A DIBR method based on inverse mapping and depth-aided image inpainting

Depth-image-based rendering (DIBR) has attracted more and more attention as a method of virtual view rendering in three-dimensional video (3DV) applications. Many efforts have been dedicated to realize high-quality rendering, ranging from pre-process of the reference depth images to post-process of the virtual texture images. A DIBR method based on inverse mapping and depth-aided image inpainting technique is proposed in this paper. In the proposed method, inverse mapping rendering technique is adopted to realize the 3D warping instead of traditional forward mapping; and a modified image inpainting technique in which depth information is considered is employed to inpaint the disocclusion regions. Besides, morphological processing is performed on the reference depth image to avoid the artifacts along the disocclusion areas. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method can obtain higher peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) and structural similarity index (SSIM) in comparison to the previous methods, while producing satisfactory visual effect.