why we should use gray scale for image processing

Question

I think this can be a stupid question but after read a lot and search a lot about image processing every example I see about image processing uses gray scale to work

I u

Answer 1

I disagree with the implication that gray scale images are always better than color images; it depends on the technique and the overall goal of the processing. For example, if you wanted to count the bananas in an image of a fruit bowl image, then it's much easier to segment when you have a colored image!

Many images have to be in grayscale because of the measuring device used to obtain them. Think of an electron microscope. It's measuring the strength of an electron beam at various space points. An AFM is measuring the amount of resonance vibrations at various points topologically on a sample. In both cases, these tools are returning a singular value- an intensity, so they implicitly are creating a gray-scale image.

For image processing techniques based on brightness, they often can be applied sufficiently to the overall brightness (grayscale); however, there are many many instances where having a colored image is an advantage.