Patent ID: 7106891

Claim:
A method for registering a plurality of image sets, wherein each of the plurality of image sets comprises at least one image, and wherein each of the plurality of image sets contain spatially overlapping areas of an imaged subject with at least one of the remaining plurality of the image sets, the method comprising: selecting a reference image set and an evaluation image set from said plurality of image sets, wherein the evaluation image set is to be aligned with the reference image set; selecting a methodology for comparing of the registration between the reference image set and the evaluation image set; selecting one or more point locations on the evaluation image set for tracking image movement; selecting one or more fixed reference points for comparison with the one or more point locations on the evaluation image set; selecting type of transformation to apply to the evaluation image set for aligning the evaluation image set with the reference image set; a) calculating quality of alignment between the reference image set and the evaluation image set using a selected quality of alignment methodology; b) calculating a location value (C) from one or more points on the evaluation image set with respect to the selected one or more fixed reference points and storing the calculation in a memory; c) calculating a next transformation to apply to the evaluation image; d) applying the transformation to at least a subset of the evaluation image set; e) calculating a convergence value (V) for the current iteration (i), and storing the convergence value to the memory; f) performing steps (a), (b) (c), (d) and (e) until at least a predetermined number N of correspondence calculation iterations have been performed; and g) repeating steps (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e) if a total number of iterations (i) performed ≦N and the convergence value (V)≦(t), wherein (t) is a threshold value that is dynamically determined using a high-pass estimate of (V) to determine a noise level C h (i).