Patent ID: 8249394

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for creating one or more natural looking output images from one or more input images having a plurality of input pixels based on given user constraints, the method comprising: assigning to a value of output pixels in the output images a shift such that the respective value of an output pixel is derived from the value of the input pixel whose location is related to the location of the output pixel by said shift, wherein at least one shift is non-zero; said shift being determined by an optimization process that is adapted to minimize a cost function that includes a data term on the shifts of single pixels and a smoothness term on the shifts of pixel pairs; and computing the output image by applying the optimized shift-map between the input and output pixels; wherein: said data term can include user constraints being of two possible types: (i) shift constraints, which can serve to limit the location in the output images of selected input pixels; and (ii) saliency constraints, which indicate a preference that selected pixels in the input images will appear or will not appear in the output image.