Laser ultrasonic scanning technique has great potential for damage evaluation in various applications. In order to detect the size and shape of the damage from the wave propagation information, this paper presents an improved imaging method based on the anomalous incident wave (AIW) energy. Compared with the original wavefield, the AIW filters the reflected wave by using wavenumber-frequency domain analysis and eliminates the traveling waves by means of adjacent incident waves subtraction. Taking these advantages of proposed method, the changes in wave energy distribution caused by the damage can be highlighted to show the size and shape of the damage. Finally, a carbon fibre reinforced polymer (CFRP) laminated plate with an impact damage is used to validate the proposed method. From the result, the proposed method improves the resolution of the damage evaluation.