Abstract
Degradation in underwater imaging is as a result of absorption and scattering of light. Propagated
visible light rays through the water column are absorbed at rates that vary depending on the
wavelength of light. Large suspended particles also scatter the propagated light rays, as can be
observed in an underwater environment. Furthermore, color is distorted due to the inverse ratio
of attenuation that is proportional to the wavelength of light through a unit of length through the
water column. These phenomena distort underwater images by making them appear dark and have
low contrast. Conventional underwater image restoration techniques are largely based on the
image formation model (IMF) which restores the image based on estimates from the degraded
images. The results are solutions that are limited to specific underwater conditions. In this paper,
we propose a novel restoration strategy by considering the optical properties in the underwater
environment at the time of image capture, a robust restoration technique can be applied to images
captured in different underwater conditions. In so doing, we design a turbidity meter that capture
wavelength-dependent absorption data which are applied as parameters to restore the distorted
images based on the RGB channels. To validate our proposed technique, we conduct experiments
in a controlled underwater environment while varying the concentration of suspended particles
based on degree of kaolin mixture.