Patent ID: 7639396

Claim:
A circuitry-implemented method comprising image editing, the method comprising: (1) obtaining digital data representing image portions p 1 , p 2 , . . . , wherein for each image portion p (p=p 1 , p 2 , . . . ), the digital data define a brightness B(p) of the portion p; (2) for each image portion p i of a plurality of the image portions p 1 , p 2 , . . . , obtaining a brightness B*(p i ) of a modified image, such that: B *( p i )=ƒ( B ( p i ), B avg ( p i )) wherein: B avg (p i ) is a function of the brightness values B(v) of image portions p in an image region R(p i ) containing a plurality of image portions including the portion p i ; and ƒ is a predefined non-identity function such that for all i, the function ƒ(B(p i ),y) is strictly monotonic my for each B(p i ), and for each B avg (p i ), the function ƒ(x,B avg (p i ) is strictly increasing in x.