Forming, with the aid of an overview image, a composite image from a mosaic of images

A method for generating a composite image, proceeding from a less-detailed overview image of relatively large field of view and from more detailed images of relatively small fields of view, said method comprising the steps of:

• combining the more detailed images to form a mosaiced detailed image in a common spatial reference frame with the overview image;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of the less detailed image and the mosaiced image as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, each pyramid transform including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of each of said pyramid transforms fitting into a specified set of contiguous octave ranges, each pyramid transform also including a remnant baseband containing a specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image, responsive to digitized representations in electrical signal form of portions of the pyramid images of both said overview image and said mosaiced image, including the remnant baseband of said overview image of relatively large field of view and at least one octave of higher-spatial-frequency content from said pyramid transform of the mosaiced image;
• and
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of said composite image as the inverse pyramid transform of its said pyramid transform.

A method for generating a composite image, proceeding from a less-detailed overview image of relatively large field of view and from more detailed images of relatively small fields of view, said method comprising the steps of;

• combining the more detailed images to form a mosaiced detailed image in a common spatial reference frame with the overview image;
• generating digitized representations of the less detailed image and the mosaiced image in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said images as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, each pyramid transform including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of each of said pyramid transforms fitting into a specified set of contiguous octave ranges, each pyramid transform also including a remnant baseband containing a specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image, responsive to digitized representations in electrical signal form of portions of the pyramid images of said overview image and said mosaiced image;
• and
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of said composite image as the inverse pyramid transform of its said pyramid transform, wherein said step of generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image comprises the substeps of:
• normalizing the energy intensities of the remnant baseband of said overview image to accord with the energy intensities of the remnant baseband of said mosaiced image;
• selecting, for inclusion in the pyramid transform of said composite image, the normalized remnant baseband of said pyramid transform of the overview image;
• and
• selecting, for inclusion in the pyramid transform of said composite image, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transform of the mosaiced image.

A method for generating a composite image, proceeding from a less-detailed overview image of relatively large field of view and from more detailed images of relatively small fields of view, said method comprising the steps of;

• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said images as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, each pyramid transform including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of each of said pyramid transforms fitting into a specified set of contiguous octave ranges, each pyramid transform also including a remnant baseband containing a specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• splining the digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said detail images in accordance with the Burt-Adelson procedure, thus to generate the pyramid transform of a mosaic image as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, said pyramid transform of the mosaic image including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content fitting into said specified set of contiguous octave ranges, said pyramid transform of the mosaic image also including a remnant baseband containing said specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image, responsive to digitized representations in electrical signal form of portions of the pyramid images of said said overview image and said mosaic image;
• and
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of said composite image as the inverse pyramid transform of its said pyramid transform--wherein said step of generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image comprises the substeps of:
• normalizing the energy intensities of the octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transform of said overview image to accord with the energy intensities of the corresponding octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transform of said mosaic image;
• normalizing the energy intensities of the remnant baseband of said overview image to accord with the energy intensities of the remnant baseband of said mosaic image;
• selecting, for inclusion in the pyramid transform of said composite image, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transform of the mosaic image for which there are no corresponding octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transform of the overview image;
• selecting, for inclusion in the pyramid transform of said composite image, weighted portions of each pair of corresponding octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of said pyramid transforms of the mosaic image and the overview image;
• and
• selecting, for inclusion in the pyramid transform of said composite image, the remnant baseband of said pyramid transform of the overview image.

A method for generating a composite image, proceeding from a less-detailed overview image of relatively large field of view and from more detailed images of relatively small fields of view, said method comprising the steps of;

• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said images as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, each pyramid transform including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content, the descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content of each of said pyramid transforms fitting into a specified set of contiguous octave ranges, each pyramid transform also including a remnant baseband containing a specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• splining the digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said detail images in accordance with the Burt-Adelson procedure, thus to generate the pyramid transform of a mosaic image as regularly sampled in two orthogonal dimensions and referred to a common spatial frame of reference, said pyramid transform of the mosaic image including a number of levels respectively constituting descending octaves of higher-spatial-frequency content fitting into said specified set of contiguous octave ranges, said pyramid transform of the mosaic image also including a remnant baseband containing said specified range of lower-spatial-frequency content;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image, responsive to digitized representations in electrical signal form of portions of the pyramid images of said said overview image and said mosaic image;
• and
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of said composite image as the inverse pyramid transform of its said pyramid transform, which said step of generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of each of said images includes the substep of:
• equalizing the the energy intensities of said detailed images in their regions of overlap.

A method for generating a composite terrain map, proceeding from an overview image created by a camera at relatively high altitude and from images derived from overlapping photographs taken at relatively low altitudes above a terrain, which composite terrain map is relatively free of step irradiance variations where the images derived from overlapping photographs taken at relatively low altitudes are splined to form the composite terrain map, said method comprising the steps of:

• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of images of said overview and each of said photographs, referred to a common spatial frame of reference;
• pyramid filtering the digitized representations in electrical signal form of each image, to generate, as the pyramid transform of that said image, a respective set of digitized representations in electrical signal form of two-dimensional band-pass filter responses descriptive of descending octaves of spatial frequencies and a respective two-dimensional low-pass filter response comprising spatial frequencies below a prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies, each of which sets has a number N of its respective band-pass filter responses within said prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies. N being an integer at least one, each of which sets that is the pyramid transform of an image of one of said photographs taken at relatively low altitudes including at least one respective band-pass filter response comprising spatial frequencies above said prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies;
• splining in accordance with the Burt-Adelson procedure the digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transforms of said images of said photographs taken at relatively low altitudes, thus to generate, as the pyramid transform of a mosaic image, a respective set of digitized representations in electrical signal form of two-dimensional band-pass filter responses descriptive of descending octaves of spatial frequencies and a respective two-dimensional low-pass filter response comprising spatial frequencies below said prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies, which set has N of its respective band-pass filter responses within said prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies, at least one other of the respective band-pass filter responses of that set comprising spatial frequencies above said prescribed band of middle spatial frequencies;
• generating digitized representations in electrical signal form of the pyramid transform of said composite image, responsive to digitized representations in electrical signal form of portions of the pyramid images of said said overview image and said mosaic image, which pyramid transform of said composite image corresponds to said composite terrain map as expressed inthe form of a pyramid transform.