Efficient Determination of an Illuminant of a Scene

A machine readable medium carrying one or more sequences of instructions for causing a system to determine a scene illuminant illuminating a scene of interest, wherein execution of said one or more sequence of instructions by one or more processors contained in said system causes said system to perform the actions of:

• selecting a subset of illuminants from a plurality of potential illuminants;
• receiving a present image frame representing said scene of interest and information representing how each of a set of colors would be manifested under each of said plurality of potential illuminants;
• determining a current illuminant from said subset of illuminants by comparing at least a portion of said present image frame with said information corresponding to said subset of illuminants for a match;
• and
• providing said current illuminant as said scene illuminant.

A device comprising:

• a memory unit designed to store information representing how each of a set of colors would be manifested under each of a plurality of potential illuminants;
• a processor for determining a scene illuminant illuminating a scene of interest, said processor being operable to:
• select a subset of illuminants from a plurality of potential illuminants;
• receive a present image frame representing said scene of interest;
• determine a current illuminant from said subset of illuminants by comparing at least a portion of said present image frame with said information corresponding to said subset of illuminants for a match;
• and
• provide said current illuminant as said scene illuminant.