Human action annotation,modeling and analysis based on implicit user interaction

This paper proposes an integrated framework for analyzing human actions in video streams. Despite most current approaches that are just based on automatic spatiotemporal analysis of sequences, the proposed method introduces the implicit user-in-the-loop concept for dynamically mining semantics and annotating video streams. This work sets a new and ambitious goal: to recognize, model and properly use “average user’s” selections, preferences and perception, for dynamically extracting content semantics. The proposed approach is expected to add significant value to hundreds of billions of non-annotated or inadequately annotated video streams existing in the Web, file servers, databases etc. Furthermore expert annotators can gain important knowledge relevant to user preferences, selections, styles of searching and perception.     

结合Web背景知识的图像语义标注

针对基于内容的图像语义标注方法中,相同或相近视觉特征对应语义可能不同的情况,提出了一个结合Web背景知识的图像语义关联模型,利用从Web页面中提取的与图像相关的属性,计算Web图像与标注关键词间的语义相关性,确定待标注Web图像的语义,实验表明该方法具有较好的性能。     

融入类别信息的图像标注概率主题模型

基于概率主题模型的图像标注方法旨在通过学习图像语义进行图像标注,近年来倍受研究人员关注。考虑到类别对图像标注可提供有价值的信息,例如,“高楼”类图像,出现“天空”、“摩天楼”的可能性大于“海水”和“沙滩”。而“海岸”类图像出现“海水”、“沙滩”的可能性要大于“天空”和“摩天楼”。在Corr-LDA模型的基础上利用图像类别来改进图像的标注性能,提出了一个融入类别信息的图像标注概率主题模型。为该模型推导了一个基于变分EM的参数估计算法,并给出了使用该模型标注图像的方法。在LabelMe和UIUC-Sport两个真实数据集上验证了提出模型的标注性能要高于其他相比较模型。     

Emulating human visual perception for measuring difference inimages using an SPN graph approach

This paper presents a new methodology for efficiently representing the content of images and comparing images by detecting and recording their visual differences. In particular, the methodology presented here is based on a stochastic Petri-net (SPN) graph approach able to extract and record local and global features from both images, compare them, and define the percentage of similarity. One of the features of the human visual perception is the detection of similarities between two images. The visual similarity is based on color, size, shape, and local and global topological changes of the image regions. Several methods dealing with image or object similarities have been proposed. The new feature of the method here is the partial emulation of the human observer's visual perception by recording differences extracted from different images. Results of the method described here are presented for a variety of images by using local and global noisy conditions.     

Image auto-annotation with automatic selection of the annotation length

Developing a satisfactory and effective method for auto-annotating images that works under general conditions is a challenging task. The advantages of such a system would be manifold: it can be used to annotate existing, large databases of images, rendering them accessible to text search engines; or it can be used as core for image retrieval based on a query image’s visual content. Manual annotation of images is a difficult, tedious and time consuming task. Furthermore, manual annotations tend to show great inter-person variance: considering an image, the opinions about what elements are significant and deserve an annotation vary strongly. The latter poses a problem for the evaluation of an automatic method, as an annotation’s correctness is greatly subjective. In this paper we present an automatic method for annotating images, which addresses one of the existing methods’ major limitation, namely a fixed annotation length. The proposed method, PATSI, automatically chooses the resulting annotation’s length for each query image. It is held as simple as possible and a build-in parameter optimization procedure renders PATSI de-facto parameter free. Finally, PATSI is evaluated on standard datasets, outperforming various state-of-the-art methods.     

Image retrieval based on index compressed vector quantization

Increased amount of visual data in several applications necessitates content-based image retrieval. Since most of visual data is stored in compressed form, it is crucial to develop indexing techniques for searching images based on their content in compressed form. Therefore, it is desirable to explore image compression techniques with capability of describing image content in compressed form. Vector Quantization (VQ) is a compression scheme that exploits intra-block correlation and image correlation reflects image content, hence VQ is a suitable compression technique for compressed domain image retrieval.This paper introduces a novel indexing scheme for compressed domain image databases based on indices generated from IC-VQ. The proposed scheme extracts image features based on relationship between indices of IC-VQ compressed images. This relationship detects contiguous regions of compressed image based on inter- and intra-block correlation. Experimental results show effectiveness superiority of the new scheme compared to VQ and color-based schemes.     

A fractal-based clustering approach in large visual database systems

Large visual database systems require effective and efficient ways of indexing and accessing visual data on the basis of content. In this process, significant features must first be extracted from image data in their pixel format. These features must then be classified and indexed to assist efficient access to image content. With the large volume of visual data stored in a visual database, image classification is a critical step to achieve efficient indexing and retrieval. In this paper, we investigate an effective approach to the clustering of image data based on the technique of fractal image coding, a method first introduced in conjunction with fractal image compression technique. A joint fractal coding technique, applicable to pairs of images, is used to determine the degree of their similarity. Images in a visual database can be categorized in clusters on the basis of their similarity to a set of iconic images. Classification metrics are proposed for the measurement of the extent of similarity among images. By experimenting on a large set of texture and natural images, we demonstrate the applicability of these metrics and the proposed clustering technique to various visual database applications.     

Semantic Annotating of Text Documents: Basic Concepts and Taxonomic Approach

One of the tools for the semantic enrichment of the content of information resources is semantic annotating, which makes it possible to comment on and evaluate annotated resources and their fragments and to carry out a semantic search on their basis. The use of the taxonomic approach simultaneously allows classifying the subjects of annotating and generating new scientometric indicators. This paper considers the essence of semantic annotating, defines the basic concepts, discusses the general model of semantic annotation and taxonomic approach to presenting the semantics of annotations, and gives the examples of taxonomies based on various properties of annotations. The implementation of semantic annotating in the Socionet scientific information system is considered as an example.     

An image annotation approach using location references to enhance geographic knowledge discovery

With the continuously increasing needs of location information for users around the world, applications of geospatial information have gained a lot of attention in both research and commercial organizations. Extraction of semantics from the image content for geospatial information seeking and knowledge discovery has been thus becoming a critical process. Unfortunately, the available geographic images may be blurred, either too light or too dark. It is therefore often hard to extract geographic features directly from images. In this paper, we describe our developed methods in applying local scale-invariant features and bag-of-keypoints techniques to annotating images, in order to carry out image categorization and geographic knowledge discovery tasks. First, local scale-invariant features are extracted from geographic images as representative geographic features. Subsequently, the bag-of-keypoints methods are used to construct a visual vocabulary and generate feature vectors to support image categorization and annotation. The annotated images are classified by using geographic nouns. The experimental results show that the proposed approach is sensible and can effectively enhance the tasks of geographic knowledge discovery.     

Look‐a‐Like: A Fast Content‐Based Image Retrieval Approach Using a Hierarchically Nested Dynamically Evolving Image Clouds and Recursive Local Data Density

The need to find related images from big data streams is shared by many professionals, such as architects, engineers, designers, journalist, and ordinary people. Users need to quickly find the relevant images from data streams generated from a variety of domains. The challenges in image retrieval are widely recognized, and the research aiming to address them led to the area of content‐based image retrieval becoming a “hot” area. In this paper, we propose a novel computationally efficient approach, which provides a high visual quality result based on the use of local recursive density estimation between a given query image of interest and data clouds/clusters which have hierarchical dynamically nested evolving structure. The proposed approach makes use of a combination of multiple features. The results on a data set of 65,000 images organized in two layers of a hierarchy demonstrate its computational efficiency. Moreover, the proposed Look‐a‐like approach is self‐evolving and updating adding new images by crawling and from the queries made.     

Confidence-based active learning

This paper proposes a new active learning approach, confidence-based active learning, for training a wide range of classifiers. This approach is based on identifying and annotating uncertain samples. The uncertainty value of each sample is measured by its conditional error. The approach takes advantage of current classifiers' probability preserving and ordering properties. It calibrates the output scores of classifiers to conditional error. Thus, it can estimate the uncertainty value for each input sample according to its output score from a classifier and select only samples with uncertainty value above a user-defined threshold. Even though we cannot guarantee the optimality of the proposed approach, we find it to provide good performance. Compared with existing methods, this approach is robust without additional computational effort. A new active learning method for support vector machines (SVMs) is implemented following this approach. A dynamic bin width allocation method is proposed to accurately estimate sample conditional error and this method adapts to the underlying probabilities. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is demonstrated using synthetic and real data sets and its performance is compared with the widely used least certain active learning method.     

Image selection and annotation for an environmental knowledge base

Images play an important role in the representation and acquisition of specialized knowledge. Not surprisingly, terminological knowledge bases (TKBs) often include images as a way to enhance the information in concept entries. However, the selection of these images should not be random, but rather based on specific guidelines that take into account the type and nature of the concept being described. This paper presents a proposal on how to combine the features of images with the conceptual propositions in EcoLexicon, a multilingual TKB on the environment. This proposal is based on the following: (1) the combinatory possibilities of concept types; (2) image types, such as photographs, drawings and flow charts; (3) morphological features or visual knowledge patterns (VKPs), such as labels, colours, arrows, and their effect on the functional nature of each image type. Currently, images are stored in association with concept entries according to the semantic content of their definitions, but they are not described or annotated according to the parameters that guided their selection, which would undoubtedly contribute to the systematization and automatization of the process. First, the images included in EcoLexicon were analyzed in terms of their adequateness, the semantic relations expressed, the concept types and their VKPs. Then, with these data, guidelines for image selection and annotation were created. The final aim is twofold: (1) to systematize the selection of images and (2) to start annotating old and new images so that the system can automatically allocate them in different concept entries based on shared conceptual propositions.     

SVD域的图像高斯噪声强度估计

精确估计图像或视频中的噪声强度对于后续的信号处理是至关重要的先决条件。通过对含噪图像的奇异值特性的研究,提出一种精确的SVD域的图像噪声强度估计算法。该算法对噪声强度估计提出了创新的解决方法:1)利用奇异值的尾部数据进行噪声强度估计,这样达到尽可能地降低图像信息对噪声估计的干扰;2)对含噪图像加入已知强度的高斯白噪声,以计算噪声估计时需要设置的与图像内容相关的参数,因此该算法可以自适应图像的结构,能够广泛地适应各种类型的图片。实验结果表明SVD域噪声强度估计算法适用于各种图片类型,而且在极大的噪声强度范围内都能够稳定精确地估计噪声强度。     

一种基于视觉单词的图像检索方法

基于内容的图像检索技术最主要的问题是图像的低层特征和高层语义之间存在着"语义鸿沟"。受文本内容分析的启发,有研究学者借鉴传统词典中用文本单词组合解释术语的思路,将图像视为视觉单词的组合,利用一系列视觉单词的组合来描述图像的语义内容。为此,利用SIFT进行图像的视觉单词特征提取,然后构建视觉单词库,最后实现了一个基于视觉单词的图像检索系统。实验结果表明,该方法在一定程度上提高了图像检索的查准率。     

Document Image Retrieval through Word Shape Coding

This paper presents a document retrieval technique that is capable of searching document images without OCR (optical character recognition). The proposed technique retrieves document images by a new word shape coding scheme, which captures the document content through annotating each word image by a word shape code. In particular, we annotate word images by using a set of topological shape features including character ascenders/descenders, character holes, and character water reservoirs. With the annotated word shape codes, document images can be retrieved by either query keywords or a query document image. Experimental results show that the proposed document image retrieval technique is fast, efficient, and tolerant to various types of document degradation.     

An information fusion approach to integrate image annotation and text mining methods for geographic knowledge discovery

Due to the steady increase in the number of heterogeneous types of location information on the internet, it is hard to organize a complete overview of the geospatial information for the tasks of knowledge acquisition related to specific geographic locations. The text- and photo-types of geographical dataset contain numerous location data, such as location-based tourism information, therefore defining high dimensional spaces of attributes that are highly correlated. In this work, we utilized text- and photo-types of location information with a novel approach of information fusion that exploits effective image annotation and location based text-mining approaches to enhance identification of geographic location and spatial cognition. In this paper, we describe our feature extraction methods to annotating images, and utilizing text mining approach to analyze images and texts simultaneously, in order to carry out geospatial text mining and image classification tasks. Subsequently, photo-images and textual documents are projected to a unified feature space, in order to generate a co-constructed semantic space for information fusion. Also, we employed text mining approaches to classify documents into various categories based upon their geospatial features, with the aims to discovering relationships between documents and geographical zones. The experimental results show that the proposed method can effectively enhance the tasks of location based knowledge discovery.     

Constructing a discriminative visual vocabulary with macro and micro sense of visual words

Visual vocabulary representation approach has been successfully applied to many multimedia and vision applications, including visual recognition, image retrieval, and scene modeling/categorization. The idea behind the visual vocabulary representation is that an image can be represented by visual words, a collection of local features of images. In this work, we will develop a new scheme for the construction of visual vocabulary based on the analysis of visual word contents. By considering the content homogeneity of visual words, we design a visual vocabulary which contains macro-sense and micro-sense visual words. The two types of visual words are appropriately further combined to describe an image effectively. We also apply the visual vocabulary to construct image retrieving and categorization systems. The performance evaluation for the two systems indicates that the proposed visual vocabulary achieves promising results.     

A modified DWT-based image steganography technique

The main challenges of image steganography are imperceptibility of the cover image and no recoverability of the secret data. To deal with these challenges, a modified digital image steganography technique based on Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) is proposed. In proposed approach, two new concepts are being proposed to minimize the distortion in the cover image. The first one i.e. secret key computation concept is proposed to make it more robust and resistive towards steganalysis. The second one, known as blocking concept, is introduced to ensure least variation in the cover image. The proposed approach is tested over ten different cover images and two secret images. Its performance is compared with the six well-known steganography techniques. The experimental results reveal that the proposed approach performs better than the existing techniques in terms of imperceptibility, security and quality measures. The six image processing attacks are also applied on the stego-image to test the robustness of the proposed approach. The effects of compression, rotation, and application of different wavelets have also been investigated on the proposed approach. The results demonstrate the robustness of the proposed approach under different image processing attacks. Both stego-image and extracted secret images possess better visual quality.     

Context-based segmentation of image sequences

We describe an algorithm for context-based segmentation of visual data. New frames in an image sequence (video) are segmented based on the prior segmentation of earlier frames in the sequence. The segmentation is performed by adapting a probabilistic model learned on previous frames, according to the content of the new frame. We utilize the maximum a posteriori version of the EM algorithm to segment the new image. The Gaussian mixture distribution that is used to model the current frame is transformed into a conjugate-prior distribution for the parametric model describing the segmentation of the new frame. This semisupervised method improves the segmentation quality and consistency and enables a propagation of segments along the segmented images. The performance of the proposed approach is illustrated on both simulated and real image data.