Patent ID: 6930694

Claim:
A method for processing video pictures for display on a display device having a plurality of luminous elements, one or more of them corresponding to each of the pixels of a picture, wherein the time duration of a video frame or video field is divided into a plurality of sub-fields during which the luminous elements can be activated for light generation in small pulses corresponding to a sub-field code word (SF R , SF G , SF B ) which is used for brightness control, wherein for corresponding pixels of a predetermined number of two or more pixel lines sub-field code words are determined which have identical entries for a number of sub-fields called common sub-fields, comprising the steps of: dividing the picture into pixel blocks, each block including at least one pixel in horizontal direction and a number of pixels corresponding to the predetermined number of two or more pixel lines in vertical direction, before the step of sub-field encoding vertically filtering the picture divided into pixel blocks, wherein the difference of brightness values within each pixel block is limited to a maximum allowed value therein, determining the minimum value of brightness of all pixels within a pixel block, and assigning the sum of the minimum value and the maximum allowed difference value to a pixel of the pixel block, if the difference between the minimum value and the brightness value of the pixel exceeds the maximum allowed difference value.