Enhancing Underwater Color Images of Diving Mask Mounted Digital Camera via Non-local Means Denoising

This paper proposes a novel framework for enhancing underwater images captured by digital camera embedded into underwater diving mask. Our approach adjusts the color balance using biasness and average of luminance. Then, scene visibility is enhanced based on underwater image model. Magnified noise in enhanced images is alleviated by Non-local means (NLM) denoising. The final enhanced images are characterized by improved visibility while retaining color fidelity and reduced noise. Our method does not require specialized hardware or prior knowledge about the underwater environment.