This paper deals with a challenging, frequently encountered, yet not properly investigated problem in two-frame optical flow estimation. That is, the input frames are compounds of two imaging layers -- one desired background layer of the scene, and one distracting, possibly moving layer due to transparency or reflection. In this situation, the conventional brightness constancy constraint -- the cornerstone of most existing optical flow methods -- will no longer be valid. In this paper, we propose a robust solution to this problem. The proposed method performs both optical flow estimation, and image layer separation. It exploits a generalized double-layer brightness consistency constraint connecting these two tasks, and utilizes the priors for both of them. Experiments on both synthetic data and real images have confirmed the efficacy of the proposed method. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt towards handling generic optical flow fields of two-frame images containing transparency or reflection.
In the context of stereo matching with transparency, Szeliski and Golland @cite_11 simultaneously recovered disparities, true colors, and opacity of visible surface elements. Tsin al @cite_27 estimated both depth and colors of the component layers. Li al @cite_6 proposed a simultaneous video defogging and stereo matching algorithm.
@cite_27 @cite_6 @cite_11
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In this paper, we address the stereo matching problem in the presence of reflections and translucency, where image formation can be modeled as the additive superposition of layers at different depth. The presence of such effects violates the Lambertian assumption underlying traditional stereo vision algorithms, making it impossible to recover component depths using direct color matching based methods. We develop several techniques to estimate both depths and colors of the component layers. Depth hypotheses are enumerated in pairs, one from each layer, in a nested plane sweep. For each pair of depth hypotheses, we compute a component-color-independent matching error per pixel, using a spatial-temporal differencing technique. We then use graph cut optimization to solve for the depths of both layers. This is followed by an iterative color update algorithm whose convergence is proven in our paper. We show convincing results of depth and color estimates for both synthetic and real image sequences. In this paper, we address stereo matching in the presence of a class of non-Lambertian effects, where image formation can be modeled as the additive superposition of layers at different depths. The presence of such effects makes it impossible for traditional stereo vision algorithms to recover depths using direct color matching-based methods. We develop several techniques to estimate both depths and colors of the component layers. Depth hypotheses are enumerated in pairs, one from each layer, in a nested plane sweep. For each pair of depth hypotheses, matching is accomplished using spatial-temporal differencing. We then use graph cut optimization to solve for the depths of both layers. This is followed by an iterative color update algorithm which we proved to be convergent. Our algorithm recovers depth and color estimates for both synthetic and real image sequences. This paper formulates and solves a new variant of the stereo correspondence problem: simultaneously recovering the disparities, true colors, and opacities of visible surface elements. This problem arises in newer applications of stereo reconstruction, such as view interpolation and the layering of real imagery with synthetic graphics for special effects and virtual studio applications. While this problem is intrinsically more difficult than traditional stereo correspondence, where only the disparities are being recovered, it provides a principled way of dealing with commonly occurring problems such as occlusions and the handling of mixed (foreground background) pixels near depth discontinuities. It also provides a novel means for separating foreground and background objects (matting), without the use of a special blue screen. We formulate the problem as the recovery of colors and opacities in a generalized 3-D (x, y, d) disparity space, and solve the problem using a combination of initial evidence aggregation followed by iterative energy minimization. This paper demonstrates the high quality, real-time segmentation techniques. We achieve real-time segmentation of foreground from background layers in stereo video sequences. Automatic separation of layers from colour contrast or from stereo alone is known to be error-prone. Here, colour, contrast and stereo matching information are fused to infer layers accurately and efficiently. The first algorithm, layered dynamic programming (LDP), solves stereo in an extended 6-state space that represents both foreground background layers and occluded regions. The stereo-match likelihood is then fused with a contrast-sensitive colour model that is learned on the fly, and stereo disparities are obtained by dynamic programming. The second algorithm, layered graph cut (LGC), does not directly solve stereo. Instead the stereo match likelihood is marginalised over foreground and background hypotheses, and fused with a contrast-sensitive colour model like the one used in LDP. Segmentation is solved efficiently by ternary graph cut. Both algorithms are evaluated with respect to ground truth data and found to have similar performance, substantially better than stereo or colour contrast alone. However, their characteristics with respect to computational efficiency are rather different. The algorithms are demonstrated in the application of background substitution and shown to give good quality composite video output.