Cross-Spectral Face Recognition Between Near-Infrared and Visible Light Modalities.

In this thesis, improvement of face recognition performance with the use of images from the visible (VIS) and near-infrared (NIR) spectrum is attempted. Face recognition systems can be adversely affected by scenarios which encounter a significant amount of illumination variation across images of the same subject. Cross-spectral face recognition systems using images collected across the VIS and NIR spectrum can counter the ill-effects of illumination variation by standardising both sets of images. A novel preprocessing technique is proposed, which attempts the transformation of faces across both modalities to a feature space with enhanced correlation. Direct matching across the modalities is not possible due to the inherent spectral differences between NIR and VIS face images. Compared to a VIS light source, NIR radiation has a greater penetrative depth when incident on human skin. This fact, in addition to the greater number of scattering interactions within the skin by rays from the NIR spectrum can alter the morphology of the human face enough to disable a direct match with the corresponding VIS face. Several ways to bridge the gap between NIR-VIS faces have been proposed previously. Mostly of a data-driven approach, these techniques include standardised photometric normalisation techniques and subspace projections. A generative approach driven by a true physical model has not been investigated till now. In this thesis, it is proposed that a large proportion of the scattering interactions present in the NIR spectrum can be accounted for using a model for subsurface scattering. A novel subsurface scattering inversion (SSI) algorithm is developed that implements an inversion approach based on translucent surface rendering by the computer graphics field, whereby the reversal of the first order effects of subsurface scattering is attempted. The SSI algorithm is then evaluated against several preprocessing techniques, and using various permutations of feature extraction and subspace projection algorithms. The results of this evaluation show an improvement in cross spectral face recognition performance using SSI over existing Retinex-based approaches. The top performing combination of an existing photometric normalisation technique, Sequential Chain, is seen to be the best performing with a Rank 1 recognition rate of 92. 5%. In addition, the improvement in performance using non-linear projection models shows an element of non-linearity exists in the relationship between NIR and VIS

Digital Image Processing

This book presents several recent advances that are related or fall under the umbrella of 'digital image processing', with the purpose of providing an insight into the possibilities offered by digital image processing algorithms in various fields. The presented mathematical algorithms are accompanied by graphical representations and illustrative examples for an enhanced readability. The chapters are written in a manner that allows even a reader with basic experience and knowledge in the digital image processing field to properly understand the presented algorithms. Concurrently, the structure of the information in this book is such that fellow scientists will be able to use it to push the development of the presented subjects even further

Face recognition by means of advanced contributions in machine learning

Face recognition (FR) has been extensively studied, due to both scientific fundamental challenges and current and potential applications where human identification is needed. FR systems have the benefits of their non intrusiveness, low cost of equipments and no useragreement requirements when doing acquisition, among the most important ones. Nevertheless, despite the progress made in last years and the different solutions proposed, FR performance is not yet satisfactory when more demanding conditions are required (different viewpoints, blocked effects, illumination changes, strong lighting states, etc). Particularly, the effect of such non-controlled lighting conditions on face images leads to one of the strongest distortions in facial appearance. This dissertation addresses the problem of FR when dealing with less constrained illumination situations. In order to approach the problem, a new multi-session and multi-spectral face database has been acquired in visible, Near-infrared (NIR) and Thermal infrared (TIR) spectra, under different lighting conditions. A theoretical analysis using information theory to demonstrate the complementarities between different spectral bands have been firstly carried out. The optimal exploitation of the information provided by the set of multispectral images has been subsequently addressed by using multimodal matching score fusion techniques that efficiently synthesize complementary meaningful information among different spectra. Due to peculiarities in thermal images, a specific face segmentation algorithm has been required and developed. In the final proposed system, the Discrete Cosine Transform as dimensionality reduction tool and a fractional distance for matching were used, so that the cost in processing time and memory was significantly reduced. Prior to this classification task, a selection of the relevant frequency bands is proposed in order to optimize the overall system, based on identifying and maximizing independence relations by means of discriminability criteria. The system has been extensively evaluated on the multispectral face database specifically performed for our purpose. On this regard, a new visualization procedure has been suggested in order to combine different bands for establishing valid comparisons and giving statistical information about the significance of the results. This experimental framework has more easily enabled the improvement of robustness against training and testing illumination mismatch. Additionally, focusing problem in thermal spectrum has been also addressed, firstly, for the more general case of the thermal images (or thermograms), and then for the case of facialthermograms from both theoretical and practical point of view. In order to analyze the quality of such facial thermograms degraded by blurring, an appropriate algorithm has been successfully developed. Experimental results strongly support the proposed multispectral facial image fusion, achieving very high performance in several conditions. These results represent a new advance in providing a robust matching across changes in illumination, further inspiring highly accurate FR approaches in practical scenarios.El reconeixement facial (FR) ha estat àmpliament estudiat, degut tant als reptes fonamentals científics que suposa com a les aplicacions actuals i futures on requereix la identificació de les persones. Els sistemes de reconeixement facial tenen els avantatges de ser no intrusius,presentar un baix cost dels equips d’adquisició i no la no necessitat d’autorització per part de l’individu a l’hora de realitzar l'adquisició, entre les més importants. De totes maneres i malgrat els avenços aconseguits en els darrers anys i les diferents solucions proposades, el rendiment del FR encara no resulta satisfactori quan es requereixen condicions més exigents (diferents punts de vista, efectes de bloqueig, canvis en la il·luminació, condicions de llum extremes, etc.). Concretament, l'efecte d'aquestes variacions no controlades en les condicions d'il·luminació sobre les imatges facials condueix a una de les distorsions més accentuades sobre l'aparença facial. Aquesta tesi aborda el problema del FR en condicions d'il·luminació menys restringides. Per tal d'abordar el problema, hem adquirit una nova base de dades de cara multisessió i multiespectral en l'espectre infraroig visible, infraroig proper (NIR) i tèrmic (TIR), sota diferents condicions d'il·luminació. En primer lloc s'ha dut a terme una anàlisi teòrica utilitzant la teoria de la informació per demostrar la complementarietat entre les diferents bandes espectrals objecte d’estudi. L'òptim aprofitament de la informació proporcionada pel conjunt d'imatges multiespectrals s'ha abordat posteriorment mitjançant l'ús de tècniques de fusió de puntuació multimodals, capaces de sintetitzar de manera eficient el conjunt d’informació significativa complementària entre els diferents espectres. A causa de les característiques particulars de les imatges tèrmiques, s’ha requerit del desenvolupament d’un algorisme específic per la segmentació de les mateixes. En el sistema proposat final, s’ha utilitzat com a eina de reducció de la dimensionalitat de les imatges, la Transformada del Cosinus Discreta i una distància fraccional per realitzar les tasques de classificació de manera que el cost en temps de processament i de memòria es va reduir de forma significa. Prèviament a aquesta tasca de classificació, es proposa una selecció de les bandes de freqüències més rellevants, basat en la identificació i la maximització de les relacions d'independència per mitjà de criteris discriminabilitat, per tal d'optimitzar el conjunt del sistema. El sistema ha estat àmpliament avaluat sobre la base de dades de cara multiespectral, desenvolupada pel nostre propòsit. En aquest sentit s'ha suggerit l’ús d’un nou procediment de visualització per combinar diferents bandes per poder establir comparacions vàlides i donar informació estadística sobre el significat dels resultats. Aquest marc experimental ha permès més fàcilment la millora de la robustesa quan les condicions d’il·luminació eren diferents entre els processos d’entrament i test. De forma complementària, s’ha tractat la problemàtica de l’enfocament de les imatges en l'espectre tèrmic, en primer lloc, pel cas general de les imatges tèrmiques (o termogrames) i posteriorment pel cas concret dels termogrames facials, des dels punt de vista tant teòric com pràctic. En aquest sentit i per tal d'analitzar la qualitat d’aquests termogrames facials degradats per efectes de desenfocament, s'ha desenvolupat un últim algorisme. Els resultats experimentals recolzen fermament que la fusió d'imatges facials multiespectrals proposada assoleix un rendiment molt alt en diverses condicions d’il·luminació. Aquests resultats representen un nou avenç en l’aportació de solucions robustes quan es contemplen canvis en la il·luminació, i esperen poder inspirar a futures implementacions de sistemes de reconeixement facial precisos en escenaris no controlats.Postprint (published version

Human-Centric Machine Vision

Recently, the algorithms for the processing of the visual information have greatly evolved, providing efficient and effective solutions to cope with the variability and the complexity of real-world environments. These achievements yield to the development of Machine Vision systems that overcome the typical industrial applications, where the environments are controlled and the tasks are very specific, towards the use of innovative solutions to face with everyday needs of people. The Human-Centric Machine Vision can help to solve the problems raised by the needs of our society, e.g. security and safety, health care, medical imaging, and human machine interface. In such applications it is necessary to handle changing, unpredictable and complex situations, and to take care of the presence of humans