A perceptual evaluation of 3D unsharp masking

Much research has gone into developing methods for enhancing the contrast of displayed 3D scenes. In the current study, we investigated the perceptual impact of an algorithm recently proposed by Ritschel et al.1 that provides a general technique for enhancing the perceived contrast in synthesized scenes. Their algorithm extends traditional image-based Unsharp Masking to a 3D scene, achieving a scene-coherent enhancement. We conducted a standardized perceptual experiment to test the proposition that a 3D unsharp enhanced scene was superior to the original scene in terms of perceived contrast and preference. Furthermore, the impact of different settings of the algorithm's main parameters enhancement-strength () and gradient size () were studied in order to provide an estimate of a reasonable parameter space for the method. All participants preferred a clearly visible enhancement over the original, non-enhanced scenes and the setting for objectionable enhancement was far above the p...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2009
• Where: HVEI
• Authors: Matthias Ihrke, Tobias Ritschel, Kaleigh Smith, Thorsten Grosch, Karol Myszkowski, Hans-Peter Seidel
• Keywords: 3D Scene, Algorithm, Emerging Technology, Enhancement, HVEI 2009