Performance

enhancement and analysis adaptive median filter

Yanming Zhao, Dongmei Li, and Zhaohui Li
following notation is used: Zmn = minimum pixel value in S Zmax = maximum pixel value in
Zmed = median pixel value in

of

an

Abstract-The classical adaptive median filter is designed to remove the positive and negative impulse noise when the probability of impulse noise is high. But simulation shows the filtered images remain the positive impulse noise in the black background and the negative impulse noise in the white background. In this paper, the classical adaptive median filter is modified and its performance is improved. Simulation results show the new scheme provides the better filtering performance.
Index Terms-median filter, impulse noise, image restoration
I. INTRODUCTION

SXY
(x, y)

SXY

xy= pixel value at coordinates

Smax = maximum allowed size of SXY

The adaptive median filter works in two levels, denoted Level A and Level B, as follows: Level A: If z. < zmed < z max min Go to level B Else increase the window size If window size <= Smax repeat level A Else output ZXY Level B: If zmin <Zxy <Z max
I

IN image processing, images are often corrupted by the positive and negative impulse noise due to decoding error or noisy channel. So it is an important task to filter the corrupted images. The median filter can remove the impulse noise efficiently [1]. But it is difficult to remove the impulse noise and preserve image sharpness concurrently when the probability of impulse noise becomes high. To overcome this situation, adaptive median filter is proposed [2-5]. The classical adaptive median filter [2] can efficiently remove the positive and negative impulse noise even though the probability of impulse noise is high. But this filter has some deficiencies: the filtered images remain the positive impulse noise in the black background and the negative impulse noise in the white background. To solve the above questions, the classical adaptive median filter is modified and its performance is improved. Experimental results show the modified scheme provides the better filtering performance.
II. THE CLASSICAL ADAPTIVE MEDIAN FILTER

(1)

output

zXY

Else
output Zm ed -

The basic difference between the adaptive median filter [2] and standard median filter is that, in adaptive median filter, the window size is variable. The algorithm is described as follows: Adaptive median filter works on a rectangular region SXY . It

changes the size of Sxy during the filtering operation depending on certain conditions as listed below. The output of the filter is a single value which replaces the current pixel value at (x, y), the point on which S is centered at the time. The
Y. Zhao, D. Li, and Z. Li are with the Information Engineering School, Communication University of China, P. R. China (phone:+86-10-65779091; fax: +86-10-65779368; e-mail: yanmingzhao(cuc.edu.cn, 1dm(cuc.edu.cn,

is large compared with the strength of the image signal, negative impulse generally is digitized as the minimum values and positive impulses generally is digitized as the maximum values. If Zmin < Zmed < Zmax Zmed is not an impulse noise. In this case, we go to Level B. The basic idea of Level B is as follows: Z is evaluated to verify whether it is an impulse or
not. If it is an impulse, it will be replaced by Zmed. Otherwise,

Now we analyze the adaptive median filter. Impulse noise can be negative or positive. Because impulse corruption usually

lizhh(cuc.edu.cn).

is retained in the filtered image. Thus, unless the pixel being considered is an impulse, the pixel value in the filtered image is the same as that ofthe input image. This can avoid unnecessary loss of detail. Adaptive median filter solves the dual purpose of removing the impulse noise from the image and reducing distortion in the

Zxy is

not an impulse.

zxy

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image. It can handle an image corrupted with impulse noise of probability greater than 0.2. And give a much better output image than standard median filter.
III.

filter is quite significant. The similar conclusion for the fingerprint picture.

can

be drawn

The PSNR results are shown in Table 1.

THE IMPROVED ADAPTIVE MEDIAN FILTER

A. The modified adaptive median filter There are some deficiencies in the above algorithm. It is is always known that the condition Zminl <Zmed Z

satisfied. When Zmin < Zmed < Zmax

when

go

to level B. Otherwise,
<Zmed Zmax
or

ZminM
Zmed
.

Zmed <

max

Zmin

Zmin

Zmax. it is kept in level A and the window size is

Smax

increased When

is reached, the algorithm outputs the

value of zxy Negative impulse appears as black point (pepper noise) in an image and positive impulse appears as white point (salt noise). When the black image in a window is corrupted by impulse noises, there are black and white pixels. For an 8-bit image, it means the pixel values are 0 or 255. But most of the pixel values are 0. So Zmin = Zmed = 0 Zmax = 255. Even the window size is increased to maximum,
Zmin = Zmed m'n med

Fig. 1. Comparison of the different methods. (a) Noisy image; (b) Standard median filter; (c) Adaptive median filter; (d) Modified adaptive median filter.
TABLE I PSNR (DB) RESULTS FOR SEVERAL METHODS I I the impulse noise probabilities 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 circuit board

max

= 255.

In

this

case,

the

output

value

should be 0. But, according to the algorithm, the output value is equal to X. ZXY may be any value between 0 and 255. So the salt noise can not be filtered in the black background of corrupted image. For the same reason, the pepper noise can not be removed in the white background. If the output value is changed from Zxy to Zmed in the
z

filter adaptive median

fi

22.4 26.8
lte
r__

22.2 25.3
30.8
I__

22.0 23.6
28.8

21.6 22.7

modified adaptive median

filter

32.8

27.7
18.1

expression (1), the above questions can be solved. For the black image, Zmin = Z<med< Zmax output is Z - Zmin 0. For ,min m Zmed mi
the white

fingerprint
18.5

standard median
fi

19.3
lte
r__

18.9

adaptive median
fi

24.8
lte
r__

23.7
24.2

22.6
23.0

21.8

image,
255

zmi

<Zme

Zm

,output

is

Zmed

Zmax

For

the

general
olvlB to level B.

image,

adaptive median
fi te l

modified

25.1

22.2

min med Zmin < Zmed

<Z max

the algorithm goes ~teagrtmge

B. Simulation results To validate the modified algorithm, simulations are performed on an X-ray image of a circuit board used in [2] and a fingerprint picture. Figure 1(a) is the corrupted circuit board image with the impulse noise probabilities of 0.25. Here the noise level is high enough to obscure most of the detail in the image. The image is filtered firstly using standard median filter. The result is shown in figure 1 (b). Although noise is effectively removed, the filter causes significant loss of detail in the image. Figure l(c) shows the result of using adaptive median filter. Noise is mostly removed and image details are preserved. However, pepper noise still can be observed in the black region of the image, such as the connectors at the left-top ofthe image. Figure l(d) shows the result of the modified adaptive median filter. Pepper noise in the black region of the image is removed efficiently. Improvement over the classical adaptive median

IV. CONCLUSION The classical adaptive median filter has some deficiencies: the filtered images remain the positive impulse noise in the black background and the negative impulse noise in the white background. To solve the above questions, a modified scheme is proposed. Experiment results shows the proposed scheme can improve the filtering performance significantly.
REFERENCES

[1]
[2] [3]

P. Gouchol, J. C. Liu, and A. S. Nair, Selective removal of impulse noise based on homogeneity level information, IEEE Trans. Image Processing, 12, 85 (2003). R.C. Gonzalez and R.E. Woods, Digital Image Processing-Second Edition (Beijing, Publishing House of Electronics Industry, 2003). H. Hwang, and R. A. Haddad, Adaptive median filters: new algorithms and results, IEEE Trans. Image Processing, 4, 499 (1995).

Authorized licensed use limited to: PSG College of Technology. Downloaded on January 3, 2010 at 00:05 from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.

H. L. Eng and K. K. Ma, Noise adaptive soft-switching median filter, IEEE Trans. Image Processing, 10, 242 (2001). [5] E. Abreu, M. Lightstone, S. K. Mitra, and K. Arakawa, A new efficient approach for the removal of impulse noise from highly corrupted images, IEEE Trans. Image Processing, 5, 1012 (1996). Yanming Zhao received the PH.D. degree from School of Telecommunication Engineering in Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications in 2005. She is now an assistant professor in the Information Engineering School, Communication University of China, P. R. China. Her main research interests are image processing and video coding. [4]

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