533

A novel frequency domain approach to automated

pseudo-colouring of images
K. A. Navas Naveen S, George Thottan R. Jayadevan, Assim. S
Associate Professor B Tech Students M Tech Students
Govt. Engineering College Govt. Engineering College Govt. Engineering College
Thrissur Thrissur Thrissur
Kerala, India Kerala, India Kerala, India
Email: kanavas@rediffmail.com Email: naveen@rediffmail.com Email: rnath.jayadevan@gmail.com
Email: george@thesimpsons.com assimsajeev@gmail.com

AbstractPseudo colouring is widely used to colour
monochrome images or to artificially colour an existing colour
image to highlight specific features in that image or to enhance
visual quality. A novel automated pseudo-colouring technique is
proposed in this paper. The proposed method comprises of two
steps; reference image selection from the database and colour
transfer using histogram interpolation. The first step relies on
Content Based Image Retrieval (CBIR) using wavelet transform.
The performance of our method is compared with other au-
tomated pseudo-colouring approaches through visual inspection
based on MOS (Mean Opinion Score). The simulation results
prove that the proposed method has many merits compared to
existing techniques.
I. I NTRODUCTION
Pseudo-colouring is one of the most common tasks in image
processing for the colourization of gray scale images in order
to enhance their visual appeal [1]. Its applications include
colourizing black and white films, medical images, satellite
images, restoring old photographs etc.
The efficiency of pseudo-colouring technique is based on
three main features viz; Distinguishability, Aesthetic sense and
Extend of pixels coloured. Distinguishability means to identify
specifically the different features or objects in a pseudo-
coloured image. Aesthetic sense defines the sense of beauty
and it differs from person to person. Extend of pixel colouring
shows the total number of pixels that were coloured by
the pseudo-colouring technique. In the conventional pseudo-
colouring technique, the source or reference image is provided
by the user along with query image [2], [3]. This requires
human intervention, which consumes large processing time
and it is not functional when large number of images or video
to be pseudo-coloured.
Recently, several automated pseudo-colouring techniques
have been developed in which user needs to provide only
the query image. Meanwhile reference image is automatically
selected by the computer from the database of colour im-
ages using an appropriate algorithm. Ye Ji et al proposed a
technique in [4] where reference image selection is based on
texture spectrum similarity. Colour transfer algorithm involves
luminance correction, sampling using texture spectrum and
transfer of chromaticity values based on luminance matching.
This technique however lacks an aesthetic appeal. In [5],
reference image is chosen by matching signatures of the
images in database with the query image. Matching is done
by correlating query and database signature vectors using their
internal product. This method fails to select the most suitable
reference image from the database for pseudo-colouring. The
Automatic mood transfer proposed by Chuang-kai Yang et al
[6] involves the methods such as image classification based on
colour mood, image segmentation and colour mood transfer.
However the extend of pixels coloured in the pseudo-coloured
image is not satisfactory. The existing techniques consider
only luminance details of pixels in an image and it fails to
extract the specific features in query image. The optimality
of automated pseudo-colouring is primarily determined by the
efficiency of reference image selection algorithm.
From the literature review, authours could gather that there
is a room for research in pseudo-colouring of gray scale
images. In this paper, a novel automated pseudo-colouring
technique has been proposed. The novelty of work is reflected
in the choice of reference image selection algorithm which
works on the principle of Content Based Image Retrieval
(CBIR) using wavelet transform [7], [8]. The algorithm in-
volves steps such as wavelet decomposition of images in the
database, feature vector calculation and finally reference image
selection from the database through matching. Manhattan
distance is used to find the closest match between query
and database images [9]. Histogram Interpolation algorithm
proposed by Cheng-Hsiung Heish et al [10] is made use
for pseudo-colouring. The YCbCr colour space is employed
for interpolation and luminance matching. High efficiency
of reference image selection algorithm and preservation of
specific features in the image are the major benefits of the
proposed method compared to existing algorithms.
The paper is organized as follows. The methodology of
the proposed technique is explained in section II. Results and
discussions are given in section III. Section IV concludes the
paper.

978-1-4244-9477-4/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE


Query image Feature vector
Faj calculation
Computation of
manhattan distance
Reference Tree structured Feature vector
image database DWT Fij calculation
Reference image selection
Fig. 1. Block Diagram for the proposed technique
II. M ETHODOLOGY
This section briefly explains two basic steps involved in the
proposed automated pseudo-colouring technique.
1) Reference image selection from image database using
CBIR based on wavelet transform.
2) Pseudo-colouring query image using selected reference
image with the application of Histogram Interpolation
algorithm.
The block diagram for the proposed technique is shown in
Fig. 1. It contains two sections; reference image selection and
pseudo-colouring which are discussed below briefly.
A. Reference Image Selection
The challenge in the reference image retrieval is to develop
the methods that can capture important characteristics of an
image, which makes it unique, and allows its accurate iden-
tification. A unique wavelet transform based reference image
selection algorithm is discussed in this section. The tree struc-
tured wavelet transform using 8-tap Daubechies coefficients
is used for image decomposition since it is superior to the
conventional transforms namely; Discrete Cosine Transform
(DCT), Discrete Sine Transform (DST), Discrete Hadamard
Transform (DHT) and pyramid-structured wavelet transforms
[8].
The reference image selection procedure involves three
basic steps. First step is the decomposition of images in
database using tree structured wavelet transform resulting
in the formation of sub-bands. The level of decomposition
depends on the size of image and energy content in each
sub-band. In the second step, feature vector calculation of
each image in the database is done. The feature parameters
selected in this work are standard deviation and energy, since
their combination gives higher efficiency for the algorithm
compared to other combinations such as mean and standard
deviation, mean and energy etc [7]. These feature parameters
corresponding to each of the sub-bands at each decomposition
level are used to construct a feature vector. The final step
involves the selection of the most suitable reference image
from database. In this step, feature vector for query image is
computed by the same procedure and then Manhattan distance
is used to compute similarity between query image and list
M
of reference images in database. Manhattan distance Dqi is
expressed as
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Selection of reference Pseudocolouring using Pseudocoloured
with shortest man. dis. histogram interpolation image
n
X
M
Dqi = |f qj f ij | (1)
j=1
where f qj and f ij are the feature vectors of query and
database images respectively and n is the length of feature
vector. The image in database having the smallest Manhattan
distance is identified as the reference image. The reference
image thus selected is used for pseudo-colouring the query
image. Efficiency of the algorithm could be improved by
increasing the level of decomposition of reference images in
database.
B. Pseudo-colouring
The conventional pseudo-colouring technique involves the
conversion of query and reference image into a decorrelated
colour space followed by luminance matching and pixel
colouring. However, it fails to colour those pixels which
have no luminance matching. This problem is solved in
Pseudo-colouring based on Histogram Interpolation which has
additional advantages of reduction in randomness of data
and introduction of smoothness between adjacent data. The
decorrelated colour space used in this technique is YCbCr,
since accuracy gets enhanced compared to l and HSI colour
spaces [5]. Histogram Interpolation based pseudo-colouring
algorithm is briefly discussed in this section.
The reference and query images are first converted to
YCbCr colour space. Then a pixel-by-pixel luminance match-
ing is carried out between query image and reference image.
The matched pixels in gray scale image are replaced by cor-
responding pixels in reference image. In case of no luminance
match, Histogram interpolation algorithm is applied for that
particular pixel. Using interpolation result, unmatched pixel in
gray scale image is coloured using estimated Cb and Cr values.
This procedure is repeated for all pixels and the coloured
image thus obtained is converted back into RGB colour space
for the final output.
The merits of reference image selection using CBIR and
histogram interpolation-based pseudo-colouring approach are
incorporated in the proposed frequency domain technique.
Therefore, this method succeeds in addressing the issues such
as preserving fine details and the edges in query image while
maintaining the luminance values of pixels.

III. R ESULTS AND DISCUSSION
This section provides simulation results of the proposed
technique. A visual quality of images produced by the pro-
posed Frequency Domain Pseudo-colouring (FDPC) technique
is compared with other recently reported pseudo-colouring
techniques such as Transfer Colour to Gray scale (TG), In-
teractive Colour Transfer (ICT) and Mood Transfer to Images
(MTI). The popular subjective quality measure, Mean Opinion
Score (MOS) was used as visual quality measure because
subjective evaluation is superior to quantitative measures such
as Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR), Weighted PSNR
(WPSNR), VSNR (Visual SNR), Visual Information Fidelity
(VIF) etc [11], [12].
Images of different sizes belonging to different categories
were used for the evaluation of the proposed technique.
Simulations were carried out in a Core 2 Duo, 2.00 GHz
Processor-based computer using MATLAB version 7.8. The
proposed algorithm was simulated using the images of size
256 256, 512 512 and 1024 1024 belonging to the class
of medical, natural, human, benchmark and satellite images.
However, some of the selected results are given in this paper.
Fig. 2 and 3 depict the results of proposed technique applied
to human and natural scene images.
(a) Input image (b) Output image
Fig. 2. Proposed method applied to human images
(a) Input image (b) Output image
Fig. 3. Proposed method applied to natural scene images
Fig. 2(b) is the pseudo-coloured image obtained by applying
proposed method on human image given in Fig. 2(a). Fig. 3(b)
is the pseudo-coloured image obtained when applied it on the
natural scene image given in Fig. 3(a).
The results show that the proposed algorithm is very effec-
tive in the selection of appropriate reference image with the
change of query image. Image given in Fig. 2(a) consists of
low information level while it has sharp edge features, where
as the image in Fig. 3(a) consists of fine details and higher
level of information than Fig. 2(a). The experimental results
535
for the proposed technique in Fig. 2(b) and Fig. 3(b) show
that the algorithm produces good results for the images with
low and high information level, while preserving fine details
and edge features. Fig. 2(b) and Fig. 3(b) were rated high
MOS (above 4.5) suggesting that the method is successful in
pseudo-colouring images.
The following experiments were done to assess the perfor-
mance of the proposed technique.
1) The reference image was selected by the user and quality
of the pseudo-coloured image was assessed using MOS.
2) The reference image was selected automatically and
quality of the pseudo-coloured image was assessed using
MOS and compared with that obtained in step 1.
3) Complexity of the proposed algorithm was assessed in
terms of computation time.
4) Distinguishability, aesthetic sense and extend of pixel
colouring were subjectively assessed on a large set of
images (28 different sized images belonging to different
types). Average values of the parameters were plotted.
(a) Input image (b) User selected image (c) Output image
Fig. 4. Pseudo-colouring with User selected Reference Image
(a) Input image (b) Automatically (c) Output image
selected image
Fig. 5. Pseudo-colouring with automatically selected Reference Image
The results shown in Fig. 4(c) and Fig. 5(c) indicate that
by visual inspection, the fine details and edge features of
the query image are better preserved and highlighted in the
pseudo-coloured image obtained with the proposed method
than with user-intervened process.
MOS of images were assessed by 32 undergraduate students
in the age group of 21 years who did not have any colourblind-
ness ailments. Each of them were given 23 slides showing the
pseudo-coloured output image based on different techniques.
MOS of each image was calculated based on the rank given
to the images for distinguishability, aesthetic sense and extend
of pixels coloured.
Table I summarizes different scores obtained for four dif-
ferent methods based on the features compared.
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TABLE I
MOS VALUES OF VARIOUS PARAMETERS IV. C ONCLUSION
A novel automated pseudo-colouring technique has been
Techniques discussed in this paper. This algorithm uses Wavelet Transform
Comparison Features
FDPC TG ICT MTI based CBIR and Histogram Interpolated pseudo-colouring.
The technique ranks much better compared to the user inter-
Distinguishability 3.56 3.03 3.00 3.54 active pseudo-colouring technique, which is a time consuming
process and not ascertains a superior visual quality. The
Aesthetic sense 3.1 2.62 5.00 3.05 proposed method outweighs other automated pseudo-colouring
techniques in terms of preserving unique features, fine details
Extend of pixel colouring 3.23 3.49 4.16 3.15
and edge features of the query image. The experiment results
show that FDPC method produces good results for the images
with different information level and size. Authours are engaged
in research focusing on the development of an automatic
pseudo-colouring technique using advanced two-dimensional
transforms such as Contourlet Transform, relying upon its
Pixel colouring added advantages compared to Wavelet Transform.
MTI
Further research is possible in the following extensions also.
ICT 1) Automated pseudo-colouring based on a reliable objec-
Aesthetic sense tive quantitative measures.
TG
FDPC
2) Techniques proscribing wrongful pseudo-colouring such
as colouring black hair by green or red.
Distinguishability 3) investigation of multispectral fusion techniques in
pseudo-colouring.
0 1 2 3 4 5
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