tutorial slides

One practical task: image matching
- How to find correspondence between pixels of two images of the same scene?

Simplest approach: correlation
Slightly more advanced: cross-correlation function calculated via Fourier Transform
Least squares error
Correlation

Fourier-Mellin Transform
Amplitude spectrum
Log-polar transform
Cross-corr. Via Fourier
Find scale/ rotation
Compensate scale/ rotation
Cross.corr. to find shifts
Success!

Block Matching: Local displacement extension
Take local fragments around different points of pre-aligned images
Match them by correlation
Construct local displacement field

Resulting displacement field
General solution for aerospace image matching!?

However…
Optical image
SAR image
Cross-correlation field
Many applications require matching images of different modalities
Optical image
Digital map
Correlation?

Criterion: Mutual Information
No correlation =>
No mutual information =>
Mutual information
Cross correlation: degraded maximum
Mutual information: Ideal maximum
Unfortunately, it’s difficult to compute and not applicable to vector maps
Viola P.A. Alignment by Maximization of Mutual Information: PhD thesis, MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts. 1995. 156 p.

Invariant structural descriptions
Image
Contours
Structural elements

Structural matching
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More questions…
How to estimate quality of structural correspondence?
How to choose the group of transformations if it is not known?
How to construct contours and structural elements optimally?
How to choose the most adequate number of contours and structural elements?
Are precision criteria such as mean square error suitable? Or have they the same shortcomings as correlation?

MSE criterion: oversegmentation
More precise
Over-segmentation!
Each region is described by average value
Correct, but not the most precise description!

Functional approximation
New point
Worst prediction!
Best precision

Information-theoretic criterion
Again, criteria from information theory help:
Mutual information can be extended for the task of matching structural elements
In general, the minimum description length can be used for model selection
The best model is the model that minimizes the sum
the description length (in bits) of the model,
the description length (in bits) of data encrypted with help of the model (deviation of data from model).

Connection to Bayes’ rule
Bayes rule:
Posterior probability: P(H | D)
Prior probability: P(H)
Likelihood: P(D | H)
The description length of the model: –log P(H)
The description length of data encrypted with the help of the model: –log P(D | H)

Application to function approximation
l(H) K(D|H)
Too simple model
Too complex model
The best model is chosen as trade-off between precision and complexity

Application to image segmentation
Ngr=300; DL=4,5e+5
Ngr=100; DL=3,8e+5
Ngr=37; DL=3,7e+5
Ngr=7; DL=3,9e+5
Initial image

Contour segmentation
MDL
Images
Extracted contours
MSE-approximation with high threshold on dispersion
MSE-approximation with low threshold on dispersion

Full solution of invariant image matching
Winter image
Spring image
Potapov A.S. Image matching with the use of the minimum description length approach // Proc. SPIE. 2004. Vol. 5426. P. 164–175.

Successful matching

More applications of MDL
Correct separation into clusters for keypoint matching in dynamic scenes
Essential for correct estimation of a dynamic scene structure
Wrong
Correct
A.N. Averkin, I.P. Gurov, M.V. Peterson, A.S. Potapov. Spectral-Differential Feature Matching and Clustering for Multi-body Motion Estimation // Proc. MVA2011 IAPR Conference on Machine Vision Applications. 2011. June 13-15, Nara, Japan. P. 173–176.

Pattern recognition, etc.:
Support-vector machines;
Discrimination functions;
Gaussian mixtures;
Decision forests;
ICA (as a particular case of MDL)
…
Image analysis
Segmentation;
Object recognition and image matching;
Optical flow estimation;
Structural description of images;
Changes detection;
…
Learning in symbolic domains, etc.
Various applications of MDL

But wait… what about theory?
MDL principle is used loosely
Description lengths are calculated within heuristically defined coding schemes
Success of a method is highly determined by the utilized coding scheme
Is there some theory that overcomes this arbitrariness?

The theory behind MDL
Algorithmic information theory
U – universal Turing machine K – Kolmogorov complexity,
l(H) – length of program H
H * – best description/model of data D
Two-part coding:
UTM defines the universal model space
OR
if H is probabilistic program
if full model is separated into two parts

Universal prediction
Solomonoff’s algorithmic probabilities
Prior probability
Predictive probability
Universal distribution of prior probabilities dominates (with multiplicative factor) over any other distribution
Bayesian prediction with the use of these priors converges in limit with prediction based on usage of true distribution
Solomonoff, R.: Algorithmic Probability, Heuristic Programming and AGI. In: Baum, E., Hutter, M., Kitzelmann, E. (eds). Advances in Intelligent Systems Research, vol. 10 (proc. 3rd Conf. on Artificial General Intelligence), pp. 151–157 (2010).

Universality of the algorithmic space
3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 5820974944 5923078164 0628620899 8628034825 3421170679 8214808651 3282306647 0938446095 5058223172 5359408128 4811174502 8410270193 8521105559 6446229489 5493038196 4428810975 6659334461 2847564823 3786783165 2712019091 4564856692 3460348610 4543266482 1339360726 0249141273 7245870066 0631558817 4881520920 9628292540 9171536436 7892590360 0113305305 4882046652 1384146951 9415116094 3305727036 5759591953 0921861173 8193261179 3105118548 0744623799 6274956735 1885752724 8912279381 8301194912 9833673362 4406566430 8602139494 6395224737 1907021798 6094370277 0539217176 2931767523 8467481846 7669405132 0005681271 4526356082 7785771342 7577896091 7363717872 1468440901 2249534301 4654958537 1050792279 6892589235 4201995611 2129021960 8640344181 5981362977 4771309960 5187072113 4999999 ………
int a=10000,b,c=8400,d,e,f[8401],g;
main() {for(;b-c;)f[b++]=a/5;
for(;d=0,g=c*2;c-=14, printf("%.4d",e+d/a),e=d%a)
for(b=c;d+=f[b]*a,f[b]=d%--g,d/=g--,--b;d*=b);}
By D.T. Winter

Grue Emerald Paradox
Hypothesis No. 1: all emeralds are green
Hypothesis No. 2: all emeralds are greu
(that is green before 2050, and blue after this time)
Likelihood of observation data equals
How can we calculate prior probabilities of these two hypotheses?
Is it possible to ground prior probabilities?
Probability theory allows to deduce one probability from another. But what are the initial probabilities?
Universal priors work
Solomonoff R. Does Algorithmic Probability Solve the Problem of Induction? // Oxbridge Research, P.O.B. 391887, Cambridge, Mass. 02139. 1997.

Methodological usefulness
Theory of universal induction answers the questions
What is the source of overlearning/ overfitting/ oversegmentation, etc.
Why is any new narrow learning method “yet another classifier”
Why are feed forwards neural networks not really “universal approximators”
And at the same time, why is “no free lunch theorem” not true

Gap between universal and pragmatic methods
Universal methods
can work in arbitrary computable environment
incomputable or computationally infeasible
approximations are either inefficient or not universal
Practical methods
work in non-toy environments
set of environments is highly restricted
=> Bridging this gap is necessary

Choice of the reference UTM
Unbiased AGI cannot be practical and efficient
Dependence of the algorithmic probabilities on the choice of UTM appears to be very useful in order to put any prior information and to reduce necessary amount of training data
UTM contains prior information
=> UTM can be optimized to account for posterior information

Limitations of narrow methods
Brightness segmentation can fail even with the MDL criterion
Essentially incorrect segments

More complex models…
Image is described as a set of independent and identically distributed samples of random variable (no segmentation).
Image is divided into regions; brightness values described independently within each region.
Second order functions are fit in each region, and brightness residuals are described as iid random variables.
Mixes of Gabor functions are used as regression models.

Comparison
Images
Brightness entropy
Regression models
Potapov A.S., Malyshev I.A., Puysha A.E., Averkin A.N. New paradigm of learnable computer vision algorithms based on the representational MDL principle // Proc. SPIE. 2010. V. 7696. P. 769606.

Classes of image representations*
Low level (functional) representations
Raw features (pixel level)
Segmentation models (contours and regions)
Structural descriptions (line segments, arcs, ellipses, corners, blobs)
Features
Keypoints
Composite structural elements
Knowledge-based
*Marr, D.: Vision: A Computational Investigation into the Human Representation and Processing of Visual Information. MIT Press (1982).

Example: image matching
Low level representations
Contour descriptions
Structural descriptions
Feature sets
Key points
Composite structural elements
Knowledge-based representations
Correlation-based methods
Maximization of mutual information
Invariant moments
Distance transform
Pattern recognition
Tree search
Formal grammars
Hough transform
Graph-theoretic methods
Decision trees
Rule bases
Logic inference
…

But again… what about theory?
MDL principle is used loosely
Description lengths are calculated within heuristically defined coding schemes
Success of a method is highly determined by the utilized coding scheme
In computer vision and machine learning, some representation is used in every method
But how to construct the best representation?
Representations correspond to ‘coding schemes’ in MDL applications. They should also be constructed on the base of strict criterion
But from what space and how?

Polynomial decision function
%(learn)=11.1
%(test)=5.4
L = 31.2 bit
Np=4
%(learn)=2.8
%(test)=3.6
L = 30.9 bit
Np=9
%(learn)=0.0
%(test)=8.6
L = 41.4 bit
Np=16
%(learn)=0.0
%(test)=18.4
L = 62.0 bit
Np=25
No outliers
Worst generalization!

Choosing between mixtures with different number of components and restrictions laid on the covariance matrix of normal distribution
L=834
L=855
L=855
L=838
L=817
L=826
L=857
L=826
L=823
1 2 3
2 3 4
2 3 4

Again, heuristic coding schemes
Let’s switch back to theory

Universal Mass Induction
Let be the set of strings
An universal method cannot be applied to mass problems since typically
where K is Kolmogorov complexity on universal machine U
However, can hold
One can search for models
within some best representation
for each xi independently
Potapov, A., Rodionov, S.: Extending Universal Intelligence Models with Formal Notion of Representation. In: J. Bach, B. Goertzel, M. Iklé (Eds.): AGI’12, LNAI 7716, pp. 242–251 (2012).

Representational MDL principle
Definition
Let representation for the set of data entities be such the program S for UTM U that for any data entity D the description H exists that U(SH)=D.
Representational MDL principle
The best image description has minimum length within given representation
The best image representation minimizes summed description length of images from the given training set (and the length of representation itself).
Main advantage: applicable to any type of representation; representation is included into general criterion as a parameter.
For example, image analysis tasks are mass problems: the same algorithm is applied to different images (or patterns) independently.
Potapov A.S. Principle of Representational Minimum Description Length in Image Analysis and Pattern Recognition // Pattern Recognition and Image Analysis. 2012. V. 22. No. 1. P. 82–91.

Possible usage of RMDL
Synthetic pattern recognition methods*:
Automatic selection among different pattern recognition methods
Selecting a representation that better fits the training sample from a specific domain either from a family of representations or from a fixed set of hand-crafted representations
Improve data analysis methods for specific representations
* Potapov A.S. Synthetic pattern recognition methods based on the representational minimum description length principle // Proc. OSAV'2008. 2008. P. 354–362.

RMDL for optimizing ANN formalisms
x3(t)
w
x2(t)
q
1
x'(t)=1/x(t)
x(t)=ln(t)
-2
1
Considered extension of ANN representation
Potapov A., Peterson M. A Representational MDL Framework for Improving Learning Power of Neural Network Formalisms // IFIP AICT 381. Springer, 2012. P. 68–77.

RMDL for optimizing ANN formalisms
Experiments: Wolf annual sunspot time series
Precision of forecasting depends on type of nonlinearity
ANN with 4 neurons, 11 connections, and 2 second-order connections: MSE=220 (typical MSE: 214–625*)

RMDL for optimizing ANN formalisms
Although we obtained an agreement between the short-term prediction precision and the RMDL criterion in average, one can agree with the statement: “MSE and NMSE are not very good measures of how well the model captures the dynamics”
Test: Financial time series

OCT image segmentation
Imprecise description within trivial representation
Description within simple representation
More precise description within more complex representation
Gurov I., Potapov A. Investigation of OCT Images Descriptions on the Base of Representational MDL Principle // Proc. MVA2009 IAPR Conference on Machine Vision Applications. P. 320–323.

Segmentation results
Description length, bits
S-0: 212204
S-1: 184672
S-2: 175096
Description length, bits
S-0: 231201
S-1: 212268
S-2: 207864
Description length, bits
S-0: 235566
S-1: 219641
S-2: 215066
Description length, bits
S-0: 236421
S-1: 213015
S-2: 206204
S-1: oversegmentation
S-2: correct detection of layers
S-1 and S-2 are almost the same (and plausible) detection of thin layers
Differing segmentation results for a single thick layer (light absorption with depth causes regular reduction of brightness). Some inclusions are not detected.
S-1: odd layer is detected and inclusion is missed
S-2: plausible results of segmentation

Application to image feature learning
Training set with preliminarily matched key points using predefined hand-crafted feature transform
Example of some found linear feature transforms
Example of some feature transforms for another environment

Results
Matching with predefined hand-crafted feature transform
Matching with learned (environment-specific) feature transform
~50% of failures with predefined features were matched successfully with learned features (new images of the same environment were used)

Analysis of hierarchical representations
Pixel level
Contour level
Level of
structural elements
Level of groups of
structural elements

Adaptive resonance
Image
1st level description
2nd level description
3rd level description
4th level description
Potapov A.S. Theoretico-informational approach to the introduction of feedback into multilevel machine-vision systems // Journal of Optical Technology. 2007. Vol. 74. Iss. 10. P. 694–699.

Implications
Independent optimi-zation of descriptions
Usage of integral description length
Without resonance

Adaptive resonance: matching as construction of common description
Initial structural elements of the first image
Initial structural elements of the second image
Fixed structural descriptions: same for both images
These descriptions slightly less precise, but w.r.t. images, but only one of them can be used instead of two

Learning representations
Very difficult problem in Turing-complete settings
Successful methods use efficient search and restricted families of representations
Deep learning
Not universal
Compact (one-level ANNs should be exponentially larger than multi-level ANNs to represent some concepts => particular case of RMDL)
Higher expressive power or more efficient search than those of former methods

What is still missing?
The MDL principle
The RMDL principle
???
Kolmogorov complexity
Heuristic criteria
Reference machines
Hand-crafted representations
Efficient search
Universal search
Theory
Practice

Key Idea
Humans create narrow methods, which efficiently solve arbitrary recurring problems Generality should be achieved not by a single uniform method solving any problem in the same fashion, but by automatic construction of (non-universal) efficient methods
Program specialization is the appropriate concept*, which relates general and narrow intelligence methods
However, no analysis of possible specialization of concrete models of universal intelligence has been given yet.
* Khudobakhshov, V.: Metacomputations and Program-based Knowledge Representation. In:K.-U. Kühnberger, S. Rudolph, P. Wang (Eds.): AGI’13, LNAI 7999, pp. 70–77 (2013).

Program Specialization
specR(pL, x0) is the result of deep transformation of pL that can be much more efficient than p(x0, .)
Let pL(x,y) be some program (in some language L) with two arguments
Specializer specR is such program (in some language R) accepting pL and x0 that
Futamura-Turchin projections

Specialization of Universal Induction
MSearch(S, x) is executed for different x with same S
This search cannot be non-exhaustive for any S, but it can be efficient for some of them
One can consider computationally efficient projection spec(MSearch, S):
Universal mass induction consists of two procedures
Search for models
Search for representations
Potapov A., Rodionov S. Making Universal Induction Efficient by Specialization // B. Goertzel et al. (Eds.): AGI 2014. Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence. 2014. V. 8598. P. 133–142.

Approach to Specialization
Direct specialization of MSearch(S, x) w.r.t. some given S*
No general techniques for exponential speedup exists
And how to get S? RSearch is still needed
Find S'=spec(MSearch(S, x), S*) simultaneously with S*
Main properties of S, S':
S is a generative representation (decoding)
S' is a descriptive representation (encoding)
S' is also the result of specialization of the search for generative models, so in general it can include some sort of optimized search
Simultaneous search for S and S' will be referred to as SS'-search

Conclusion
Attempts to build more powerful practical methods leaded us to utilization of the MDL principle that was heuristically applied for solving many tasks
The MDL principle is very useful tool for introducing model selection criteria free from overfitting in the tasks of image analysis and pattern recognition
We introduced the representational MDL principle to bridge the gap between universal induction and practical methods and used it to extend practical methods
The remaining difference between universal and practical methods is in search algorithms. Specialization of universal search is necessary to automatically produce efficient methods