Adaptive color error diffusion to improve halftone smoothness

Joseph Shou-Pyng Shu; Jack D. Boyce

doi:10.1117/12.271607

4 April 1997 Adaptive color error diffusion to improve halftone smoothness

Joseph Shou-Pyng Shu, Jack D. Boyce

Proceedings Volume 3018, Color Imaging: Device-Independent Color, Color Hard Copy, and Graphic Arts II; (1997) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.271607
Event: Electronic Imaging '97, 1997, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

An adaptive error diffusion technique for color ink jet printing has been developed to improve halftone smoothness and quality. The technique makes the output color dot distribution smoothly spread apart each other. This reduces color interference noises. In addition, it increases frequency at light tones to result better visual quality. Threshold values for different color plans are determined adaptively depending on the color values and their accumulated errors. For a given CMY(K) color input pixel, the CMY(K) values are summed with errors which were diffused from previously-processed neighboring pixels. The summed CMY(K) values suggest the priority of turning 'ON' colors. Threshold values for CMY(K) are, therefore, ranked and assigned by different values. When we change a threshold value in a single color channel, visually it does not change output tones. This characteristic makes the adaptive threshold result same tones but more smooth dot distribution. In addition, the reduction of printer mechanical registration errors is discussed by the presented error diffusion. It achieves overall quality improvement. Experimental results are provided to show the effectiveness of the technique.

Citation Download Citation

Joseph Shou-Pyng Shu and Jack D. Boyce "Adaptive color error diffusion to improve halftone smoothness", Proc. SPIE 3018, Color Imaging: Device-Independent Color, Color Hard Copy, and Graphic Arts II, (4 April 1997); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.271607

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