduce the bright regions (62, 64, 66) and/or enhance the person (100) and his surrounding area (102). If the person (100) only is of interest, the gain profile is such that, for each of lines "m" to "t", a high gain is applied to pixels within the area (102) and a low gain is applied to pixels outside that area (102). Similarly, if only the bright regions (62, 64, 66) are of interest, a suitable gain profile is derived from the image (60) itself to allow detail in the bright regions (62, 64, 66) to be determined.