Depth map post-processing for depth-image-based rendering: a user study

We analyse the impact of depth map post-processing techniques on the visual quality of stereo pairs that contain a novel view. To this end, we conduct a user study, in which we address (1) the effects of depth map post processing on the quality of stereo pairs that contain a novel view and (2) the question whether objective quality metrics are suitable for evaluating them. We generate depth maps of six stereo image pairs and apply six different post-processing techniques. The unprocessed and the post-processed depth maps are used to generate novel views. The original left views and the novel views form the stereo pairs that are evaluated in a paired comparison study. The obtained results are compared with the results delivered by the objective quality metrics. We show that post-processing depth maps significantly enhances the perceived quality of stereo pairs that include a novel view. We further observe that the correlation between subjective and objective quality is weak.