Face recognition in the thermal infrared domain
- Resource Type
- Authors
- Artur Grudzień; Norbert Palka; Marcin Kowalski; Mieczyslaw Szustakowski
- Source
- Counterterrorism, Crime Fighting, Forensics, and Surveillance Technologies
- Subject
- Thermal infrared
Biometrics
business.industry
Infrared
Computer science
020206 networking & telecommunications
02 engineering and technology
Facial recognition system
Domain (software engineering)
Face verification
Face (geometry)
Biometric trait
0202 electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering
020201 artificial intelligence & image processing
Computer vision
Artificial intelligence
business
- Language
Biometrics refers to unique human characteristics. Each unique characteristic may be used to label and describe individuals and for automatic recognition of a person based on physiological or behavioural properties. One of the most natural and the most popular biometric trait is a face. The most common research methods on face recognition are based on visible light. State-of-the-art face recognition systems operating in the visible light spectrum achieve very high level of recognition accuracy under controlled environmental conditions. Thermal infrared imagery seems to be a promising alternative or complement to visible range imaging due to its relatively high resistance to illumination changes. A thermal infrared image of the human face presents its unique heat-signature and can be used for recognition. The characteristics of thermal images maintain advantages over visible light images, and can be used to improve algorithms of human face recognition in several aspects. Mid-wavelength or far-wavelength infrared also referred to as thermal infrared seems to be promising alternatives. We present the study on 1:1 recognition in thermal infrared domain. The two approaches we are considering are stand-off face verification of non-moving person as well as stop-less face verification on-the-move. The paper presents methodology of our studies and challenges for face recognition systems in the thermal infrared domain.