Learning to rank for content-based image retrieval

In Content-based Image Retrieval (CBIR), accurately ranking the returned images is of paramount importance, since users consider mostly the topmost results. The typical ranking strategy used by many CBIR systems is to employ image content descriptors, so that returned images that are most similar to the query image are placed higher in the rank. While this strategy is well accepted and widely used, improved results may be obtained by combining multiple image descriptors. In this paper we explore this idea, and introduce algorithms that learn to combine information coming from different descriptors. The proposed learning to rank algorithms are based on three diverse learning techniques: Support Vector Machines (CBIR-SVM), Genetic Programming (CBIR-GP), and Association Rules (CBIR-AR). Eighteen image content descriptors(color, texture, and shape information) are used as input and provided as training to the learning algorithms. We performed a systematic evaluation involving two complex and heterogeneous image databases (Corel e Caltech) and two evaluation measures (Precision and MAP). The empirical results show that all learning algorithms provide significant gains when compared to the typical ranking strategy in which descriptors are used in isolation. We concluded that, in general, CBIR-AR and CBIR-GP outperforms CBIR-SVM. A fine-grained analysis revealed the lack of correlation between the results provided by CBIR-AR and the results provided by the other two algorithms, which indicates the opportunity of an advantageous hybrid approach.