Image Completion Using Global Patch Matching and Optimal Seam Synthesis

This paper presented a global exemplar-based image completion method for filling large missing or damaged regions in an image. Based on three proposed completion rules, the image completion problem is formulated as a global discrete optimization problem with a well-defined energy function. The energy function can evaluate image consistency globally and is minimized with an expectation-maximization (EM) like algorithm, which considers patch matching and patch synthesis in a unified way. In the algorithm, M step and E step are achieved by fast coherent searching and optimal seam synthesis respectively. Moreover, E step combines image patch synthesis and coherent correction simultaneously. We analyzed our global energy function and optimization method in theory. Simulation comparisons with other state-of-the-art methods show the superiority of our proposed method in ensuring global coherent and avoiding image blurring.