Polarization-informed deep learning for 3D integral imaging restoration in turbidity

In this paper, we present a polarimetric image restoration approach that aims to recover the Stokes parameters and the degree of linear polarization from their corresponding degraded counterparts. The Stokes parameters and the degree of linear polarization are affected due to the degradations present in partial occlusion or turbid media, such as scattering, attenuation, and turbid water. The polarimetric image restoration with corresponding Mueller matrix estimation is performed using polarization-informed deep learning and 3D Integral imaging. An unsupervised image-to-image translation (UNIT) framework is utilized to obtain clean Stokes parameters from the degraded ones. Additionally, a multi-output convolutional neural network (CNN) based branch is used to predict the Mueller matrix estimate along with an estimate of the corresponding residue. The degree of linear polarization with the Mueller matrix estimate generates information regarding the characteristics of the underlying transmission media and the object under consideration. The approach has been evaluated under different environmentally degraded conditions, such as various levels of turbidity and partial occlusion. The 3D integral imaging reduces the effects of degradations in a turbid medium. The performance comparison between 3D and 2D imaging in varying scene conditions is provided. Experimental results suggest that the proposed approach is promising under the scene degradations considered. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on polarization-informed deep learning in 3D imaging, which attempts to recover the polarimetric information along with the corresponding Mueller matrix estimate in a degraded environment.