Technique for image fusion based on NSST domain INMF

A novel technique for image fusion based on non-subsampled shearlet transform (NSST) domain improved non-negative matrix factorization (INMF) is proposed. Firstly, NSST, which owns much lower computational complexity compared with other conventional typical multi-resolution tools, is adopted to perform the multi-scale and multi-directional decompositions of source images. Secondly, the traditional basic NMF model is updated to be an improved NMF (INMF). INMF is utilized to capture the marked characteristics in a series of sub-band components from the pure mathematical point of view and without destroying the two-dimensional structural information in the image. Thirdly, with INMF and the model of local directional contrast (LDC), the fused sub-images can be achieved. Finally, the final fused image can be obtained by using the inverse NSST. Experimental results demonstrate that the presented technique outperforms other typical NMF-based ones in both visual effect and objective evaluation criteria.