Fingerprint Image Enhancement: Multi-Filter Approaches and Stage Timing Evaluation

The performance of fingerprint recognition and verification systems heavily depends on the quality of the input fingerprint images. This paper introduces a multi-filter image enhancement strategy tailored for enhancing low-quality fingerprint images. The objective is to enhance the visibility and definition of ridge patterns, tackling problems stemming from irregular skin contacts and contaminated sensor surfaces. Author incorporates a new normalization technique that adjusts for finger flexibility, improving the correction of anomalies and boosting overall image quality, especially in detecting fine details. Experimental evidence shows that technique surpasses previous methods in effectiveness.