Enhanced visualization methods for computed radiography images

This paper focuses on the application of two image enhancement techniques for the picture archiving and communications systems imaging diagnostic workstation applied to computed radiography (CR) and digital radiography images. The first method is a contrast enhancement technique based on a class of nonlinear intensity transformations described by analytic transfer functions derived from Hurter and Driffield characteristic curves. The second method employs antialiasing techniques preventing the formation of Moiré patterns on subsampled CR images containing antiscatter grid lines, designed to achieve a good balance between artifact suppression and resolution degradation. These techniques are likely to become standard features for all high-end medical imaging workstations in the near future, and thus, we are suggesting that more powerful descriptions of these types of processing should be included in the Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine standard.