Digital Image Processing: Digital Imaging Fundamentals: Brian - Macnamee@Comp - Dit.Ie

Digital Image Processing:
Digital Imaging Fundamentals
Brian Mac Namee

Brian.MacNamee@comp.dit.ie
Course Website: http://www.comp.dit.ie/bmacnamee

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Contents
This lecture will cover:
– Human visual system
– Light and the electromagnetic spectrum
– Image representation
– Image sensing and acquisition
– Sampling, quantisation and resolution
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Human Visual System
The best vision model we have!
Knowledge of how images form in the eye
can help us with processing digital images
We will take just a whirlwind tour of the
human visual system
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Structure of the Human Eye
The lens focuses light from objects onto the
retina
The retina is covered with
light receptors called
cones (6-7 million) and
rods (75-150 million)
Cones are concentrated
around the fovea and are
very sensitive to colour
Rods are more spread out
and are sensitive to low levels of illumination
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Blind-Spot Experiment
Draw an image similar to that below on a
piece of paper (the dot and cross are about
6 inches apart)
Close your right eye and focus on the cross

with your left eye
Hold the image about 20 inches away from
your face and move it slowly towards you
The dot should disappear!
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Image Formation in the Eye
Muscles within the eye can be used to
change the shape of the lens allowing us
focus on objects that are near or far away
An image is focused onto the retina causing
rods and cones to become excited which
ultimately send signals to the brain
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Brightness Adaptation & Discrimination
The human visual system can perceive

approximately 1010 different light intensity
levels
However, at any one time we can only
discriminate between a much smaller
number – brightness adaptation
Similarly, the perceived intensity of a region
is related to the light intensities of the
regions surrounding it
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Brightness Adaptation & Discrimination
24 (cont…)
An example of Mach bands
An example of simultaneous contrast

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Optical Illusions
Our visual
systems play lots
of interesting
tricks on us
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Light and the Electromagnetic Spectrum
Light is just a particular part of the

electromagnetic spectrum that can be
sensed by the human eye
The electromagnetic spectrum is split up
according to the wavelengths of different
forms of energy
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Reflected Light
The colours that we perceive are determined
by the nature of the light reflected from an
object
For example, if white
light is shone onto a Wh
ite L
ight
green object most Colours
wavelengths are Absorbed
en Light
absorbed, while green G r e
light is reflected from

the object
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Sampling, Quantisation and Resolution
In the following slides we will consider what

is involved in capturing a digital image of a
real-world scene
– Image sensing and representation
– Sampling and quantisation
– Resolution
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Image Representation
Before we discuss image acquisition recall
that a digital image is composed of M rows
and N columns of pixels
each storing a value col
Pixel values are most

often grey levels in the
range 0-255(black-white)
We will see later on
that images can easily
be represented as f (row, col)
matrices row
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Image Acquisition
Images are typically generated by
illuminating a scene and absorbing the
energy reflected by the objects in that scene
– Typical notions of
illumination and
scene can be way off:
• X-rays of a skeleton
• Ultrasound of an
unborn baby
• Electro-microscopic
images of molecules
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Image Sensing
Incoming energy lands on a sensor material
responsive to that type of energy and this
generates a voltage
Collections of sensors are arranged to
capture images
Imaging Sensor
Line of Image Sensors

Array of Image Sensors
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Image Sampling and Quantisation
A digital sensor can only measure a limited
number of samples at a discrete set of
energy levels
Quantisation is the process of converting a
continuous analogue signal into a digital
representation of this signal
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Image Sampling and Quantisation
24 (cont…)
Remember that a digital image is always
only an approximation of a real world
scene
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Spatial Resolution
The spatial resolution of an image is
determined by how sampling was carried out
Spatial resolution simply refers to the
smallest discernable detail in an image
– Vision specialists will
often talk about pixel
size
– Graphic designers will
talk about dots per 5.1
p ixels
inch (DPI) Meg
a
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Spatial Resolution (cont…)
1024 * 1024 512 * 512 256 * 256
128 * 128 64 * 64 32 * 32
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Intensity Level Resolution
Intensity level resolution refers to the
number of intensity levels used to represent
the image
– The more intensity levels used, the finer the level of
detail discernable in an image
– Intensity level resolution is usually given in terms of
the number of bits used to store each intensity level
Number of Intensity
Number of Bits Examples
Levels
1 2 0, 1
2 4 00, 01, 10, 11
4 16 0000, 0101, 1111
8 256 00110011, 01010101
16 65,536 1010101010101010
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Intensity Level Resolution (cont…)
256 grey levels (8 bits per pixel) 128 grey levels (7 bpp) 64 grey levels (6 bpp) 32 grey levels (5 bpp)
16 grey levels (4 bpp) 8 grey levels (3 bpp) 4 grey levels (2 bpp) 2 grey levels (1 bpp)
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Resolution: How Much Is Enough?
The big question with resolution is always
how much is enough?
– This all depends on what is in the image and
what you would like to do with it
– Key questions include
• Does the image look aesthetically pleasing?
• Can you see what you need to see within the
image?
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Resolution: How Much Is Enough?
24 (cont…)
The picture on the right is fine for counting

the number of cars, but not for reading the
registration plate
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Summary
We have looked at:
– Human visual system
– Light and the electromagnetic spectrum
– Image representation
– Image sensing and acquisition
– Sampling, quantisation and resolution
Next time we start to look at techniques for
image enhancement

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Digital Image Processing:

Digital Imaging Fundamentals

Brian Mac Namee

Course Website: http://www.comp.dit.ie/bmacnamee

Close your right eye and focus on the cross

The human visual system can perceive

An example of Mach bands

An example of simultaneous contrast

Light is just a particular part of the

wavelengths are Absorbed

light is reflected from

In the following slides we will consider what

Pixel values are most

Line of Image Sensors

1024 * 1024 512 * 512 256 * 256

The picture on the right is fine for counting

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