Multi-view similarity aggregation and multi-level gap optimization for unsupervised person re-identification

Abstract

Currently, unsupervised person re-identification (Re-ID) typically directly computes the similarity matrix between samples and then applies clustering algorithms to generate pseudo labels for model training, achieving significant progress to some extent. However, distance matrices calculated from a single perspective cannot effectively handle complex and variable sample noise environments, leading to pseudo labels that are not comprehensive or accurate enough, with considerable noise that can misguide model optimization. To address this issue, this paper proposes a Multi-view Similarity Aggregation and Multi-level Gap Optimization (MSAMGO) to improve the accuracy of pseudo labels before and after clustering. Specifically, Multi-view Similarity Aggregation (MSA) involves integrating similarity matrices calculated from multiple perspectives to generate reliable pseudo labels for clustering, greatly reducing noise interference from the source. Additionally, the Multi-level Gap Optimization (MGO) is introduced to leverage the positive and negative centroids of similarity between cluster-level samples and the correlation between instance-level samples. Together, they ensure the overall quality of pseudo-labels, reduce noise interference, and collectively promote model optimization. Experiments were conducted on several datasets, demonstrating that our method surpasses the majority of existing unsupervised person re-identification to a large extent and exhibits excellent generalization.