Patent ID: 7342609

Claim:
A method for providing exposure adjustment in an imaging apparatus, comprising: a) capturing an image of a scene; b) partitioning the image into a predetermined number of blocks of image data values; c) determining, for each of the blocks of image data values, a difference between the image data value of the block and the image data value of a neighboring block to produce a plurality of difference values; d) identifying those blocks having a difference value greater than a predetermined threshold value as contour blocks; e) using the contour blocks to identify a subset of the predetermined number of blocks of image data values; f) determining a ratio of the number of blocks of image data values in the subset to the predetermined number of blocks of image data values; g) using the ratio as an input to a predetermined function to provide a weighting coefficient; h) calculating an exposure value using all of the predetermined number of blocks of image data values; i) using the image data values in the subset of the predetermined number of blocks to produce an exposure adjustment value; j) using the weighting coefficient to modify the exposure adjustment value; and k) using the modified exposure adjustment value to adjust the exposure value.