Search for: All records

Sketch-to-image is an important task to reduce the burden of creating a color image from scratch. Unlike previous sketch-to-image models, where the image is synthesized in an end-to-end manner, leading to an unnaturalistic image, we propose a method by decomposing the problem into subproblems to generate a more naturalistic and reasonable image. It first generates an intermediate output which is a semantic mask map from the input sketch through instance and semantic segmentation in two levels, background segmentation and foreground segmentation. Background segmentation is formed based on the context of the foreground objects. Then, the foreground segmentations are sequentially added to the created background segmentation. Finally, the generated mask map is fed into an image-to-image translation model to generate an image. Our proposed method works with 92 distinct classes. Compared to state-of-the-art sketch-to-image models, our proposed method outperforms the previous methods and generates better images. 

Sketch-to-image synthesis method transforms a simple abstract black-and-white sketch into an image. Most sketch-to-image synthesis methods generate an image in an end-to-end manner, leading to generate a non-satisfactory result. The reason is that, in end-to-end models, the models generate images directly from the input sketches. Thus, with very abstract and complicated sketches, the models might struggle in generating naturalistic images due to the simultaneous focus on both factors: overall shape and fine-grained details. In this paper, we propose to divide the problem into subproblems. To this end, an intermediate output, which is a semantic mask map, is first generated from the input sketch via an instance and semantic segmentation. In the instance segmentation stage, the objects' sizes might be modified depending on the surrounding environment and their respective size prior to reflect reality and produce more realistic images. In the semantic seg-mentation stage, a background segmentation is first constructed based on the context of the detected objects. Various natural scenes are implemented for both indoor and outdoor scenes. Following this, a foreground segmentation process is commenced, where each detected object is semantically added into the constructed segmented background. Then, in the next stage, an image-to-image translation model is leveraged to convert the semantic mask map into a colored image. Finally, a post-processing stage is incorporated to further enhance the image result. Extensive experiments demonstrate the superiority of our proposed method over state-of-the-art methods. 

The proliferation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) models such as Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) has shown impressive success in image synthesis. Artificial GAN-based synthesized images have been widely spread over the Internet with the advancement in generating naturalistic and photo-realistic images. This might have the ability to improve content and media; however, it also constitutes a threat with regard to legitimacy, authenticity, and security. Moreover, implementing an automated system that is able to detect and recognize GAN-generated images is significant for image synthesis models as an evaluation tool, regardless of the input modality. To this end, we propose a framework for reliably detecting AI-generated images from real ones through Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs). First, GAN-generated images were collected based on different tasks and different architectures to help with the generalization. Then, transfer learning was applied. Finally, several Class Activation Maps (CAM) were integrated to determine the discriminative regions that guided the classification model in its decision. Our approach achieved 100% on our dataset, i.e., Real or Synthetic Images (RSI), and a superior performance on other datasets and configurations in terms of its accuracy. Hence, it can be used as an evaluation tool in image generation. Our best detector was a pre-trained EfficientNetB4 fine-tuned on our dataset with a batch size of 64 and an initial learning rate of 0.001 for 20 epochs. Adam was used as an optimizer, and learning rate reduction along with data augmentation were incorporated. 

In this paper, we investigate the career path prediction of an individual in the future. This benefits a variety of application in the industry including enhancing human resources, career guidance, and keeping track of future trends. To this end, we collected a dataset via LinkedIn network, with the job position and the job domain for each individual. There are many attributes related to historical background for each individual. For the career prediction, we investigate six different multi-class multi-output classification methods. Via the benchmark suite, the best classifier achieves an accuracy rate of 91.21% and 95.97% for the job domain and the job position, respectively. 

Image synthesis is a process of converting the input text, sketch, or other sources, i.e., another image or mask, into an image. It is an important problem in the computer vision field, where it has attracted the research community to attempt to solve this challenge at a high level to generate photorealistic images. Different techniques and strategies have been employed to achieve this purpose. Thus, the aim of this paper is to provide a comprehensive review of various image synthesis models covering several aspects. First, the image synthesis concept is introduced. We then review different image synthesis methods divided into three categories: image generation from text, sketch, and other inputs, respectively. Each sub-category is introduced under the proper category based upon the general framework to provide a broad vision of all existing image synthesis methods. Next, brief details of the benchmarked datasets used in image synthesis are discussed along with specifying the image synthesis models that leverage them. Regarding the evaluation, we summarize the metrics used to evaluate the image synthesis models. Moreover, a detailed analysis based on the evaluation metrics of the results of the introduced image synthesis is provided. Finally, we discuss some existing challenges and suggest possible future research directions. 

The price of a house depends on many factors, such as its size, location, amenities, surrounding establishments, and the season in which the house is being sold, just to name a few of them. As a seller, it is absolutely essential to price the property competitively else it will not attract any buyers. This problem has given rise to multiple companies as well as past research works that try to enhance the predictability of property prices using relevant mathematical models and machine learning techniques. In this research, we investigate the usage of machine learning in predicting the house price based on related estate attributes and visual images. To this end, we collect a dataset of 2,000 houses across different cities in the United States. For each house, we annotate 14 estate attributes and five visual images for exterior, interior-living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. Following the dataset collection, different features are extracted from the input data. Furthermore, a multi-kernel regression approach is used to predict the house price from both visual cues and estate attributes. The extensive experiments demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method over the baselines.