We develop a face recognition algorithm which is insensitive to gross variation in lighting direction and facial expression. Taking a pattern classification approach, we consider each pixel in an image as a coordinate in a high-dimensional space. We take advantage of the observation that the images of a particular face, under varying illumination but fixed pose, lie in a 3-D linear subspace of the high dimensional image space -- if the face is a Lambertian surface without shadowing. However, since faces are not truly Lambertian surfaces and do indeed produce self-shadowing, images will deviate from this linear subspace. Rather than explicitly modeling this deviation, we linearly project the image into a subspace in a manner which discounts those regions of the face with large deviation. Our projection method is based on Fisher's Linear Discriminant and produces well separated classes in a low-dimensional subspace even under severe variation in lighting and facial expressions. The Eigenface

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Abstract—This paper addresses the problem of retrieving images from large image databases. The method is based on local grayvalue invariants which are computed at automatically detected interest points. A voting algorithm and semilocal constraints make retrieval possible. Indexing allows for efficient retrieval from a database of more than 1,000 images. Experimental results show correct retrieval in the case of partial visibility, similarity transformations, extraneous features, and small perspective deformations. Index Terms—Image retrieval, image indexing, graylevel invariants, matching, interest points. 1

Stable local feature detection and representation is a fundamental component of many image registration and object recognition algorithms. Mikolajczyk and Schmid [14] recently evaluated a variety of approaches and identified the SIFT [11] algorithm as being the most resistant to common image deformations. This paper examines (and improves upon) the local image descriptor used by SIFT. Like SIFT, our descriptors encode the salient aspects of the image gradient in the feature point's neighborhood; however, instead of using SIFT's smoothed weighted histograms, we apply Principal Components Analysis (PCA) to the normalized gradient patch. Our experiments demonstrate that the PCAbased local descriptors are more distinctive, more robust to image deformations, and more compact than the standard SIFT representation. We also present results showing that using these descriptors in an image retrieval application results in increased accuracy and faster matching.

Human face detection is often the first step in applications such as video surveillance, human computer interface, face recognition, and image database management. We propose a face detection algorithm for color images in the presence of varying lighting conditions as well as complex backgrounds. Our method detects skin regions over the entire image, and then generates face candidates based on the spatial arrangement of these skin patches. The algorithm constructs eye, mouth, and boundary maps for verifying each face candidate. Experimental results demonstrate successful detection over a wide variety of facial variations in color, position, scale, rotation, pose, and expression from several photo collections.

this paper we focus on featureextraction and face-identification processes

We present a real-time face tracker in this paper. The system has achieved a rate of 30+ frames/second using an HP-9000 workstation with a framegrabber and a Canon VC-C1 camera. It can track a person’s face while the person moves freely (e.g., walks, jumps, sits down and stands up) in a room. Three types of models have been employed in developing the system. First, we present a stochastic model to characterize skin-color distributions of human faces. The information provided by the model is sufficient for tracking a human face in various poses and views. This model is adaptable to different people and different lighting conditions in real-time. Second, a motion model is used to estimate image motion and to predict search window. Third, a camera model is used to predict and to compensate for camera motion. The system can be applied to tele-conferencing and many HCI applications including lip-reading and gaze tracking. The principle in developing this system can be extended to other tracking problems such as tracking the human hand. 1

Many problems in information processing involve some form of dimensionality reduction. In this paper, we introduce Locality Preserving Projections (LPP). These are linear projective maps that arise by solving a variational problem that optimally preserves the neighborhood structure of the data set. LPP should be seen as an alternative to Principal Component Analysis (PCA) -- a classical linear technique that projects the data along the directions of maximal variance. When the high dimensional data lies on a low dimensional manifold embedded in the ambient space, the Locality Preserving Projections are obtained by finding the optimal linear approximations to the eigenfunctions of the Laplace Beltrami operator on the manifold. As a result, LPP shares many of the data representation properties of nonlinear techniques such as Laplacian Eigenmaps or Locally Linear Embedding. Yet LPP is linear and more crucially is defined everywhere in ambient space rather than just on the training data points. This is borne out by illustrative examples on some high dimensional data sets.

Abstract—We propose an appearance-based face recognition method called the Laplacianface approach. By using Locality Preserving Projections (LPP), the face images are mapped into a face subspace for analysis. Different from Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) which effectively see only the Euclidean structure of face space, LPP finds an embedding that preserves local information, and obtains a face subspace that best detects the essential face manifold structure. The Laplacianfaces are the optimal linear approximations to the eigenfunctions of the Laplace Beltrami operator on the face manifold. In this way, the unwanted variations resulting from changes in lighting, facial expression, and pose may be eliminated or reduced. Theoretical analysis shows that PCA, LDA, and LPP can be obtained from different graph models. We compare the proposed Laplacianface approach with Eigenface and Fisherface methods on three different face data sets. Experimental results suggest that the proposed Laplacianface approach provides a better representation and achieves lower error rates in face recognition. Index Terms—Face recognition, principal component analysis, linear discriminant analysis, locality preserving projections, face manifold, subspace learning. 1

Abstract. This paper studies a statistical skin-color model and its adaptation. It is revealed that (1) human skin colors cluster in a small region in a color space; (2) the variance of a skin color cluster can be reduced by intensity normalization, and (3) under a certain lighting condition, a skin-color distribution can be characterized by amultivariate normal distribution in the normalized color space. We then propose an adaptive model to characterize human skin-color distributions for tracking human faces under di erent lighting conditions. The parameters of the model are adapted based on the maximum likelihood criterion. The model has been successfully applied to a real-time face tracker and other applications. 1