几何不变性及其在3D物体识别中的应用

三维物体识别是计算机视觉研究的重要内容之一，它要求从3D物体的2D图象中识别和定位物体．由于物体成像时会受到观察视角、摄像机参数的影响，因此使得同一物体在不同观察视角、不同摄像机参数等条件下所得到的图象存在差异．但由于几何不变性方法可以有效地消除这种差异带给3D物体识别的不利影响，所以，近20年来这种方法受到了广泛的关注和研究．为使人们了解该领域的研究现状，以对该领域的研究有所启发，首先讨论了基于几何不变性的3D物体识别方法的研究内容，包括研究的几何框架和其不变性以及几何不变性在3D物体识别中的主要应用；其次，总结性地评述了该领域的研究现状；最后，提出了研究的发展方向．     

When is it Possible to Identify 3D Objects From Single Images Using Class Constraints?

One approach to recognizing objects seen from arbitrary viewpoint is by extracting invariant properties of the objects from single images. Such properties are found in images of 3D objects only when the objects are constrained to belong to certain classes (e.g., bilaterally symmetric objects). Existing studies that follow this approach propose how to compute invariant representations for a handful of classes of objects. A fundamental question regarding the invariance approach is whether it can be applied to a wide range of classes. To answer this question it is essential to study the set of classes for which invariance exists. This paper introduces a new method for determining the existence of invariant functions for classes of objects together with the set of images from which these invariants can be computed. We develop algebraic tests that determine whether the objects in a given class can be identified from single images. These tests apply to classes of objects undergoing affine projection. In addition, these tests allow us to determine the set of views of the objects which are degenerate. We apply these tests to several classes of objects and determine which of them is identifiable and which of their views are degenerate.     

形状的全尺度可视化表示与识别

目的视觉目标的形状特征表示和识别是图像领域中的重要问题。在实际应用中,视角、形变、遮挡和噪声等干扰因素造成识别精度较低,且大数据场景需要算法具有较高的学习效率。针对这些问题,本文提出一种全尺度可视化形状表示方法。方法在尺度空间的所有尺度上对形状轮廓提取形状的不变量特征,获得形状的全尺度特征。将获得的全部特征紧凑地表示为单幅彩色图像,得到形状特征的可视化表示。将表示形状特征的彩色图像输入双路卷积网络模型,完成形状分类和检索任务。结果通过对原始形状加入旋转、遮挡和噪声等不同干扰的定性实验,验证了本文方法具有旋转和缩放不变性,以及对铰接变换、遮挡和噪声等干扰的鲁棒性。在通用数据集上进行形状分类和形状检索的定量实验,所得准确率在不同数据集上均超过对比算法。在MPEG-7数据集上精度达到99.57%,对比算法的最好结果为98.84%。在铰接和射影变换数据集上皆达到100%的识别精度,而对比算法的最好结果分别为89.75%和95%。结论本文提出的全尺度可视化形状表示方法,通过一幅彩色图像紧凑地表达了全部形状信息。通过卷积模型既学习了轮廓点间的形状特征关系,又学习了不同尺度间的形状特征关系。本文方法...     

多相机环境下基于颜色不变量和熵图的目标识别

不同相机环境下的光照条件差异是影响目标识别的一个重要因素.依据光照模型推导出与环境光照无关的颜色不变量,并将其作为目标识别的特征,利用熵图估计出的特征向量的HP相似度作为相似性评价标准进行目标识别.实验结果表明,该方法对于不同相机间环境光照条件的变化具有很好的抵抗能力,目标识别率较高.     

Distinctive Image Features from Scale-Invariant Keypoints

This paper presents a method for extracting distinctive invariant features from images that can be used to perform reliable matching between different views of an object or scene. The features are invariant to image scale and rotation, and are shown to provide robust matching across a substantial range of affine distortion, change in 3D viewpoint, addition of noise, and change in illumination. The features are highly distinctive, in the sense that a single feature can be correctly matched with high probability against a large database of features from many images. This paper also describes an approach to using these features for object recognition. The recognition proceeds by matching individual features to a database of features from known objects using a fast nearest-neighbor algorithm, followed by a Hough transform to identify clusters belonging to a single object, and finally performing verification through least-squares solution for consistent pose parameters. This approach to recognition can robustly identify objects among clutter and occlusion while achieving near real-time performance.     

基于形态及受约束结构的三维物体建模方法

文中提出一种基于物体形态及受约束结构的三维物体建模方法,该方法利用具有透视不变性的三维结构来表达物体的各个形态。利用该表达方法可以使机器视觉系统在用单幅灰度图像识别物体时,在模型索引阶段避开求解物体位姿、摄像机参数、特征对应等复杂问题,从而实现先索引后匹配的识别策略,提高识别物体的实时性。文中首先论述了透视不变性和具有透视不变性的受约束结构的基本概念;其次,给出了用受约束结构进行三维物体建模的一般方法和应用实例;最后,指出了这种方法的不足和进一步的研究方向。     

基于形态和约束结构的几何哈希法

几何哈希法,作为一种有效的模型搜索算法,在物体识别中有着重要的应用。现有的几何哈希法仅适合于仿射变换下的二维景物识别,论文提出了适合透视投影变换下三维物体识别的几何哈希方法。该方法利用物体的三维形态和物体中具有射影不变量的几何约束结构来构造哈希表。一方面,几何约束结构提供了物体模型的索引功能;另一方面,物体的三维形态提供了物体成像位姿的有关信息,使后续的匹配验证得以简化。实验中使用人造物体对该方法进行了验证,实验表明该方法正确有效。     

A new feature extractor invariant to intensity, rotation, and scaling of color images

This paper proposes a new method for extracting the invariant features of an image based on the concept of principal component analysis and a competitive learning algorithm. The proposed algorithm can be applied to binary, gray-level, or colored-texture images with a size greater than 256 × 256 pixels. In addition to translation, scaling, and rotation invariant extraction, the extraction of a feature invariant to color intensity can be implemented by using this method. In our experiment, the proposed method shows the capability to differentiate images having the same shape but different colored textures. The experimental results report the effectiveness of this technique and its performance as measured by recognition accuracy rate and computational time. These results are also compared with those obtained by classical techniques.     

Image Parsing: Unifying Segmentation,Detection, and Recognition

In this paper we present a Bayesian framework for parsing images into their constituent visual patterns. The parsing algorithm optimizes the posterior probability and outputs a scene representation as a parsing graph, in a spirit similar to parsing sentences in speech and natural language. The algorithm constructs the parsing graph and re-configures it dynamically using a set of moves, which are mostly reversible Markov chain jumps. This computational framework integrates two popular inference approaches—generative (top-down) methods and discriminative (bottom-up) methods. The former formulates the posterior probability in terms of generative models for images defined by likelihood functions and priors. The latter computes discriminative probabilities based on a sequence (cascade) of bottom-up tests/filters. In our Markov chain algorithm design, the posterior probability, defined by the generative models, is the invariant (target) probability for the Markov chain, and the discriminative probabilities are used to construct proposal probabilities to drive the Markov chain. Intuitively, the bottom-up discriminative probabilities activate top-down generative models. In this paper, we focus on two types of visual patterns—generic visual patterns, such as texture and shading, and object patterns including human faces and text. These types of patterns compete and cooperate to explain the image and so image parsing unifies image segmentation, object detection, and recognition (if we use generic visual patterns only then image parsing will correspond to image segmentation (Tu and Zhu, 2002. IEEE Trans. PAMI, 24(5):657–673). We illustrate our algorithm on natural images of complex city scenes and show examples where image segmentation can be improved by allowing object specific knowledge to disambiguate low-level segmentation cues, and conversely where object detection can be improved by using generic visual patterns to explain away shadows and occlusions.     

Active contours: Generalization of the snake mode

Abstract— Segmentation is one of the fundamental issues in the field of image processing and computer vision. Various approaches include differentiating an object in the image as a final goal or for further processing (medical diagnosis, surveillance, 3‐D reconstruction and more). Snakes, a model proposed by Kass, Witkin, and Terzopoulos in 1987, provides an efficient method for segmenting an object through the minimization of its energy. The advantage of snakes is in its ability to use high‐level data given by the algorithm operator, as opposed to other methods such as the Laplace technique. The snakes model inherently imposes strong constraints on a given image in order to successfully segment an object. In this paper, the use of adjustment methods is described, which allow us to generalize the snake model to a wider range of applications. Through the use of pre‐processing techniques, the model's constraints were softened. The main theoretical model and its use in facing a real life image is presented.     

一种新的边缘检测计算模型和算法

该文分析了普通线性移不变边缘检测算子与人的视觉系统感知光强度变化时性能的不一致性,并根据视知觉原理提出了新的边缘检测模型和算法,由此所获得的边缘检测器不再仅是局部性的而且是兼备全局性的自适应特征提取系统.对一组含有小目标的自然场景图象的实验结果证实,与局部性算子相比,该方法具有优良的从低反差图象中提取边缘特征的性能.     

Fason：一种图象快速分形压缩的改进算法

本文针对图象所具有的分形特性，充分挖掘子图象块和父块之间的相似性，提出了一种与传统方法完全不同的快速图象分形压缩算法--Fason算法。该算法在无明显质量下降的同时，对压缩速度有一定的提高。并且，Fason算法还能取消传统分形压缩算法中对域块池的空间需求。     

Multidimensional Morphable Models: A Framework for Representing and Matching Object Classes

We describe a flexible model for representing images of objects of a certain class, known a priori, such as faces, and introduce a new algorithm for matching it to a novel image and thereby perform image analysis. The flexible model, known as a multidimensional morphable model, is learned from example images of objects of a class. In this paper we introduce an effective stochastic gradient descent algorithm that automatically matches a model to a novel image. Several experiments demonstrate the robustness and the broad range of applicability of morphable models. Our approach can provide novel solutions to several vision tasks, including the computation of image correspondence, object verification and image compression.     

Universal access to communication and learning: the role of automatic speech recognition

This communication discusses how automatic speech recognition (ASR) can support universal access to communication and learning through the cost-effective production of text synchronised with speech and describes achievements and planned developments of the Liberated Learning Consortium to: support preferred learning and teaching styles; assist those who for cognitive, physical or sensory reasons find notetaking difficult; assist learners to manage and search online digital multimedia resources; provide automatic captioning of speech for deaf learners or when speech is not available or suitable; assist blind, visually impaired or dyslexic people to read and search material; and, assist speakers to improve their communication skills.     

利用2D射影变换求解空间复杂结构的3D不变量

3D不变量作为不随姿态、视点等成像条件变化而变化的特征参量，可以广泛应用于计算机视觉的多重领域．通过分析2D射影变换矩阵求解的多种可能性，由单纯基于点集对应的思路扩展到利用点集、线集、点、线组合等其它方法，从而拓宽了建立两射影平面对应关系的应用条件．由此提出了一种基于多种点线组合构造虚元素的方法，结合实元素和虚元素可以巧妙提取空间复杂结构下的多种3D不变量，以用于目标识别和描述当中．实验结果验证了方法的有效性。     

An Expression Deformation Approach to Non-rigid 3D Face Recognition

The accuracy of non-rigid 3D face recognition approaches is highly influenced by their capacity to differentiate between the deformations caused by facial expressions from the distinctive geometric attributes that uniquely characterize a 3D face, interpersonal disparities. We present an automatic 3D face recognition approach which can accurately differentiate between expression deformations and interpersonal disparities and hence recognize faces under any facial expression. The patterns of expression deformations are first learnt from training data in PCA eigenvectors. These patterns are then used to morph out the expression deformations. Similarity measures are extracted by matching the morphed 3D faces. PCA is performed in such a way it models only the facial expressions leaving out the interpersonal disparities. The approach was applied on the FRGC v2.0 dataset and superior recognition performance was achieved. The verification rates at 0.001 FAR were 98.35% and 97.73% for scans under neutral and non-neutral expressions, respectively.     

Model-based approach for high-dimensional non-Gaussian visual data clustering and feature weighting

Clustering is the task of classifying patterns or observations into clusters or groups. Generally, clustering in high-dimensional feature spaces has a lot of complications such as: the unidentified or unknown data shape which is typically non-Gaussian and follows different distributions; the unknown number of clusters in the case of unsupervised learning; and the existence of noisy, redundant, or uninformative features which normally compromise modeling capabilities and speed. Therefore, high-dimensional data clustering has been a subject of extensive research in data mining, pattern recognition, image processing, computer vision, and other areas for several decades. However, most of existing researches tackle one or two problems at a time which is unrealistic because all problems are connected and should be tackled simultaneously. Thus, in this paper, we propose two novel inference frameworks for unsupervised non-Gaussian feature selection, in the context of finite asymmetric generalized Gaussian (AGG) mixture-based clustering. The choice of the AGG distribution is mainly due to its ability not only to approximate a large class of statistical distributions (e.g. impulsive, Laplacian, Gaussian and uniform distributions) but also to include the asymmetry. In addition, the two frameworks simultaneously perform model parameters estimation as well as model complexity (i.e., both model and feature selection) determination in the same step. This was done by incorporating a minimum message length (MML) penalty in the model learning step and by fading out the redundant densities in the mixture using the rival penalized EM (RPEM) algorithm, for first and second frameworks, respectively. Furthermore, for both algorithms, we tackle the problem of noisy and uninformative features by determining a set of relevant features for each data cluster. The efficiencies of the proposed algorithms are validated by applying them to real challenging problems namely action and facial expression recognition.