history

Protected image enhancement workflows

id: LK-20260629-protected-image-enhancement-workflows
date: 2026-06-29
sequence: 16
type: feat
compatibility: compatible
component: `labkit_ImageEnhance_app` | `1.2.2 -> 1.3.0`
component: `labkit_ImageMatch_app` | `1.2.1 -> 1.3.0`
scope: historical project evolution

Context

The existing appearance adjustments could change a subject together with its background. Image Enhance and Image Match needed modes that protected subject detail while correcting bright backgrounds and tone.

Decision and rationale

Add subject-preserving enhancement and protected tone matching as explicit methods with their own parameters, descriptions, and tests. Keep these methods inside the image apps because they encode workflow-specific decisions rather than generic image primitives.

Changes

• Image Enhance 1.2.2 -> 1.3.0
• Image Match 1.2.1 -> 1.3.0

• Added Subject-preserving enhance to Image Enhance.
• Added Protected tone to Image Match.
• Added calculation and GUI coverage for both methods.

User and data impact

Users could brighten or normalize a background with less change to the main subject. The new methods were optional; existing histories and other matching methods retained their previous behavior.

Compatibility and migration

Existing enhancement steps and Image Match inputs remained valid. The new protected methods were additional choices and did not rewrite saved source images.

Validation

Commit 1768dd57 added focused Image Enhance and Image Match unit tests and updated both GUI workflow tests.

Evidence

• Main commit 1768dd57.

Known limitations and follow-up

The protected methods reduce unwanted subject changes but cannot infer semantic foreground perfectly. Their result still requires visual review.