Wavelet-domain blur invariants for image analysis

Projection Operators and Moment Invariants to Image Blurring

In this paper we introduce a new theory of blur invariants. Blur invariants are image features which preserve their values if the image is convolved by a point-spread function (PSF) of a certain class. We present the invariants to convolution with an arbitrary N-fold symmetric PSF, both in Fourier and image domain. We introduce a notion of a primordial image as a canonical form of all blur-equivalent images. It is defined in spectral domain by means of projection operators. We prove that the moments of the primordial image are invariant to blur and we derive recursive formulae for their direct computation without actually constructing the primordial image. We further prove they form a complete set of invariants and show how to extent their invariance also to translation, rotation and scaling. We illustrate by simulated and real-data experiments their invariance and recognition power. Potential applications of this method are wherever one wants to recognize objects on blurred images.

Registration of images with N -fold dihedral blur

In this paper, we extend our recent registration method designed specifically for registering blurred images. The original method works for unknown blurs, assuming the blurring point-spread function (PSF) exhibits an N -fold rotational symmetry. Here, we also generalize the theory to the case of dihedrally symmetric blurs, which are produced by the PSFs having both rotational and axial symmetries. Such kind of blurs are often found in unfocused images acquired by digital cameras, as in out-of-focus shots the PSF typically mimics the shape of the shutter aperture. This makes our registration algorithm particularly well-suited in applications where blurred image registration must be used as a preprocess step of an image fusion algorithm, and where common registration methods fail, due to the amount of blur. We demonstrate that the proposed method leads to an improvement of the registration performance, and we show its applicability to real images by providing successful examples of blurred image registration followed by depth-of-field extension and multichannel blind deconvolution.

Image deconvolution by means of frequency blur invariant concept

Different blur invariant descriptors have been proposed so far, which are either in the spatial domain or based on the properties available in the moment domain. In this paper, a frequency framework is proposed to develop blur invariant features that are used to deconvolve a degraded image caused by a Gaussian blur. These descriptors are obtained by establishing an equivalent relationship between the normalized Fourier transforms of the blurred and original images, both normalized by their respective fixed frequencies set to one. Advantage of using the proposed invariant descriptors is that it is possible to estimate both the point spread function (PSF) and the original image. The performance of frequency invariants will be demonstrated through experiments. An image deconvolution is done as an additional application to verify the proposed blur invariant features.

Blur invariant translational image registration for N-fold symmetric blurs

In this paper, we propose a new registration method designed particularly for registering differently blurred images. Such a task cannot be successfully resolved by traditional approaches. Our method is inspired by traditional phase correlation, which is now applied to certain blur-invariant descriptors instead of the original images. This method works for unknown blurs assuming the blurring PSF exhibits an N-fold rotational symmetry. It does not require any landmarks. We have experimentally proven its good performance, which is not dependent on the amount of blur. In this paper, we explicitly address only registration with respect to translation, but the method can be readily generalized to rotation and scaling.

Gaussian blurring-invariant comparison of signals and images

We present a Riemannian framework for analyzing signals and images in a manner that is invariant to their level of blurriness, under Gaussian blurring. Using a well known relation between Gaussian blurring and the heat equation, we establish an action of the blurring group on image space and define an orthogonal section of this action to represent and compare images at the same blur level. This comparison is based on geodesic distances on the section manifold which, in turn, are computed using a path-straightening algorithm. The actual implementations use coefficients of images under a truncated orthonormal basis and the blurring action corresponds to exponential decays of these coefficients. We demonstrate this framework using a number of experimental results, involving 1D signals and 2D images. As a specific application, we study the effect of blurring on the recognition performance when 2D facial images are used for recognizing people.