The Elastic Surface Transformation.

Abstract : The Elastic Surface Transformation (EST) is a new signal processing and display technique that permits the observer to manipulate and enhance marginal signals. The EST process consists of photographically transferring information from an electron-optical sensor to a uniformly pre-stretched surface. The surface is then allowed to contract in a continuous fashion to produce a uniform spatial compression of the prestretched surface. During contraction the size of elements on the surface remains constant, but the shrinking reduces their spatial dispersion, or increases the density of the elements per unit area. As the element density increases, the signal or image contrast also increases and the edges of the image are enhanced. The compressed imagery is then optically magnified to its original size. The effect on the image patterns are such that marked improvement occurs for the observer--he can see the image that was heretofore invisible. The processing enables him to see information elements and to integrate them into image patterns at various stages of shrinking. (Author)