Ambient Light Compensation Through Adaptive Visual Modeling

Jaclyn Pytlarz

Ambient light can significantly degrade picture quality by reducing visibility of details and contrast. In many cases, it is difficult to control or eliminate ambient light, making it essential to compensate for its effect. This is especially true in the context of media and entertainment, where viewers often consume content in different lighting conditions and environments. Traditional image processing techniques, such as adjusting the backlight, brightness/contrast, or more professionally using a PLUGE signal, do not sufficiently model the human visual system. The result is that detail is lost under changes in ambient light. This is especially problematic for very dark scenes, which have become apparent with cinematic high dynamic range content. This paper proposes a method of ambient light compensation by adaptively modeling the contrast sensitivity functions of the human visual system. By estimating global eye adaptation to both the content and the surround environment, the contrast sensitivity models may be used to maintain perceptual detail and contrast under varying ambient illumination. We build upon existing models of human vision and show how we can use cone sensitivity to maintain global contrast. Since displays have limited dynamic range, we show how this can be adaptive to the content and environment.

Print ISSN
Electronic ISSN
2160-2492
Published
2024-07
Content type
Original Research
Keywords
ambient, light, contrast, perception, media
DOI
10.5594/JMI.2024/QHIF9784