Debayering RGBW color filter arrays: A pansharpening approach

The RGBW color filter arrays (CFA) contains R, G, B, and white pixels. It is also known as CFA2.0, which has more luminance information than that of the standard Bayer pattern. A standard demosaicing algorithm was included in the patent associated with CFA2.0. In this paper, we cast the debayering/demosaicing problem for CFA2.0 as a pansharpening problem. The new formulation is very flexible in that it enables us to plug in many pansharpening algorithms for demosaicing. We then compare the standard and the pansharpening approaches. Two benchmark image sets (IMAX and Kodak) were used in our evaluations. It was observed that the standard demosaicing approach worked well for Kodak images, but the pansharpening approaches worked better for the IMAX images. Finally, we also present a comparative study between the standard Bayer pattern and the CFA2.0.