Spurred by technological improvements, displays (as well as printers)
are increasingly available in a wide range of resolutions. Increased
resolution improves perceptual quality in at least two different ways:
reducing the perceived contrast of undesirable artifacts (such as
halftoning or dithering textures), and increasing the perceived
contrast of desirable image features (particularly when rendering text
and high precision graphics). Much of the past literature addresses
questions of how to optimize one or both of these for a given
resolution, but there is little guidance on tradeoffs when the
resolution itself is variable.
In this paper, we present an analytic framework for quantifying how
the perceived visual contrast of textures changes with resolution, and
a simple, tractable model that accurately predicts visual contrast of
grayscale-rendered text at different resolutions. These contrast
metrics provide a solid basis for evaluating the effectiveness of
grid-fitting and similar techniques for perceptually tuned grayscale
font rendering, and can also be a useful tool for evaluating
engineering tradeoffs such as choosing an optimum resolution relative
to cost, speed, or bandwidth constraints.
Even Toned Screening has evolved from a research project into a practical module for halftoning on color inkjet printers, with many commercial and free software users worldwide. Feedback from these users has motivated tuning and other modifications to make the algorithm more practical. This paper discusses both the core algorithms and the practical issues involved in driving real printers for real users. The specific issues include: Nonsquare aspect ratios, Interaction between dither microstructure and weaving patterns, multilevel dot generation, processing speed, and interactions between microstructures in overlapping planes.
This paper presents a system for reducing moire artifacts in halftoned images. Moire artifacts arise when the source image contains periodic texture with a frequency close to that of the halftone screen. In addition, moire-like artifacts occur with aperiodic texture in the frequency range of the halftone screen, as well as fine lines. The system is effective in suppressing each of these classes of artifact. The system first generates a trial halftone using a standard halftone screen. It then analyzes the moire present in this trial halftone, generating a correction signal, which is then added to the source image to form a compensated image. This compensated image is then halftoned using a second halftone screen to produce the final resulting halftone. Several refinements are discussed which reduce potential artifacts caused by the system.
A highly sensitive register mark is formed by the moire pattern resulting from the overprinting of two screened patches. The two screened patches have slightly different screen frequencies so that when the two planes are in exact register a bright spot appears in the center of the register mark. When the two planes are misregistered, the bright spot is displaced by a gain factor times the misregister, where the gain factor is approximately equal to the size of the patch times the screen frequency (typically 10 to 20). The register mark indicates both the direction and degree of misregister. If the screen frequency were uniform throughout the patch, the mark could falsely indicate register when in fact the misregister was a multiple of exactly one dot. We warp the frequency of the screen pattern, with the center of the patch having a finer screen than the perimeter. A misregister of one dot or more does not produce a symmetrical bright spot in the center of the mark. Thus, the mark provides a positive indication of exact register. The range of sensitivity is nominally plus or minus half of a screen dot in both X and Y directions. It may, however, be extended by recognition of the frequency warped patterns resulting from larger misregistrations.
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