A computer-implemented image processing method comprising the steps of: receiving an X-ray image; multi-scale decomposing said image into spatial frequency component images comprising at least one low pass component image and at least one further spatial frequency component image; normalizing the at least one further spatial frequency component image relative to expected noise based on a noise model to obtain at least one normalized spatial frequency component image, wherein noise is modelled in said noise model as a function of X-ray dose; combining said at least one low pass component image and the at least one normalized spatial frequency component image into a reconstructed version of the received image; outputting said reconstructed version of the received image, wherein the combining step comprises modifying or preserving image pixels of the at least one normalized spatial frequency component image in dependence on a strength of the respective image pixels, wherein the modifying includes damping or amplifying, with damping said pixels when the strength of the respective image pixel is inside a pre-defined interval and with preserving or amplifying said image pixels when the strength of the respective image pixel is outside the pre-defined interval, wherein the modifying of the image pixels is achieved by applying a function ( f NR) to said image pixels, said function being defined on a range of image pixel strengths, wherein said function ( f NR) is monotonically increasing over said range of image pixel strengths, wherein the function ( f NR) is as per: f NR y = y a max − a min tanh γ 2 a max − a min y 2 y 0 2 − 1 + t 0 1 + t 0 + a min wherein: y represents an image pixel strength; a min, a max are constants with a max ≥ 1, 0 < a min < 1; γ is a constant; t 0 = tanh γ 2 a max − a min; and y 0 represents a location of an inflection point of the function ( f NR); wherein a min represents a slope of the function ( f NR) that relates to a virtual X-ray dose increase. receiving an X-ray image; multi-scale decomposing said image into spatial frequency component images comprising at least one low pass component image and at least one further spatial frequency component image; normalizing the at least one further spatial frequency component image relative to expected noise based on a noise model to obtain at least one normalized spatial frequency component image, wherein noise is modelled in said noise model as a function of X-ray dose; combining said at least one low pass component image and the at least one normalized spatial frequency component image into a reconstructed version of the received image; outputting said reconstructed version of the received image, wherein the combining step comprises modifying or preserving image pixels of the at least one normalized spatial frequency component image in dependence on a strength of the respective image pixels, wherein the modifying includes damping or amplifying, with damping said pixels when the strength of the respective image pixel is inside a pre-defined interval and with preserving or amplifying said image pixels when the strength of the respective image pixel is outside the pre-defined interval, wherein the modifying of the image pixels is achieved by applying a function ( f NR) to said image pixels, said function being defined on a range of image pixel strengths, wherein said function ( f NR) is monotonically increasing over said range of image pixel strengths, wherein the function ( f NR) is as per: f NR y = y a max − a min tanh γ 2 a max − a min y 2 y 0 2 − 1 + t 0 1 + t 0 + a min wherein: y represents an image pixel strength; a min, a max are constants with a max ≥ 1, 0 < a min < 1; γ is a constant; t 0 = tanh γ 2 a max − a min; and y 0 represents a location of an inflection point of the function ( f NR); wherein a min represents a slope of the function ( f NR) that relates to a virtual X-ray dose increase. y represents an image pixel strength; a min, a max are constants with a max ≥ 1, 0 < a min < 1; γ is a constant; t 0 = tanh γ 2 a max − a min; and y 0 represents a location of an inflection point of the function ( f NR); wherein a min represents a slope of the function ( f NR) that relates to a virtual X-ray dose increase.