Key-point associating apparatus, key-point associating method, and non-transitory computer-readable storage medium

A key-point associating method performed by a computer, comprising:

• acquiring a target image on which one or more persons are captured;
• detecting key-points of the persons from the target image for each one of body parts of the person;
• generating a spatial feature map for each one of predefined pairs of the body parts using the target image, the spatial feature map of the pair of the body parts including a first direction region for each one of the key-points that represents a first body part of that pair and a second direction region for each one of the key-points that represents a second body part of that pair, the first direction region and the second direction region that belong to a same person as each other representing a direction from the key-point of the first direction region to the key-point of the second direction region;
• and
• generating a key-point group, which includes the key-points of a same person as each other, for each one of the persons captured on the target image.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing a program that causes a computer to execute:

• acquiring a target image on which one or more persons are captured;
• detecting key-points of the persons from the target image for each one of body parts of the person;
• generating a spatial feature map for each one of predefined pairs of the body parts using the target image, the spatial feature map of the pair of the body parts including a first direction region for each one of the key-points that represents a first body part of that pair and a second direction region for each one of the key-points that represents a second body part of that pair, the first direction region and the second direction region that belong to a same person as each other representing a direction from the key-point of the first direction region to the key-point of the second direction region;
• and
• generating a key-point group, which includes the key-points of a same person as each other, for each one of the persons captured on the target image.