We present an approach to low-level vision that combines two main ideas: the use of convolutional networks as an image processing architecture and an unsupervised learning procedure that synthesizes training samples from specific noise models. We demonstrate this approach on the challenging problem of natural image denoising. Using a test set with a hundred natural images, we find that convolutional networks provide comparable and in some cases superior performance to state of the art wavelet and Markov random field (MRF) methods. Moreover, we find that a convolutional network offers similar performance in the blind denoising setting as compared to other techniques in the non-blind setting. We also show how convolutional networks are mathematically related to MRF approaches by presenting a mean field theory for an MRF specially designed for image denoising.

We present an approach to low-level vision that combines two main ideas: the use of convolutional networks as an image processing architecture and an unsupervised learning procedure that synthesizes training samples from specific noise models. We demonstrate this approach on the challenging problem of natural image denoising. Using a test set with a hundred natural images, we find that convolutional networks provide comparable and in some cases superior performance to state of the art wavelet and Markov random field (MRF) methods. Moreover, we find that a convolutional network offers similar performance in the blind denoising setting as compared to other techniques in the non-blind setting. We also show how convolutional networks are mathematically related to MRF approaches by presenting a mean field theory for an MRF specially designed for image denoising. Although these approaches are related, convolutional networks avoid computational difficulties in MRF approaches that arise from probabilistic learning and inference.

RedEye is an image processing architecture that doesn't record pictures, it records descriptions of what it sees. There is too much in the world to see. Digital cameras capture all that is within their field of vision, storing richly detailed images in large files. But for many purposes, they don't have to. When we're driving, we don't need to know the license plates of all the cars around us, just their general shapes and positions.