Patent ID: 8059905

Claim:
A method for thresholding comprising: loading a set of data element values for a digital image from a computer readable storage medium at a computer configured to process images; providing a set of computer code on the computer readable storage medium, the computer code executable to perform a method comprising; selecting a data element having a corresponding data element value in the set of data element values stored on the computer readable medium; applying a feature detector function to a plurality of feature detectors in a neighborhood about the selected data element, wherein applying the feature detector function comprises: determining which feature detector from the plurality of feature detectors in the neighborhood has a lowest measure of difference from the selected data element, wherein each feature detector comprises a different predefined subset of data elements in the neighborhood, wherein the measure of difference is mean absolute deviation; outputting a response value of the feature detector in the neighborhood with the lowest measure of difference from the selected data element as a first response value for the feature detector function for the selected data element; determining a first expected response value for the feature detector function from a first noise profile corresponding to the feature detector function, wherein the first noise profile characterizes expected responses for the feature detector function according to a color tuple of a pixel; and determining an output data value for the selected data element for a thresholding function utilizing the first response value and the first expected response value; and outputting the output data value for the selected data element, wherein the output data value câ€² is generated according to: c â€² = c Â· max f âˆˆ F â¢ { max â¡ ( Î± , r f - Î² â¢ â¢ n f r f + É› ) } .