Color fusion method for low-light-level and infrared images in night vision

The fusion of low-light-level image and infrared image can increase the reliability of interpretation since it combines the complementary information in multispectral images, and that a color fused image can improve human observer performance and reaction times. To obtain a color night vision image by dual band sensors (visible and infrared), we first adopt the false color fusion scheme by principles of biological opponent-color vision, then transfer the first order statistics of a natural color image (target image) to the false color fused image in a perceptually decorrelated YCbCr color space. In order to give prominence to targets and details in the result, we produce a grayscale fused image using principal component analysis of the visible and infrared images, and substitute it for the Y component during the color transfer procedure. Finally, we illustrated an example of the whole fusing process. The realistic, colorful and natural fused image demonstrates validity of the method.