Extending depth of field by intrinsic mode image fusion

Here, a versatile data-driven application independent method to extend the depth of field is presented. The principal contribution in this effort is the use of features extracted by empirical mode decomposition, namely Intrinsic Mode Images, for fusion. The input images are decomposed into intrinsic mode images and fusion is performed on the extracted oscillatory modes, by means of weighing schemes that allow emphasis of focused regions in each input image. The fused image unifies information from all focal planes, while maintaining the verisimilitude of the scene. In order to validate the fusion performance of our method, we have compared our results with those of region-based and multiscale decomposition based fusion techniques. Several illustrative examples and objective comparisons are provided.