Image Processing Techniques for Face-based Biometrics


Massimo Tistarelli

Computer Vision Laboratory

University of Sassari, DAP

piazza Duomo, 6 ¨C 07041 Alghero (SS) ¨C Italy

e-mail: tista@uniss.it

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Overview

The tutorial will consists of two sessions devoted to the description of the basic techniques related to face recognition. The lectures will provide a comprehensive outline of face-based biometrics, its relation to biological systems (the psychophysics of the human visual system), including the existing applications and commercial systems.

The lectures will then provide an in-depth analysis of the state-of-the-art algorithms for face-image analysis including: face detection and tracking, landmark localization, feature extraction, face representation and classification.

The lectures will devote most of the time to the image processing aspects of the recognition process, rather than on the classification itself. Therefore, the most relevant issues and problems will be raised, providing practical solutions and algorithms responding to them. Particular attention will be devoted to the most advanced issues in the field and the current approaches presented in the literature.

Finally, the tutorial will present two relevant and novel issues: the use of face image sequences for exploiting the time domain, the extension to 3D face analysis, and the categorization of facial expression to infer human emotions.

[1] Tistarelli, M., Bigun, J. and Grosso, E. (2005) Advanced Studies in Biometrics, Tutorial Lecture Notes in Computer Science 3161, Springer Verlag.

[2] Tistarelli, M, Lagorio, A. and Grosso, E. (2004) "What Can I Tell From Your Face?", in Proceedings of the ˇ°First International Conference on Biometric Authenticationˇ± (ICBA 2004), July 2004, pp. 72-78, Springer Verlag, Lecture Notes in Computer Science.

 

Outline

Part 1

1.     Basic concepts of biometric systems: motivations, potential applications, techniques and system issues.

2.     Why face-based biometrics: advantages and disadvantages.

3.     Notions from the psychophysics of the human visual system: Neurophysiology of the human visual system and face-     related experiments.

4.     How a face-based recognition system works.

5.     Examples from existing systems and applications.

6.     Performance evaluation and testing.

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Part 2

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1.     Algorithmic issues in face recognition:

a.     Face detection and tracking

b.     Geometric and photometric normalization

c.     Landmark localization

d.     Face representation

e.     Classification

2.     Open problems: outstanding issues and possible solutions

3.     New frontiers in face recognition:

a.     Exploitation of the time dimension (face image sequences)

b.     3D face image analysis

c.     Categorization of facial expressions and the description of emotions.

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Biography

Massimo Tistarelli was born on November 11, 1962 in Genoa, Italy.

He received a degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Genoa, Italy in 1987 and the Phd in Computer Science and Robotics in 1991 from the same university.

Since 1994 he has been the director of the Computer Vision Laboratory at the Department of Communication, Computer and Systems Science of the University of Genoa, leading several national and European projects on computer vision applications and image-based biometrics.

His main research interests cover biological and artificial vision (particularly in the area of recognition and dynamic scene analysis), biometrics, robotic navigation and visuo-motor coordination. He is author of more than 70 papers in scientific conferences and international journals.

In 2000 he was the chairman for the International workshop on "Advances in Facial Image Analysis and Recognition Technology" and in 2002 for the International workshop on ˇ°Biometric Authenticationˇ±.

He was associate editor for the journal Image and Vision Computing. In 2003, 2005 and 2006 he was the director for the International Summer School on Biometrics held in Alghero, Italy.

He is member of the program committee in several international conferences on computer vision and image analysis, and reviewer for the most outstanding journals in the field.

Prof. Tistarelli is one of the leading scientists in biometrics and particularly for face recognition. He is a member and part of the steering board of the European Network of Excellence Biosecure, involving all major European research centres working in biometrics.

Massimo Tistarelli is currently Full Professor in Computer Science at the Department of Architecture and Planning at the University of Sassari, Italy.