Rapid hybrid interpolation for color filter array CCD

Interpolation is a basic operation in image processing and is routinely used in image enlargement and reduction. For instance, it is required in single chip CCDs that are widely used in digital cameras and camcorder. Numerous interpolation algorithms have been proposed, which differs in performance and processing time. A problem with conventional interpolation algorithms is that as the complexity increases, the performance does not improve accordingly. In other words, in order to obtain marginal improvement, the number of operations increases significantly. In order to address this problem, in the proposed algorithm, we first apply a simple test to predict which interpolation is most appropriate for a given pixel in terms of complexity and performance. As a result, it is possible to obtain high quality images without significantly increasing the processing time.