Enhancing eyeglasses removal in facial images: a novel approach using translation models for eyeglasses mask completion

Accurately removing eyeglasses from facial images is crucial for improving the performance of various face-related tasks such as verification, identification, and reconstruction. This paper presents a novel approach to enhancing eyeglasses removal by integrating a mask completion technique into the existing framework. Our method focuses on improving the accuracy of eyeglasses masks, which is essential for subsequent eyeglasses and shadow removal steps. We introduce a unique dataset specifically designed for eyeglasses mask image completion. This dataset is generated by applying Top-Hat morphological operations to existing eyeglasses mask datasets, creating a collection of images containing eyeglasses masks in two states: damaged (incomplete) and complete (ground truth). A Pix2Pix image-to-image translation model is trained on this newly created dataset for the purpose of restoring incomplete eyeglass mask predictions. This restoration step significantly improves the accuracy of eyeglass frame extraction and leads to more realistic results in subsequent eyeglasses and shadow removal. Our method incorporates a post-processing step to refine the completed mask, preventing the formation of artifacts in the background or outside of the eyeglasses frame box, further enhancing the overall quality of the processed image. Experimental results on CelebA, FFHQ, and MeGlass datasets showcase the effectiveness of our method, outperforming state-of-the-art approaches in quantitative metrics (FID, KID, MOS) and qualitative evaluations.