Recomposing photographs from multiple frames

1. A method for producing a composite photo by replacing a face in a first digital image with a face from a second digital image comprising:

a. automatically detecting one or more faces in the first digital image;

b. identifying at least one target face from the detected faces that needs to be replaced;

c. automatically detecting one or more faces in the second digital image;

d. identifying at least one source face from the second image detected faces for replacing the target face;

e. automatically locating facial features in both the first and second digital images;

f. using the located facial features from the target and source faces to perform facial geometry correction using facial features located on the target face and the source face to produce a geometrically corrected source face, and perform appearance correction on the geometrically corrected source face under a plurality of automatically determined parameters to produce a corrected source face;

g. replacing the target face with the corrected source face and blending the corrected source face into the first digital image by:

i. producing a source face mask for the corrected source face;

ii. producing an eroded source face mask;

iii. replacing pixels in the target face with pixels in the corrected source face based on the eroded source face mask; and

iv. blending the corrected source face into the first image around the boundary pixels indicated by the eroded source face mask; and

h. producing the composite photo from the corrected source face image.

2. The method according to claim 1 wherein step d includes using facial features in the target face to identify the source face through automatic face recognition.

3. The method according to claim 1 further including

i. interactively fine tuning the replaced source face in the composite photo using the facial features and parameters automatically determined in steps e and f as starting points.

4. The method according to claim 3 further including

i. providing an interface to allow a user to click on two eyes of a subject in case automatic face detection fails to find the face; and

ii. using the user clicked eye positions to locate face contour and other facial features.

5. A method for producing a composite photo from a series of frames captured by a video capture device, comprising:

a. selecting a frame from the series of frames;

b. automatically detecting one or more faces from the selected frame;

c. automatically identifying at least one target face from the detected group faces that needs to be replaced;

d. automatically detecting faces in other frames captured by the video capture device;

e. using facial features in the target face to identify source faces in the other frames through automatic face recognition;

f. producing a collage of usable source faces from the identified source faces in the other frames;

g. selecting a source face from the collage of useable source faces;

h. using features from the target and the selected source face to perform facial geometry and appearance corrections to the selected source face under a plurality of automatically determined parameters; and

i. replacing the target face with the corrected source face and blending the corrected source face into the first digital image to form the composite group photo.

6. The method of claim 5 further including

j. interactively fine tuning the replaced source face using the parameters automatically determined in steps e and f as starting points.

7. A method for producing a composite photo by replacing a face in a first digital image with a face from a second digital image comprising:

a. automatically detecting one or more faces in the first digital image by;

i. providing an interface to allow a user to click on two eyes of a subject in case automatic face detection fails to find the face; and

ii. using the user clicked eye positions to locate face contour and other facial features,

b. identifying at least one target face from the detected faces that needs to be replaced;

c. automatically detecting one or more faces in the second digital image;

d. identifying at least one source face from the second image detected faces for replacing the target face;

e. automatically locating facial features in both the first and second digital images;

f. using the located facial features from the target and source faces to perform facial geometry and appearance corrections to the source face under a plurality of automatically determined parameters to produce a corrected source face;

g. replacing the target face with the corrected source face and blending the corrected source face into the first digital image by interactively fine tuning the replaced source face in the composite photo using the facial features and parameters automatically determined in steps e and f as starting points; and

h. producing the composite photo from the corrected source face image.