ELECTRO-OPTICS  LABORATORY

Coded aperture imaging (CAI) methods offer multidimensional and multispectral imaging capabilities with minimal resources than what is needed in a lens-based direct imager. In the CAI method, the light diffracted from an object is modulated by a coded mask, and the resulting intensity distribution is recorded. Most of the CAI techniques involve two steps: the recording of the point spread function (PSF) and object intensity under identical conditions and with the same coded mask. The image of the object is reconstructed by computationally processing the PSF and object intensity. The above recording and reconstruction procedure precludes the introduction of special beam characteristics in imaging, such as a direct imager. In this study, a postprocessing approach is developed, where synthetic PSFs capable of introducing special beam characteristics when processed with the object intensity are generated using an iterative algorithm. The method is applied to generate edge-enhanced images in both CAI as well as Fresnel incoherent correlation holography methods.