Impact of Multiscale Retinex Computation on Performance of Segmentation Algorithms

Abstract

Classical segmentation algorithms subdivide an image into its constituent components based upon some metric that defines commonality between pixels. Often, these metrics incorporate some measure of "activity" in the scene, e.g. the amount of detail that is in a region. The Multiscale Retinex with Color Restoration (MSRCR) is a general purpose, non-linear image enhancement algorithm that significantly affects the brightness, contrast and sharpness within an image. In this paper, we will analyze the impact the MSRCR has on segmentation results and performance.