Associative hierarchical CRFs for object class image segmentation

Most methods for object class segmentation are formulated as a labelling problem over a single choice of quantisation of an image space - pixels, segments or group of segments. It is well known that each quantisation has its fair share of pros and cons; and the existence of a common optimal quantisation level suitable for all object categories is highly unlikely. Motivated by this observation, we propose a hierarchical random field model, that allows integration of features computed at different levels of the quantisation hierarchy. MAP inference in this model can be performed efficiently using powerful graph cut based move making algorithms. Our framework generalises much of the previous work based on pixels or segments. We evaluate its efficiency on some of the most challenging data-sets for object class segmentation, and show it obtains state-of-the-art results.