A method of providing a contrast-enhanced image of a contoured surface of an undercarriage of a motor vehicle with at least one image capturing device and at least one illumination device including an illumination matrix having a plurality of illumination elements (L11-L18, L21-L28) arranged in illumination rows (L1, L2), the method comprising the steps of: a) moving the motor vehicle with respect to the image capturing device and the illumination device; b) illuminating the surface with the illumination device such that the surface is illuminated from different illumination directions in accordance with the motor vehicle movement, by sequentially activating individual illumination rows (L1, L2) of the illumination matrix; c) recording multiple overlapping images (B i) of the surface using different light exposure and/or illumination while the motor vehicle is moved over the image capturing device; d) automatically generating partial images (T i) of the overlapping areas of the recorded images (B i), wherein at least two partial images (T i) comprising the same region of the surface are generated from recorded images (B i) which have been recorded with different light exposure and/or illumination; e) automatically generating, for each region, a contrast-enhanced image (E i) from the partial images (T i) of the respective region; and f) automatically assembling the generated contrast-enhanced images (E i) to form a contrast-enhanced total image of the surface, wherein, in step (d) a contrast-enhanced image (E i) for a region is generated by either automatically generating from at least two partial images (T i) each of the same region, which have been recorded with different light exposure and/or illumination, at least one synthetic intermediate image, automatically identifying partial objects having optimum contrast in the partial images (T i) and in the synthetic intermediate images (Z i), and taking the same over into the contrast-enhanced image (E i), or by automatically generating at least one synthetic intermediate image (Y 11, Y 12, Y 2i) from at least two partial images (T 1, T 2) each of the same region, which have been recorded with different light exposure/ illumination, employing variance-based contrast adaptation, and automatically generating the contrast enhanced image (E i) from adjacent synthetic intermediate images (Y 11, Y 12, Y 2i) by employing variance-based contrast adaptation. a) moving the motor vehicle with respect to the image capturing device and the illumination device; b) illuminating the surface with the illumination device such that the surface is illuminated from different illumination directions in accordance with the motor vehicle movement, by sequentially activating individual illumination rows (L1, L2) of the illumination matrix; c) recording multiple overlapping images (B i) of the surface using different light exposure and/or illumination while the motor vehicle is moved over the image capturing device; d) automatically generating partial images (T i) of the overlapping areas of the recorded images (B i), wherein at least two partial images (T i) comprising the same region of the surface are generated from recorded images (B i) which have been recorded with different light exposure and/or illumination; e) automatically generating, for each region, a contrast-enhanced image (E i) from the partial images (T i) of the respective region; and f) automatically assembling the generated contrast-enhanced images (E i) to form a contrast-enhanced total image of the surface, wherein, in step (d) a contrast-enhanced image (E i) for a region is generated by either automatically generating from at least two partial images (T i) each of the same region, which have been recorded with different light exposure and/or illumination, at least one synthetic intermediate image, automatically identifying partial objects having optimum contrast in the partial images (T i) and in the synthetic intermediate images (Z i), and taking the same over into the contrast-enhanced image (E i), or by automatically generating at least one synthetic intermediate image (Y 11, Y 12, Y 2i) from at least two partial images (T 1, T 2) each of the same region, which have been recorded with different light exposure/ illumination, employing variance-based contrast adaptation, and automatically generating the contrast enhanced image (E i) from adjacent synthetic intermediate images (Y 11, Y 12, Y 2i) by employing variance-based contrast adaptation.