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An Image Preprocessing Algorithm for Illumination Invariant Face Recognition

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Audio- and Video-Based Biometric Person Authentication (AVBPA 2003)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 2688))

Abstract

Face recognition algorithms have to deal with significant amounts of illumination variations between gallery and probe images. State-of-the-art commercial face recognition algorithms still struggle with this problem. We propose a new image preprocessing algorithm that compensates for illumination variations in images. From a single brightness image the algorithm first estimates the illumination field and then compensates for it to mostly recover the scene reflectance. Unlike previously proposed approaches for illumination compensation, our algorithm does not require any training steps, knowledge of 3D face models or reflective surface models. We apply the algorithm to face images prior to recognition. We demonstrate large performance improvements with several standard face recognition algorithms across multiple, publicly available face databases.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, 5000 Forbes Avenue, 15213, Pittsburgh, PA

    Ralph Gross & Vladimir Brajovic

Authors
  1. Ralph Gross
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  2. Vladimir Brajovic
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Vision, Speech and Signal Proc., University of Surrey, GU2 7XH, Guildford, Surrey, UK

    Josef Kittler

  2. Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, SO17 1BJ, Southampton, UK

    Mark S. Nixon

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© 2003 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Gross, R., Brajovic, V. (2003). An Image Preprocessing Algorithm for Illumination Invariant Face Recognition. In: Kittler, J., Nixon, M.S. (eds) Audio- and Video-Based Biometric Person Authentication. AVBPA 2003. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2688. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44887-X_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44887-X_2

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-40302-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44887-7

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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