RI: Small: Collaborative Research: Contour-Assisted Visual Inference: Systems, Algorithms, and Applications

遮挡轮廓在许多计算机视觉任务中扮演着重要的角色。与普通照片不同，OC图像去除了照明、纹理和外观的影响，同时保留了重要的深度边缘和轮廓。这个项目开发了一个在视觉推理任务中获取、处理和使用OCS的综合框架。在传感器方面，研究小组开发了一种新的遮挡轮廓相机或OC-Cam。新的OC-Cam通过耦合一组可控红外(IR)LED和一对可见光-IR相机来扩展多闪相机。在算法和应用方面，研究团队系统地开发了OC辅助的视觉推理算法。对于识别，获取的OCS被用作特征过滤器，以提高类别级别的目标识别。对于跟踪，PI应用OCS通过滤除背景和纹理边缘来增强目标的表示。此外，研究小组还调查了OC辅助的图像摘要和隐私保护方面之前未被探索的问题。该项目可以在研究和教育方面对计算机视觉、人工智能、刑事司法和机器人等广泛领域产生深远影响。由于OCS在人类视觉中的重要性，其结果可以为视觉心理学的研究提供一个试验台。此外，OC-Cam有望成为构建下一代监视系统的概念灵感。最后，将捕获的OC数据集和相关工具提供给其他研究人员，为验证新的基于OC的计算机视觉算法提供平台。

Occlusion contour (OC) is well known to play important roles in many computer vision tasks. Unlike regular photographs, an OC image removes the effects of illumination, texture, and appearance while preserving important depth edges and silhouette. This project develops a comprehensive framework for acquiring, processing, and utilizing OCs in visual inference tasks. On the sensor front, the research team develops a new Occlusion Contour Camera or OC-Cam. The new OC-Cam extends the multi-flash camera by coupling an array of controllable infrared (IR) LEDs and a visible-IR camera pair. On the algorithm and application fronts, the research team systematically develops OC-assisted visual inference algorithms. For recognition, the acquired OCs are used as a feature filter to improve category-level object recognition. For tracking, the PIs apply OCs to enhance target representation by filtering out the background and texture edges. Furthermore, the research team investigates the previously under-explored problems of OC-assisted image summarization and privacy protection.This project can cast deep impact on broad areas of computer vision, artificial intelligence, criminal justices, and robotics, both in research and education. Due to the importance of OCs in human vision, the results can produce a testbed for the study of visual psychology. Furthermore, the OC-Cam is expected to serve as conceptual inspiration for constructing the next-generation surveillance systems. Finally, the captured OC datasets and relevant tools are made available to other researchers, to provide a platform for validating new OC-based computer vision algorithms.