Scene Visibility Estimation

Visibility Estimation Using a Single Image



Introduction


     In this paper, we propose a novel method for visibility estimation using only a single image as input. An assumption is proposed: the extinction coefficient of light is approximately a constant in clear atmosphere. Such assumption is based on a key observation – the clear atmosphere is composed of air molecules and a few small-scale aerosol particles, and distributions of them remain almost unchanged. Using this assumption with the theory of atmospheric radiation, the extinction coefficient in clear atmosphere can be estimated. Based on the dark channel prior, ratio for logarithmic values of two medium transmission maps respectively in current and clear atmosphere is calculated using a single image. By multiplying the clear extinction coefficient and the ratio, we can estimate the extinction coefficient of the input image and then obtain the visibility value. Compared with other methods that require the explicit extraction of the scene, our method needs no constraint and performs well in various types of scenes. Moreover, the actual distance information can also be estimated as a by-product of this method.
     In future work, we plan to explore the relationship between visibility and air quality by deep learning, which is expected to be an important complementary approach for air quality monitoring.

Method

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Result

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Code


It will be uploaded later.

Funding


This research is supported by:

- National Natural Science Foundation of China

Copyright notice


Please respect the original works, reproduced when the original source of the article and the author information.
More findings can be obtained in Visibility Estimation Using a Single Image (CCCV,2017) and Single Image-Based Scene Visibility Estimation (IEEE ACCESS,2019). If our works are useful to you, please cite them.
If you have any questions, please contact the original author of this article Qin Li, by email: liqin6@csu.edu.cn.