The Kelly three-stage model of photographic information recording is a mathematical model of black-and-white silverhalide film with granularity neglected. In the work reported here, the theory is extended for use in phase-holographic applications. Granularity effects are contained in the fourth and final stage, a two-dimensional, nonhomogeneous, filtered Poisson process. The output of this stage is a sample function of the random process that describes the pattern of modification of the emulsion. Formulas for the signal-to-noise ratio of a hologram and the optimum granular behavior are derived as examples of the use of the granularity model. exposure Developed pattern Optical f---Sensitometry ----Chemical image diffusion diffusion Figure 1 The structure of Kelly's model of photographic information recording, showing the decomposition of the over-all operation into three spatially and temporally separated stages.a fourth stage is added following the chemical-diffusion stage to account for granularity and bleaching or etching of the emulsion.The design of the granularity stage is based on both conceptual and experimental considerations. Conceptually, it is reasonable to expect the effects of individual bleachedsilver grains to appear in a mathematical model as carriers as well as corrupters of information. (No grains, no hologram.) The similar dual role played by the electrons in a phototube suggests that the mathematical model of granularity effects should be closely related to the theory of shot noise in vacuum tubes. 3• 4 Those additional random fluctuations of amplitude transmission and phase shift in the hologram that are independent of granularity effects can be accounted for as additive or multiplicative noise.Admittedly, in a phototube all of the electrons are identical, whereas in a hologram all of the grains are different. The clouds of bleached or etched emulsion surrounding the bleached-out grains are also all different.
IntroductionA decade ago D. H. Kellyl formulated a mathematical model of photographic information recording in terms of a sequence of three operations or stages connected in tandem, the output of one being the input of the next. To ensure that each operation was a separate entity, free of interaction with the other two, he separated the operations in space and time. That is, he noted that first the radiant-flux pattern incident on an emulsion sifts its way through the turbid emulsion and perhaps even bounces off the back of the film before it strikes the silver-halide crystals in the emulsion. It is only when the incident photons strike the crystals that they create latent-image centers on and in the crystals. And it is much later that the activated crystals, and perhaps their near neighbors, are developed into silver grains at a rate which depends on the local concentration of developer at the crystals. Thus, Kelly was led to describe the photographic process in terms of 1) an optical-diffusion stage functioning in the emulsion and its backing during exposure, 2) a sensitometry stage f...