Multi-scale retinex with color restoration image enhancement based on Gaussian filtering and guided filtering

In order to restore image color and enhance contrast of remote sensing image without suffering from color cast and insufficient detail enhancement, a novel improved multi-scale retinex with color restoration (MSRCR) image enhancement algorithm based on Gaussian filtering and guided filtering was proposed in this paper. Firstly, multi-scale Gaussian filtering functions were used to deal with the original image to obtain the rough illumination components. Secondly, accurate illumination components were acquired by using the guided filtering functions. Then, combining with four-direction Sobel edge detector, a self-adaptive weight selection nonlinear image enhancement was carried out. Finally, a series of evaluate metrics such as mean, MSE, PSNR, contrast and information entropy were used to assess the enhancement algorithm. The results showed that the proposed algorithm can suppress effectively noise interference, enhance the image quality and restore image color effectively.