ENHANCING CONTRAST OF VIDEO DATA WHILE PRESERVING SHARPNESS

A method of enhancing the contrast of image or video data may include applying a contrast increasing transfer function to a reference image to generate an enhanced image. A transformation may be applied to the reference image to generate reference high frequency components and may also be applied to the enhanced image to generate enhanced high frequency components. For a pixel in the reference image, whether a corresponding enhanced high frequency component has a higher energy than a corresponding reference high frequency component may be determined. The method may also include replacing the pixel in the reference image with a corresponding pixel in the reference image if the corresponding enhanced high frequency component has a higher energy than the corresponding reference high frequency component.