Image de-noising method

1. A method of denoising an image represented by a digital signal representation, the method comprising the steps of:

creating at least one approximation image at at least one scale by applying a multi-scale decomposition algorithm to the image wherein all details of the at least one approximation image at a scale representing grey values of pixels of the image have been omitted;

creating translation difference images by pixel-wise subtracting values of the at least one approximation image at a scale s and values of a translated version of the at least one approximation image;

applying a denoising operator to translation difference values of the translation difference images so that the translation difference values are modified as a function of an estimated local signal-to-noise ratio to provide denoised translation difference images;

computing at least one denoised center difference image at a specific scale by combining the denoised translation difference images at scale s or a finer scale; and

computing a denoised image by applying a reconstruction algorithm which reverses the multi-scale decomposition algorithm to the at least one denoised center difference image; wherein

the estimated local signal-to-noise ratio is estimated by comparing a translation difference to a selection of translation differences in a local neighborhood of the translation difference.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the selection of translation differences is defined as the translation differences having an orientation approximately perpendicular to an orientation of a translation difference of interest.

3. The method according to claim 2 , further comprising the step of comparing the translation differences to a weighted average of the selection of translation differences in the local neighborhood.

4. The method according to claim 3 , wherein weights of the weighted average are a function of a pair-wise distance between neighboring pixels and a central pixel and/or pair-wise differences between an orientation of neighboring translation differences and the orientation of the translation difference of interest.

5. The method according to claim 3 , wherein the denoising operator applies a multiplicative correction factor to the translation differences.

6. The method according to claim 4 , wherein the multiplicative correction factor is a function of a ratio of a magnitude of the translation difference and a magnitude of the weighted average of the selection of translation differences in the local neighborhood.

7. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the image is a radiographic image.

8. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising computer executable code adapted to carry out the steps of the method of claim 1 when executed on a computer.