Performance evaluation and design of an algorithm to augment security in visual cryptography

Abstract

newlineThe main research work carried out in visual cryptography technique is to improve the quality of image. The performance of the visual cryptography is influenced by the quality of an image. So, for improving the quality of an image Error Diffusion Technique is used, which mainly removes noise and improve the error ratio using the randomize quantization error mechanism. There are several error diffusion techniques available to perform halftoning on images. The research work focuses on image enhancement phase by utilizing the halftoning method and enhances the error diffusion technique for improving the quality of the reconstructed image. The performance is also compared with various error diffusion techniques such as Floyed-Steinberg algorithm, Jarvis algorithm and Stucki algorithm. The result of the proposed algorithm is measured by performing the parameter tuning procedure for quality analysis. The tuned parameters identified in this work as image quality metrics are PSNR, MSE, SNR, WSNR and UQI. The proposed algorithm gives better-optimized results in terms of quality and execution time than other algorithms like Floyed-Steinberg, Jarvis and Stucki. newlineThe experiment conducted on the images such as Lena, Peppers, Barbar, Boat, Tree and Clock. In this work, Floyed-Steinberg algorithm of error diffusion technique has been enhanced to improve the quality of image with respect to noise, visual appearance and execution time in MATLAB environment. newlineThe proposed research work focuses on image reconstruction for security expansion. The different error diffusion techniques are compared with different parameters for identifying the scope of expansion in the existing algorithm. So by comparing Floyed-Steinberg, Jarvis and Stucki algorithms, this model identifies the image quality metrics such as PSNR, MSE, SNR, WSNR, UQI and increases the parameter value by modifying the existing algorithm. newlineWith the proposed algorithm, all the well-known algorithm like Floyed-Steinberg, Jarvis, Stucki algorithms are compared based on various