Recursive Plateau Histogram Equalization for the Contrast Enhancement of the Infrared Images

One simple and efficient algorithm based on recursive plateau histogram equalization for the contrast enhancement of the infrared images is proposed in this paper. In this method, the plateau threshold is selected automatically as the average value of the probability density function. Based on the threshold value, the probability density function is divided into two sub-groups. The sub-group whose values are greater than the threshold value is clipped. New threshold value is calculated for another sub-group whose values are less than the old threshold value and the separation process is performed recursively on it. Experimental results show that our method can enhance the contrast of the infrared images better than other histogram equalization based methods. Furthermore, our method is simple enough to make it suitable to be implemented by FPGA for real time image process.