4D Frequency Analysis of Computational Cameras for Depth of Field Extension

Depth of field (DOF), the range of scene depths that appear sharp in a photograph, poses a fundamental tradeoff in photography---wide apertures are important to reduce imaging noise, but they also increase defocus blur. Recent advances in computational imaging modify the acquisition process to extend the DOF through deconvolution. Because deconvolution quality is a tight function of the frequency power spectrum of the defocus kernel, designs with high spectra are desirable. In this paper we study how to design effective extended-DOF systems, and show an upper bound on the maximal power spectrum that can be achieved. We analyze defocus kernels in the 4D light field space and show that in the frequency domain, only a low-dimensional 3D manifold contributes to focus. Thus, to maximize the defocus spectrum, imaging systems should concentrate their limited energy on this manifold. We review several computational imaging systems and show either that they spend energy outside the focal manifold or do not achieve a high spectrum over the DOF. Guided by this analysis we introduce the lattice-focal lens, which concentrates energy at the low-dimensional focal manifold and achieves a higher power spectrum than previous designs. We have built a prototype lattice-focal lens and present extended depth of field results

Depth Fields: Extending Light Field Techniques to Time-of-Flight Imaging

A variety of techniques such as light field, structured illumination, and time-of-flight (TOF) are commonly used for depth acquisition in consumer imaging, robotics and many other applications. Unfortunately, each technique suffers from its individual limitations preventing robust depth sensing. In this paper, we explore the strengths and weaknesses of combining light field and time-of-flight imaging, particularly the feasibility of an on-chip implementation as a single hybrid depth sensor. We refer to this combination as depth field imaging. Depth fields combine light field advantages such as synthetic aperture refocusing with TOF imaging advantages such as high depth resolution and coded signal processing to resolve multipath interference. We show applications including synthesizing virtual apertures for TOF imaging, improved depth mapping through partial and scattering occluders, and single frequency TOF phase unwrapping. Utilizing space, angle, and temporal coding, depth fields can improve depth sensing in the wild and generate new insights into the dimensions of light's plenoptic function.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures, Accepted to 3DV 201

Learning Wavefront Coding for Extended Depth of Field Imaging

Depth of field is an important factor of imaging systems that highly affects the quality of the acquired spatial information. Extended depth of field (EDoF) imaging is a challenging ill-posed problem and has been extensively addressed in the literature. We propose a computational imaging approach for EDoF, where we employ wavefront coding via a diffractive optical element (DOE) and we achieve deblurring through a convolutional neural network. Thanks to the end-to-end differentiable modeling of optical image formation and computational post-processing, we jointly optimize the optical design, i.e., DOE, and the deblurring through standard gradient descent methods. Based on the properties of the underlying refractive lens and the desired EDoF range, we provide an analytical expression for the search space of the DOE, which is instrumental in the convergence of the end-to-end network. We achieve superior EDoF imaging performance compared to the state of the art, where we demonstrate results with minimal artifacts in various scenarios, including deep 3D scenes and broadband imaging

Plenoptic Signal Processing for Robust Vision in Field Robotics

This thesis proposes the use of plenoptic cameras for improving the robustness and simplicity of machine vision in field robotics applications. Dust, rain, fog, snow, murky water and insufficient light can cause even the most sophisticated vision systems to fail. Plenoptic cameras offer an appealing alternative to conventional imagery by gathering significantly more light over a wider depth of field, and capturing a rich 4D light field structure that encodes textural and geometric information. The key contributions of this work lie in exploring the properties of plenoptic signals and developing algorithms for exploiting them. It lays the groundwork for the deployment of plenoptic cameras in field robotics by establishing a decoding, calibration and rectification scheme appropriate to compact, lenslet-based devices. Next, the frequency-domain shape of plenoptic signals is elaborated and exploited by constructing a filter which focuses over a wide depth of field rather than at a single depth. This filter is shown to reject noise, improving contrast in low light and through attenuating media, while mitigating occluders such as snow, rain and underwater particulate matter. Next, a closed-form generalization of optical flow is presented which directly estimates camera motion from first-order derivatives. An elegant adaptation of this "plenoptic flow" to lenslet-based imagery is demonstrated, as well as a simple, additive method for rendering novel views. Finally, the isolation of dynamic elements from a static background is considered, a task complicated by the non-uniform apparent motion caused by a mobile camera. Two elegant closed-form solutions are presented dealing with monocular time-series and light field image pairs. This work emphasizes non-iterative, noise-tolerant, closed-form, linear methods with predictable and constant runtimes, making them suitable for real-time embedded implementation in field robotics applications

Plenoptic Signal Processing for Robust Vision in Field Robotics

This thesis proposes the use of plenoptic cameras for improving the robustness and simplicity of machine vision in field robotics applications. Dust, rain, fog, snow, murky water and insufficient light can cause even the most sophisticated vision systems to fail. Plenoptic cameras offer an appealing alternative to conventional imagery by gathering significantly more light over a wider depth of field, and capturing a rich 4D light field structure that encodes textural and geometric information. The key contributions of this work lie in exploring the properties of plenoptic signals and developing algorithms for exploiting them. It lays the groundwork for the deployment of plenoptic cameras in field robotics by establishing a decoding, calibration and rectification scheme appropriate to compact, lenslet-based devices. Next, the frequency-domain shape of plenoptic signals is elaborated and exploited by constructing a filter which focuses over a wide depth of field rather than at a single depth. This filter is shown to reject noise, improving contrast in low light and through attenuating media, while mitigating occluders such as snow, rain and underwater particulate matter. Next, a closed-form generalization of optical flow is presented which directly estimates camera motion from first-order derivatives. An elegant adaptation of this "plenoptic flow" to lenslet-based imagery is demonstrated, as well as a simple, additive method for rendering novel views. Finally, the isolation of dynamic elements from a static background is considered, a task complicated by the non-uniform apparent motion caused by a mobile camera. Two elegant closed-form solutions are presented dealing with monocular time-series and light field image pairs. This work emphasizes non-iterative, noise-tolerant, closed-form, linear methods with predictable and constant runtimes, making them suitable for real-time embedded implementation in field robotics applications

Compressive light field photography using overcomplete dictionaries and optimized projections

Light field photography has gained a significant research interest in the last two decades; today, commercial light field cameras are widely available. Nevertheless, most existing acquisition approaches either multiplex a low-resolution light field into a single 2D sensor image or require multiple photographs to be taken for acquiring a high-resolution light field. We propose a compressive light field camera architecture that allows for higher-resolution light fields to be recovered than previously possible from a single image. The proposed architecture comprises three key components: light field atoms as a sparse representation of natural light fields, an optical design that allows for capturing optimized 2D light field projections, and robust sparse reconstruction methods to recover a 4D light field from a single coded 2D projection. In addition, we demonstrate a variety of other applications for light field atoms and sparse coding, including 4D light field compression and denoising.Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC postdoctoral fellowship)United States. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA SCENICC program)Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Sloan Research Fellowship)United States. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA Young Faculty Award

Near-invariant blur for depth and 2D motion via time-varying light field analysis

Recently, several camera designs have been proposed for either making defocus blur invariant to scene depth or making motion blur invariant to object motion. The benefit of such invariant capture is that no depth or motion estimation is required to remove the resultant spatially uniform blur. So far, the techniques have been studied separately for defocus and motion blur, and object motion has been assumed 1D (e.g., horizontal). This article explores a more general capture method that makes both defocus blur and motion blur nearly invariant to scene depth and in-plane 2D object motion. We formulate the problem as capturing a time-varying light field through a time-varying light field modulator at the lens aperture, and perform 5D (4D light field + 1D time) analysis of all the existing computational cameras for defocus/motion-only deblurring and their hybrids. This leads to a surprising conclusion that focus sweep, previously known as a depth-invariant capture method that moves the plane of focus through a range of scene depth during exposure, is near-optimal both in terms of depth and 2D motion invariance and in terms of high-frequency preservation for certain combinations of depth and motion ranges. Using our prototype camera, we demonstrate joint defocus and motion deblurring for moving scenes with depth variation