Fourier Slice Super-resolution in plenoptic cameras

Abstract

Plenoptic cameras are a promising solution to increase the capabilities of current commercial cameras because they capture the four-dimensional lightfield of a scene. Processing the recorded lightfield, these cameras offer the possibility of focusing the scene after the shot or obtaining 3D information. Conventional photographs focused on determined planes can be obtained through projections of the four-dimensional lightfield onto two spatial dimensions. These photographs can be efficiently computed using the Fourier Slice technique but their resolution is usually less than 1% of the full resolution of the camera sensor. Several super-resolution methods have been recently developed to increase the spatial resolution of plenoptic cameras. In this paper we propose a new super-resolution method based on the Fourier Slice technique. We show how several existing super-resolution methods can be seen as particular cases of this approach. Besides the theoretical interest of this unified view, we also show how to obtain simultaneously spatial and depth super-resolution removing the limitations of previous approaches.