Error Diffusion Techniques with Principal Distance Constraints

초록

In order to generate the gray scale image by the binary state imaging devices such as a digital printer, the gray scale image needs to be converted into the binary image by the halftoning techniques. This paper presents a new error diffusion technique to achieve the homogeneous dot distributions on the binary images. In this paper, ‘the minimum pixel distance’ from the current pixel under binarization to the nearest minor pixel is defined first. Also, the gray levels of the input image are converted into a new variable based on the principal distance for the error diffusion. In the proposed method, the difference in the principal distances is utilized for the error propagation, whereas the gray level difference due to the binarization is diffused to the neighboring pixels in the existing error diffusion techniques. The quantization is accomplished by comparing the updated principal distances with the minimum pixel distance.