Tone mapping HDR images using local texture and brightness measures

Abstract

The process of adapting the dynamic range of a real-world scene or a photograph in a controlled manner to suit the lower dynamic range of display devices is called tone mapping. In this paper, we present a novel local tone mapping technique for high-dynamic range (HDR) images taking texture and brightness as cues. We make use of bilateral filtering to obtain base and detail layer of the luminance component. In our proposed approach, we weight the base layer using local to global brightness ratio and texture estimator, and then combine it with the detail layer to get the tone mapped image. To see the difference in contrasts between the original HDR Image and the tone mapped image using our model, we make use of an online dynamic range (in)dependent metric. We present our results and compare it with other tone mapping algorithms and demonstrate that our model is better suited to compress the dynamic range of HDR images preserving visibility and information and with minimal artifacts.