3D Model Enhanced Face Recognition

Wen-Yi Zhao, Rama Chellappa

Abstract: A personal identification system based on the analysis of frontal or profile images of the face has applications in human-computer interfaces, access control, surveillance etc. Among many practical face recognition schemes, image based approaches are possibly the most promising ones. However, the 2D images/patterns of 3D face objects can change dramatically due to lighting and viewing variations. In this paper, we propose a generic 3D model to enhance existing face recognition systems. More specifically, we use a 3D model to synthesize the so-called prototype image from a given image acquired under different lighting and viewing conditions.