Advanced underwater image restoration: A comparative study of white balance, dehazing, and contrast enhancement techniques

Underwater imaging plays a vital role in marine research, environmental monitoring, and underwater robotics. Scattering light effects underwater image quality negatively by creating colorful distortions that also minimize image contrast. All steps of the integrated framework require complete evaluation among white balance correction and dehazing filtering and testing for both contrast adjustment and sharpening methods. The enhancement techniques received evaluations through PSNR and SSIM tests on standard underwater images to determine their achievement results. White balance adjustment delivers the best color accuracy which produces 54.87 dB PSNR and 0.9991 SSIM ratings. These enhancement methods delivered minimal outcome based on their PSNR values which maintained at 6.5 dB. The enhanced contrast visualization from the modification failed to match the quality delivered by the white balance correction. This research develops innovative findings through the combination of different underwater image enhancement techniques which results in an integrated system that enables color correction functions alongside dehazing sharpening and contrast enhancement. The exact measurement of these approaches depends on the evaluation performed through PSNR and SSIM metrological systems. The presented research successfully demonstrated conventional methods for underwater image enhancement while establishing new possibilities for studies about real-time adaptive methods which enhance robotic underwater exploration. Keywords: Underwater image enhancement, white balance, dehazing, PSNR, SSIM.