Fusion of visible and infrared images in HSV color space

Multiple images taken from different imaging devices are required to be combined together to obtain a single fused image that provides an enhanced representation of an observed scene. The images obtained from imaging devices having different modalities usually provide complementary information. For instance, visible and infrared (IR) images provide complementary information of an object or a scene. Visible images provide the outline of an object or a scene whereas infrared images provide information of some special effects such as hidden objects or persons. Further, color image processing is also gaining importance in most of the real-life applications as color images provide better visual information and are highly suitable for human visual perception. Thus, fusion of visible and infrared images in HSV color space is proposed in the paper. Visual evaluations and objective comparisons on different datasets of visible and infrared images show that the proposed algorithm can effectively combine the information contained in input images and therefore can be successfully utilized in surveillance, military and many other real-life applications.