CS 790Q Biometrics

Automated Iris
Recognition Technology &
Iris Biometric System
Instructor: Dr G. Bebis
Presented by Chang Jia
Dec 9th, 2005

Overview
The Iris as a Biometrics: The iris is an overt body that

is available for remote assessment with the aid of a

machine vision system to do automated iris recognition.
Iris recognition technology combines computer vision,

pattern recognition, statistical inference, and optics.

The spatial patterns that are apparent in the human iris

are highly distinctive to an individual.

Clinical observations

Developmental biology
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Overview

The structure
Theofstructure
the iris seen
of theinhuman
a transverse
eye section
The structure of the iris seen in a frontal section

Overview
Its suitability as an exceptionally accurate biometric

derives from its

extremely data-rich physical structure

genetic independence no two eyes are the same

patterns apparently stable throughout life

physical protection by a transparent window (the cornea),

highly protected by internal organ of the eye

externally visible, so noninvasive patterns imaged

from a distance
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Overview
The disadvantages to use iris as a biometric

measurement are

Small target (1 cm) to acquire from a distance (about 1

m)

Moving target

Located behind a curved, wet, reflecting surface

Obscured by eyelashes, lenses, reflections

Partially occluded by eyelids, often drooping

Deforms non-elastically as pupil changes size

Illumination should not be visible or bright

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CS 790Q Biometrics

PART I:
Iris Recognition: An Emerging
Biometric Technology
R. Wildes, "Iris Recognition: An Emerging

Biometric Technology", Proceedings of the

IEEE, vol 85, no. 9, pp. 1348-1363, 1997.

Outline
Technical Issues **

Image Acquisition

Iris Localization

Pattern Matching

Systems and Performance

** (Throughout the discussion in this paper, the iris-recognition

systems of Daugman and Wildes et al. will be used to provide

illustrations.)
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Technical Issues

Schematic diagram of iris recognition

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I. Image Acquisition
Why important?

One of the major challenges of automated iris

recognition is to capture a high-quality image of the iris
while remaining noninvasive to the human operator.
Concerns on the image acquisition rigs

Obtained images with sufficient resolution and sharpness

Good contrast in the interior iris pattern with proper

illumination

Well centered without unduly constraining the operator

Artifacts eliminated as much as possible

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I. Image Acquisition - Rigs

The Daugman image-acquisition rig

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I. Image Acquisition - Rigs

The Wildes et al. image-acquisition rig

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I. Image Acquisition - Results

Result Image from Wildes et al. rig -- capture the iris

as part of a larger image that also contains data derived
from the immediately surrounding eye region
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Discussion
In common:

Easy for a human operator to master

Use video rate capture
Difference:
Illumination

The Daugmans system makes use of an LED-based point light

source in conjunction with a standard video camera.
The Wildes et al. system makes use of a diffuse source and
polarization in conjunction with a low-light level camera.

Operator self-position

The Daugmans system provides the operator with live video

feedback
The Wildes et al. system provides a reticle to aid the operator in
positioning
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II. Iris Localization

Purpose: to localize that portion of the acquired

image that corresponds to an iris

In particular, it is necessary to localize that portion of

the image derived from inside the limbus (the border

between the sclera and the iris) and outside the pupil.
Desired characteristics of iris localization:

Sensitive to a wide range of edge contrast

Robust to irregular borders

Capable of dealing with variable occlusions

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II. Iris Localization

The Daugman system fits the circular contours via

gradient ascent on the parameters so as to maximize

Where
is a radial Gaussian,
and circular contours (for the limbic and pupillary
boundaries) be parameterized by center location (xc,yc),
and radius r (active contour fitting method)
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II. Iris Localization

The Wildes et al. system performs its contour fitting in

two steps. (histogram-based approach)

First, the image intensity information is converted into a binary

edge-map

where
and

Second, the edge points vote to instantiate particular contour

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parameter values.

II. Iris Localization

The voting procedure of the Wildes et al. system is

realized via Hough transforms on parametric

definitions of the iris boundary contours.

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Illustrative Results of Iris Localization

only that portion of the image below the upper eyelid and above the lower
eyelid should be included
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Obtained by using the Wildes et al. system

Discussion
Both approaches are likely to encounter difficulties if

required to deal with images that contain broader

regions of the surrounding face than the immediate
eye region
Difference:

the active contour approach avoids the inevitable

thresholding involved in generating a binary edge-map

the histogram-based approach to model fitting should

avoid problems with local minima that the active
contour models gradient descent procedure might
experience

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III. Pattern Matching

Four steps:

1) bringing the newly acquired iris pattern into spatial

alignment with a candidate data base entry;
2) choosing a representation of the aligned iris patterns
that makes their distinctive patterns apparent;
3) evaluating the goodness of match between the newly
acquired and data base representations;
4) deciding if the newly acquired data and the data base
entry were derived from the same iris based on the
goodness of match.
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III. Pattern Matching -Alignment

Purpose: to establish a precise correspondence

between characteristic structures across the two

images.
Both of the systems under discussion compensate for

image shift, scaling, and rotation.

For both systems, iris localization is charged with

isolating an iris in a larger acquired image and thereby

accomplishes alignment for image shift.

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III. Pattern Matching -Alignment

The Daugmans system uses radial scaling to

compensate for overall size as well as a simple model

of pupil variation based on linear stretching.
Map Cartesian image coordinates
(x, y) to dimensionless polar (r, )
image coordinates according to

The Wildes et al. system uses an image-registration

technique to compensate for both scaling and

rotation. The mapping function (u,v) is to minimize

while being constrained to capture a

similarity transformation of image
coordinates (x, y) to (x, y)

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III. Pattern Matching -Alignment

The two methods for establishing correspondences

between acquired and data base iris images seem to

be adequate for controlled assessment scenarios
Improvements:

more sophisticated methods may prove to be

necessary in more relaxed scenarios

more complicated global geometric

compensations will be necessary if full perspective
distortions (e.g., foreshortening) become
significant
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III. Pattern Matching - Representation

The Daugmans system uses demodulation with

complex-valued 2D Gabor wavelets to encode the

phase sequence of the iris pattern to an IrisCode.

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III. Pattern Matching - Representation

In implementation, the Gabor filtering is performed

via a relaxation algorithm, with quantization of the

recovered phase information yielding the final
representation.

Pictorial Examples of one IrisCode

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III. Pattern Matching - Representation

The Wildes et al. system makes us of an isotropic

bandpass decomposition derived from application of

Laplacian of Gaussian filters to the image data.

with the standard deviation of the Gaussian and the radial distance
of a point from the filters center

In practice, the filtered image is realized as a

Laplacian pyramid. This representation is defined

procedurally in terms of a cascade of small
Gaussian-like filters.
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III. Pattern Matching - Representation

Result: Multiscale representation for iris pattern

matching. Distinctive features of the iris are manifest

across a range of spatial scales.

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Obtained by using the Wildes et al. system

IV. Pattern Matching Goodness of Match

The Daugman system computes the normalized

Hamming distance as

The result of this computation is then used as the

goodness of match, with smaller values indicating

better matches.

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IV. Pattern Matching - Decision

The Wildes et al. system employs normalized

correlation between the acquired and data base

representations.

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IV. Pattern Matching - Decision

For the Daugman system, this amounts to choosing a

separation point in the space of (normalized)

Hamming distances between iris representations.
In order to calculate the cross-over point, sample
populations of imposters and authentics were each fit
with parametrically defined distributions.

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IV. Pattern Matching - Decision

For the Wildes et al. system, the decision-making

process must combine the four goodness-of-match

measurements that are calculated by the previous
stage of processing (i.e., one for each pass band in
the Laplacian pyramid representation) into a single
accept/reject judgment.

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Systems and Performance - The

Daugman iris-recognition system
Both the enrollment and verification modes take under 1s to

complete.
Empirical test 1: 592 irises from 323 persons the system

exhibited no false accepts and no false rejects

Empirical test 2:

Phase1: 199 irises from 122 persons, 878 attempts in

identification mode over 8 days no false accepts and 89
false rejects (47 retry with still 16 rejected)

Phase2: 96 irises (among 199) with 403 entries for

identification no false accepts and no false rejects

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Systems and Performance - The

Wildes et al. iris-recognition system
Both the enrollment and verification modes require

approximately 10s to complete.

Only one empirical test: 60 different irises with 10

images each (5 at the beginning and 5 about one

month later) from 40 persons no false accepts and
no false rejects.

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Questions?

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CS 790Q Biometrics

PART II:
An Iris Biometric System
for Public and Personal Use
M. Negin et al., "An Iris Biometric System for
Public and Personal Use", IEEE Computer, pp.
70-75, February 2000.

Iris identification process

The system captures a digital image of one eye,

encodes its iris pattern, then matches that file against

the file stored in the database for that individual.

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The public-use system

The public-use multiple-camera system for correctly

positioning and imaging a subjects iris.

Note: wide-field-of-view (WFOV) & narrow-field-of-view (NFOV) camera 37

The public-use optical platform

(a) left and right

illuminator pods,
gaze director, and
optical filter

(b) a solid model of

the platforms
internal
components.
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The personal-use system

The user manually positions the camera three to four

inches in front of the eye.

Make sure that the devices LED centers within the
aperture that superimposes the users line of sight
and the cameras optical axis.

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Identification Performance
Verification distributions of authentic results (in brown)

and imposter results (in green).

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Field Trial Experience

The first pilot programwith the Nationwide Building

Society in Swindon, Englandran for six months and

included more than 1,000 participants, before going into
regular service during the fourth quarter of 1998.
The field trial experience has been very positive:

91 percent prefer iris identification to a PIN (personal identification

number) or signature,

94 percent would recommend iris identification to friends and family,

94 percent were comfortable or very comfortable using the system.

The survey also found nearly 100 percent approval on

three areas of crucial importance to consumers: reliability,

security, and acceptability.
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Questions?

Thank You.

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