a method and apparatus for adjusting the contrast of an input image is disclosed . brightness level data of the input image is filtered to obtain at least a low frequency component and a high frequency component . the high frequency component is amplified . the input image and the amplified high frequency component are summed to produce brightness level data of the output image . the filtering is carried out by at least one recursive infinite impulse response filter having a single delay coefficient that is adaptive to areas of high contrast in the input image .