CSCI 129 Computational Photography

Fall 2012, MWF 11:00 to 11:50, CIT 477 (Lubrano)
Instructor: James Hays
HTA: Sam Birch and GTA: Emanuel Zgraggen

Computational Photography Montage

Course Description

Course Catalog Entry
Computational Photography describes the convergence of computer graphics, computer vision, and the Internet with photography. Its goal is to overcome the limitations of traditional photography using computational techniques to enhance the way we capture, manipulate, and interact with visual media. In this course we will study many interesting, recent image based algorithms and implement them to the degree that is possible. We will cover topics such as The course will consist of six programming projects, two written exams, and a student-chosen final project. Students can earn graduate credit for the course but will need to meet higher requirements on all projects throughout the semester. The graduate version can count towards a graphics specialization.

Prerequisites

This course requires programming experience as well as linear algebra, basic calculus, and basic probability. Previous knowledge of computer graphics or computer vision will be helpful. It is strongly recommended that students have taken one of the following courses (or equivalent courses at other institutions): Some of the course topics overlap with these related courses, but none of the assignments will.

Assignments

Winning projects

All Results

Image alignment with pyramids Hang Su Project 1 Results
Gradient domain fusion using Poisson blending Daniel Moreno Project 2 Results
Image retargeting with Seam Carving Jonathan Mace Bryce Aebi Project 3 Results
Texture synthesis and transfer with Image Quilting Hua Guo Project 4 Results
High dynamic range and tone mapping Yan Li Project 5 Results
Automatic Panorama Construction Daniel Moreno Project 6 Results
Your choice for final project Ian Strickman Yan Li Final Project Results
It is strongly recommended that all projects be completed in Matlab. All starter code will be provided for Matlab. Students may implement projects through other means but it will generally be more difficult.

Equipment

Students are encouraged to capture their own photographic data for their projects. There's no need for anything fancy -- any digital camera with manual controls should work.

Textbook

Readings will be assigned in the free, online textbook "Computer Vision: Algorithms and Applications" by Richard Szeliski.

Grading

Your final grade will be made up from You have three "late days" for the whole course. That is to say, the first 24 hours after the due date and time counts as 1 day, up to 48 hours is two and 72 for the third late day. This will not be reflected in the initial grade reports for your assignment, but they will be factored in and distributed at the end of the semester so that you get the most points possible.

Graduate credit is available and each project will specifiy the minimum requirements to earn such credit.

Important Links:

Contact Info and Office Hours:

You can contact the professor or TA staff with any of the following: Professor James' office hours will be held in his office (CIT 445). TA office hours will be held in CIT 227 or CIT 271.

Tentative Syllabus

Class Date Topic Slides Reading Projects
W, Sept 5 Introduction to computational photography .ppt, .pdf Szeliski chapter 1
F, Sept 7 Cameras and optics .ppt, .pdf Szeliski chapter 2, especially 2.1.5 Project 1 out
M, Sept 10 Capturing light, man vs machine .ppt, .pdf Szeliski chapter 2
W, Sept 12 Sampling and reconstruction .ppt, .pdf Szeliski chapter 2
F, Sept 14 Linear Filters .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 3.2
M, Sept 17 Frequency Domain .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 3.4 Project 1 due
Project 2 out
W, Sept 19 Blending and compositing .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 3.3 and 9.3.4
F, Sept 21 Project 2 and Morphology .pptx, .pdf
.ppt, .pdf
Szeliski 3.3.2
M, Sept 24 Point Processing and Image Warping .ppt, .pdf
.ppt, .pdf
Szeliski 3.1 and 3.6.1
W, Sept 26 Image Retargeting .ppt, .pdf
F, Sept 28 Image Retargeting, continued see above Project 2 due
Project 3 out
M, Oct 1 Video Textures .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 13.5
W, Oct 3 Texture synthesis and filling .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 10.5
F, Oct 5 Image analogies, Graph cut, Scene completion .ppt, .pdf
.ppt, .pdf
Szeliski 9.3.2
M, Oct 8 No class
W, Oct 10 Exam review, Single image super-resolution .pptx, .pdf Project 3 due
F, Oct 12 Exam 1 Project 4 out
M, Oct 15 Invited Speaker: Connelly Barnes
W, Oct 17 Matting, Transparency, and Illumination .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 10.4 and 13.4
F, Oct 19 Recovering High Dynamic Range .pptx, .pdf Szeliski 10.2
M, Oct 22 Invited Speaker: John F. Hughes
W, Oct 24 Tone mapping .pptx, .pdf Szeliski 10.2 Project 4 due
F, Oct 26 Stereo .pptx, .pdf Szeliski chapter 11 Project 5 out
M, Oct 29 No class - Hurricane Sandy
W, Oct 31 Invited Speaker: Sylvain Paris. Fast Bilateral Filter .ppt, .pdf
F, Nov 2 Project 5 and Stereo, continued .pptx, .pdf
.ppt, .pdf
Szeliski chapter 11
M, Nov 5 Modeling light and lightfields .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 13.3
W, Nov 7 Image-based lighting .ppt, .pdf
F, Nov 9 Homographies and mosaics .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 9.1
M, Nov 12 Automatic image correspondence .pptx, .pdf Szeliski 4.1 Project 5 due
Project 6 out
W, Nov 14 RANSAC and mosaic wrapup .pptx, .pdf Szeliski 6.1 and 9.1.6
F, Nov 16 Taking good photographs
M, Nov 19 Photo quality assessment .pptx, .pdf
W, Nov 21 Project 6 and Final Project Discussion
F, Nov 23 No class, Thanksgiving break
M, Nov 26 Coded Aperture Photography .ppt, .pdf Levin et al., SIGGRAPH 2007 Project 6 due
Final Project
W, Nov 28 Visual Data and the Internet .ppt, .pdf Szeliski 14.5.1 and 14.4.4
F, Nov 30 Visual Data and the Internet II .ppt, .pdf
M, Dec 3 Invited speaker: Pierre-Yves Laffont. Intrinsic Images
W, Dec 5 Exam 2
F, Dec 7 Exam 2 recap, Final project discussion
M, Dec 10 No class, reading period
W, Dec 12 No class, reading period
F, Dec 21, 2pm Final Presentations during exam period

Acknowledgements

The materials from this class rely heavily on slides prepared by other instructors. In particular, many materials are modified from those of Alexei A. Efros, who in turn uses materials from Steve Seitz, Rick Szeliski, Paul Debevec, Stephen Palmer, Paul Heckbert, David Forsyth, Steve Marschner and others, as noted in the slides. Feel free to use these slides for academic or research purposes, but please maintain all acknowledgements.

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