Two stage detection for photographic eye artifacts

• US 8,175,342 B2
• Filed: 04/03/2011
• Issued: 05/08/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: FotoNation Limited (Adeia Inc.)
• Original Assignee: DigitalOptics Corporation Europe Limited (Adeia Inc.)
• Inventors: Prilutsky, Yury, Steinberg, Eran, Corcoran, Peter, Pososin, Alexei, Bigioi, Petronel, Ciuc, Mihai
• Primary Examiner(s): Rahmjoo, Mike
• Application Number:
  US13/079,013
• Publication Number:
  US 20110262034A1
• Time in Patent Office: 401 Days
• Field of Search: 382/117, 382/275, 382/260, 382/274, 382/103, 358/515, 358/518, 345/589
• US Class Current: 382/117
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/193 Preprocessing; Feature extraction

Abstract

The detection of red-eye defects is enhanced in digital images for embedded image acquisition and processing systems. A two-stage redeye filtering system includes a speed optimized filter that performs initial segmentation of candidate redeye regions and optionally applies a speed-optimized set of falsing/verification filters to determine a first set of confirmed redeye regions for correction. Some of the candidate regions which are rejected during the first stage are recorded and re-analyzed during a second stage by an alternative set of analysis-optimized filters to determine a second set of confirmed redeye regions.

Claims

1. A method of processing a digital image comprising:

using a processor;

obtaining candidate face regions of an acquired digital image;

filtering the candidate face regions with a first speed optimized filter to produce a first set of candidate red-eye regions;

encoding at least a portion of the acquired digital image; and

storing the encoded portion of the acquired digital image in association with said first set of candidate red-eye regions for later image processing of said encoded image,

wherein the first speed optimized filter is applied upon image acquisition, and a second analysis-optimized filter is applied in a background or playback mode or both.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising applying a speed-optimized set of one or more falsing/verification filters.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising passing the first set of candidate redeye regions through an analysis-optimized filter.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising passing candidate face regions rejected by the filtering through the analysis-optimized filter sometime after the filtering, encoding and storing.

5. A system for processing a digital image, comprising:

(a) an image acquisition subsystem;

(b) a face detector for obtaining candidate face regions of an acquired digital image;

(c) a speed optimized filter for filtering the candidate face regions to produce a first set of candidate red-eye regions;

(d) a processor for encoding at least a portion of the acquired digital image;

(e) a storage device for storing therein the encoded portion of the acquired digital image in association with said first set of candidate red-eye regions for later image processing of said encoded image; and

(f) an analysis optimized filter for filtering the candidate red-eye regions in a background or playback mode or both,

(g) wherein the speed optimized filter is applied upon image acquisition.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the analysis-optimized filter for filtering at least initially rejected candidate face regions to produce a second set of candidate red-eye regions.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the analysis-optimized filter for confirming one or more of the first set of candidate red eye regions sometime after speed-optimized filtering.

8. One or more non-transitory, processor-readable media having code embedded therein for programming one or more processors to perform a method of processing a digital image, wherein the method comprises:

obtaining candidate face regions of an acquired digital image;

filtering the candidate face regions with a first speed optimized filter to produce a first set of candidate red-eye regions;

encoding at least a portion of the acquired digital image; and

storing the encoded portion of the acquired digital image in association with said first set of candidate red-eye regions for later image processing of said encoded image,

wherein the first speed optimized filter is applied upon image acquisition, and a second analysis-optimized filter is applied in a background or playback mode or both.

9. The one or more non-transitory, processor-readable media of claim 8, the method further comprising applying a speed-optimized set of one or more falsing/verification filters.

10. The one or more non-transitory, processor-readable media of claim 8, the method further comprising passing the first set of candidate redeye regions through an analysis-optimized filter.

11. The one or more non-transitory, processor-readable media of claim 8, the method further comprising passing candidate face regions rejected by the filtering through the analysis-optimized filter sometime after the filtering, encoding and storing.