174 research outputs found
Recent Progress in Image Deblurring
This paper comprehensively reviews the recent development of image
deblurring, including non-blind/blind, spatially invariant/variant deblurring
techniques. Indeed, these techniques share the same objective of inferring a
latent sharp image from one or several corresponding blurry images, while the
blind deblurring techniques are also required to derive an accurate blur
kernel. Considering the critical role of image restoration in modern imaging
systems to provide high-quality images under complex environments such as
motion, undesirable lighting conditions, and imperfect system components, image
deblurring has attracted growing attention in recent years. From the viewpoint
of how to handle the ill-posedness which is a crucial issue in deblurring
tasks, existing methods can be grouped into five categories: Bayesian inference
framework, variational methods, sparse representation-based methods,
homography-based modeling, and region-based methods. In spite of achieving a
certain level of development, image deblurring, especially the blind case, is
limited in its success by complex application conditions which make the blur
kernel hard to obtain and be spatially variant. We provide a holistic
understanding and deep insight into image deblurring in this review. An
analysis of the empirical evidence for representative methods, practical
issues, as well as a discussion of promising future directions are also
presented.Comment: 53 pages, 17 figure
A Panorama on Multiscale Geometric Representations, Intertwining Spatial, Directional and Frequency Selectivity
The richness of natural images makes the quest for optimal representations in
image processing and computer vision challenging. The latter observation has
not prevented the design of image representations, which trade off between
efficiency and complexity, while achieving accurate rendering of smooth regions
as well as reproducing faithful contours and textures. The most recent ones,
proposed in the past decade, share an hybrid heritage highlighting the
multiscale and oriented nature of edges and patterns in images. This paper
presents a panorama of the aforementioned literature on decompositions in
multiscale, multi-orientation bases or dictionaries. They typically exhibit
redundancy to improve sparsity in the transformed domain and sometimes its
invariance with respect to simple geometric deformations (translation,
rotation). Oriented multiscale dictionaries extend traditional wavelet
processing and may offer rotation invariance. Highly redundant dictionaries
require specific algorithms to simplify the search for an efficient (sparse)
representation. We also discuss the extension of multiscale geometric
decompositions to non-Euclidean domains such as the sphere or arbitrary meshed
surfaces. The etymology of panorama suggests an overview, based on a choice of
partially overlapping "pictures". We hope that this paper will contribute to
the appreciation and apprehension of a stream of current research directions in
image understanding.Comment: 65 pages, 33 figures, 303 reference
Proceedings of the second "international Traveling Workshop on Interactions between Sparse models and Technology" (iTWIST'14)
The implicit objective of the biennial "international - Traveling Workshop on
Interactions between Sparse models and Technology" (iTWIST) is to foster
collaboration between international scientific teams by disseminating ideas
through both specific oral/poster presentations and free discussions. For its
second edition, the iTWIST workshop took place in the medieval and picturesque
town of Namur in Belgium, from Wednesday August 27th till Friday August 29th,
2014. The workshop was conveniently located in "The Arsenal" building within
walking distance of both hotels and town center. iTWIST'14 has gathered about
70 international participants and has featured 9 invited talks, 10 oral
presentations, and 14 posters on the following themes, all related to the
theory, application and generalization of the "sparsity paradigm":
Sparsity-driven data sensing and processing; Union of low dimensional
subspaces; Beyond linear and convex inverse problem; Matrix/manifold/graph
sensing/processing; Blind inverse problems and dictionary learning; Sparsity
and computational neuroscience; Information theory, geometry and randomness;
Complexity/accuracy tradeoffs in numerical methods; Sparsity? What's next?;
Sparse machine learning and inference.Comment: 69 pages, 24 extended abstracts, iTWIST'14 website:
http://sites.google.com/site/itwist1
The SURE-LET approach to image denoising
Denoising is an essential step prior to any higher-level image-processing tasks such as segmentation or object tracking, because the undesirable corruption by noise is inherent to any physical acquisition device. When the measurements are performed by photosensors, one usually distinguish between two main regimes: in the first scenario, the measured intensities are sufficiently high and the noise is assumed to be signal-independent. In the second scenario, only few photons are detected, which leads to a strong signal-dependent degradation. When the noise is considered as signal-independent, it is often modeled as an additive independent (typically Gaussian) random variable, whereas, otherwise, the measurements are commonly assumed to follow independent Poisson laws, whose underlying intensities are the unknown noise-free measures. We first consider the reduction of additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN). Contrary to most existing denoising algorithms, our approach does not require an explicit prior statistical modeling of the unknown data. Our driving principle is the minimization of a purely data-adaptive unbiased estimate of the mean-squared error (MSE) between the processed and the noise-free data. In the AWGN case, such a MSE estimate was first proposed by Stein, and is known as "Stein's unbiased risk estimate" (SURE). We further develop the original SURE theory and propose a general methodology for fast and efficient multidimensional image denoising, which we call the SURE-LET approach. While SURE allows the quantitative monitoring of the denoising quality, the flexibility and the low computational complexity of our approach are ensured by a linear parameterization of the denoising process, expressed as a linear expansion of thresholds (LET).We propose several pointwise, multivariate, and multichannel thresholding functions applied to arbitrary (in particular, redundant) linear transformations of the input data, with a special focus on multiscale signal representations. We then transpose the SURE-LET approach to the estimation of Poisson intensities degraded by AWGN. The signal-dependent specificity of the Poisson statistics leads to the derivation of a new unbiased MSE estimate that we call "Poisson's unbiased risk estimate" (PURE) and requires more adaptive transform-domain thresholding rules. In a general PURE-LET framework, we first devise a fast interscale thresholding method restricted to the use of the (unnormalized) Haar wavelet transform. We then lift this restriction and show how the PURE-LET strategy can be used to design and optimize a wide class of nonlinear processing applied in an arbitrary (in particular, redundant) transform domain. We finally apply some of the proposed denoising algorithms to real multidimensional fluorescence microscopy images. Such in vivo imaging modality often operates under low-illumination conditions and short exposure time; consequently, the random fluctuations of the measured fluorophore radiations are well described by a Poisson process degraded (or not) by AWGN. We validate experimentally this statistical measurement model, and we assess the performance of the PURE-LET algorithms in comparison with some state-of-the-art denoising methods. Our solution turns out to be very competitive both qualitatively and computationally, allowing for a fast and efficient denoising of the huge volumes of data that are nowadays routinely produced in biomedical imaging
Graph Spectral Image Processing
Recent advent of graph signal processing (GSP) has spurred intensive studies
of signals that live naturally on irregular data kernels described by graphs
(e.g., social networks, wireless sensor networks). Though a digital image
contains pixels that reside on a regularly sampled 2D grid, if one can design
an appropriate underlying graph connecting pixels with weights that reflect the
image structure, then one can interpret the image (or image patch) as a signal
on a graph, and apply GSP tools for processing and analysis of the signal in
graph spectral domain. In this article, we overview recent graph spectral
techniques in GSP specifically for image / video processing. The topics covered
include image compression, image restoration, image filtering and image
segmentation
Wavelet Analysis and Denoising: New Tools for Economists
This paper surveys the techniques of wavelets analysis and the associated methods of denoising. The Discrete Wavelet Transform and its undecimated version, the Maximum Overlapping Discrete Wavelet Transform, are described. The methods of wavelets analysis can be used to show how the frequency content of the data varies with time. This allows us to pinpoint in time such events as major structural breaks. The sparse nature of the wavelets representation also facilitates the process of noise reduction by nonlinear wavelet shrinkage , which can be used to reveal the underlying trends in economic data. An application of these techniques to the UK real GDP (1873-2001) is described. The purpose of the analysis is to reveal the true structure of the data - including its local irregularities and abrupt changes - and the results are surprising.Wavelets, Denoising, Structural breaks, Trend estimation
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