Method and system for enhancing portrait images that are processed in a batch mode

A method for enhancing an appearance of one or more faces appearing in a plurality of digital images that can be assigned to one or more classes based on subject matter, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) detecting a location of facial feature points in the one or more faces, said facial feature points including points identifying salient features including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, and hair;
• (b) using the location of the facial feature points to segment the face into different regions, said different regions including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, neck and hair regions;
• (c) determining one or more facially relevant characteristics of the different regions;
• (d) based on the facially relevant characteristics of the different regions, selecting (1) one or more enhancement filters each customized especially for a particular region and (2) the default parameters for the enhancement filters, wherein the default parameters are dependent on the class of images, wherein the class is based on a category of substantially similar subject matter;
• and
• (e) executing the enhancement filters on the particular regions, thereby producing an enhanced digital image from the digital image.

An automatic retouching method for enhancing an appearance of a face located in a digital image, wherein said face has hair in a skin region thereof, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) acquiring a digital image containing one or more faces;
• (b) detecting a location of facial feature points in the one or more faces, including special feature points that are useful for identifying the location of a facial hair region;
• (c) defining a bounding box for the facial hair region by utilizing the feature points;
• (d) generating a plurality of feature probability maps within the bounding box;
• (e) combining the feature probability maps to generate a combined feature probability map for the facial hair region;
• and
• (f) based on the combined feature probability map for the facial hair region, using an enhancement filter to enhance at least the texture or the skin tone of the facial hair region while masking off the facial hair, thereby producing an enhanced digital image from the digital image.

A method for enhancing an appearance of a face located in a digital image, wherein the appearance includes one or more symmetrical features, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) acquiring an original digital image containing one or more faces;
• (b) detecting a location of facial feature points in the one or more faces, said facial feature points including points identifying salient symmetrical features including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, and hair;
• (c) using the location of the facial feature points to segment the face into different regions, said different regions including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, neck and hair regions;
• (d) determining one or more facially relevant characteristics of the different regions;
• (e) based on the facially relevant characteristics of the different regions, selecting (1) one or more enhancement filters each customized especially for a particular region and (2) the default parameters for the enhancement filters;
• and
• (f) executing the enhancement filters on the particular regions in a proportional manner to account for symmetry between the facially relevant characteristics of the different regions, thereby producing an enhanced digital image from the original digital image.

A method for enhancing the skin texture of a face appearing in a digital image, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) generating a luminance image from the digital image;
• (b) using a valley/peak detector to detect skin features in the luminance image;
• (c) classifying the skin features according to their feature-based characteristics, wherein the skin features are classified according to location in a skin region;
• (d) selecting relevant skin features for modification;
• (e) modifying the relevant skin features using an adaptive interpolation procedure, thereby producing a modified image;
• and
• (f) blending the digital image and the modified image to produce an enhanced image, wherein the amount of blending is dependent upon a characteristic of a relevant skin feature being between a minimum and maximum size threshold, wherein the thresholds are varied based on location of the skin feature.

A method for enhancing the skin texture of a face appearing in a digital image, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) generating a luminance image from the digital image;
• (b) using a valley/peak detector to detect skin features in the luminance image;
• (c) classifying the skin features according to their feature-based characteristics, wherein the skin features are classified according to a type of skin feeature;
• (d) selecting relevant skin features for modification;
• (e) modifying the relevant skin features using an adaptive interpolation procedure, thereby producing a modified image;
• and
• (f) blending the digital image and the modified image to produce an enhanced image based on the type of the skin feature, wherein the degree of blending is varied based on the type of feature.

A method for enhancing the skin texture of a face appearing in a digital image by re-texturizing skin regions of the face, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) detecting skin features in the digital image;
• (b) classifying the skin features according to their feature-based characteristics;
• (c) selecting relevant skin features for modification;
• (e) enhancing the relevant skin features;
• (f) generating a spatially scaled idealized texture;
• and
• (g) adding the spatially scaled idealized texture into the relevant skin features, thereby producing a re-texturized digital image.

A method for enhancing the shape of symmetrical features appearing in a face located in a digital image, said method comprising the steps of:

• (a) acquiring a digital image containing one or more faces;
• (b) detecting a location of facial feature points in the one or more faces, said facial feature points including points identifying a pair of salient symmetrical features amenable to shape adjustment;
• (c) using the facial feature points to determine two or more source points that are positioned relative to the salient features;
• (d) using the facial feature points to determine two or more destination points which determine the desired change of the salient features;
• and
• (e) warping the shape of the salient feature by using the source points and the destination points in a manner that substantially equalizes changes in shape for the pair of symmetrical features.

A processing method for enhancing an appearance of a face located in a digital image that is processed in a user-interactive kiosk environment, the method comprising the steps of:

• acquiring an original digital image containing one or more faces;
• detecting a face in the original digital image;
• processing the original digital image to determine if the face is suitable for enhancement based on at least one of size and state of focus of the face in the image;
• if the face is found to be acceptable for enhancement relative to a predetermined threshold related to size and state of focus, then enhancing the image according to one or more enhancement algorithms and displaying the image for review by a user of the kiosk;
• and
• if the face is found not to be acceptable by the user, then providing an interactive retouching mode for the user to interactively adjust the one or more enhancement algorithms until the image is acceptable.

A user-interactive photographic kiosk for processing a digital image for enhancing an appearance of a face located in the image, the kiosk comprising:

• an input interface for acquiring an original digital image containing one or more faces;
• a processor for (a) detecting a face in the original digital image;
• (b) processing the original digital image to determine if the face is suitable for enhancement based on at least one of size and state of focus of the face in the image;
• and (c) if the face is found to be acceptable for enhancement relative to a predetermined threshold related to size and state of focus, then enhancing the image according to one or more enhancement algorithms;
• a display for displaying the enhanced image for review by a user of the kiosk;
• and
• an interactive retouching mode for enabling the user, if the face is found not to be acceptable, to interactively adjust the one or more enhancement algorithms until the image is acceptable.

A method for enhancing the appearance of teeth and eyes in a face appearing in a digital image, while balancing their color and uniformity, said method comprising the steps of:

• acquiring a digital image having pixel values representative of teeth and eye regions of a face contained in the image;
• determining a preferred color for the teeth and eye regions;
• calculating a difference between each pixel value and a mean color value determined from the pixel values;
• providing an enhanced image of the teeth and eyes from a scaled combination of said difference and the preferred color for the teeth and eye regions, whereby the mean and variance of the color distributions of the pixels of the teeth and eyes are shifted such that the teeth and eye regions are given a more pleasing appearance.