Retrieval with knowledge-driven kernel design: an approach to improving SVM-based CBIR with relevance feedback

The performance of SVM-based image retrieval is often constrained by the scarcity of training samples. The total number of image samples labeled by users in a retrieval session is very limited, and this small number of labeled samples cannot effectively represent the true distributions of positive and negative image classes, especially for the negative image class. This paper proposes a novel approach to deal with this problem. Instead of treating it as a problem, the mere existence of the small number of labeled images and their desired distribution in the kernel space is considered as prior knowledge from image retrieval to aid the design of the kernel used by SVMs. This is achieved by maximizing a criterion, such as one based on scatter matrices, through gradient-based search methods, incurring very little computational overhead to real-time retrieval process. Experimental results on two benchmark image databases demonstrate the improved retrieval performance by the dynamically designed kernel and hence the effectiveness of the proposed approach for SVM based image retrieval