Patent ID: 7084879

Claim:
Image editing apparatus, comprising processing means, input means and selection means; wherein a source frame comprising a foreground image against a solid background color is provided to said processing means via said input means, wherein said source frame is composed of a plurality of pixels, each pixel being represented by three components defining a position within a color space; wherein said processing means is configured to: calculate a transformation that maximizes a distance value of a selected pixel in the background, which when applied to any pixel in said source frame defines a transformed pixel, wherein for any pixel said distance value describes how close its color is to a specified color; calculate first, second and third compensating values, wherein said compensating values are functions of amounts that when added to the first, second and third components respectively of the transformed selected background pixel minimize saturation of said transformed selected background pixel but leave luminance unaltered; calculate a flare value for each pixel in said source frame, wherein for each said pixel said flare value is a function of the distance value of the transformed pixel; and for each pixel in said source frame, multiply the first, second and third compensating values by the flare value of said source frame pixel and add multiplication results to the first, second and third components respectively of said source frame pixel to suppress flare of the background color from said foreground image.