Reducing quantization errors in imaging systems

Abstract

A technique is described to greatly reduce or avoid the quantization errors that occur when mapping a relatively linear RGB color space into a greatly non-linear printer CMY color space of equal precision, avoiding the contouring or banding that occurs when printing color gradients in a non-linear printing system. The technique performs a dither-like process on the original RGB continuous tone data. The RGB values are dithered to create a range of values that, when mapped to the non-linear printer continuous tone CMY values, creates a range of CMY values that, on average, represent the correct average tone of the input RGB values. The generated CMY continuous tone values are then halftoned and printed.

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