Data to 7 Oct 2026

Photo-Sketching: Inferring Contour Drawings from Images

arXiv 1901.00542 ↗First posted 2 Jan 2019cs.CVcited by 67

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Abstract (arXiv)

Edges, boundaries and contours are important subjects of study in both computer graphics and computer vision. On one hand, they are the 2D elements that convey 3D shapes, on the other hand, they are indicative of occlusion events and thus separation of objects or semantic concepts. In this paper, we aim to generate contour drawings, boundary-like drawings that capture the outline of the visual scene. Prior art often cast this problem as boundary detection. However, the set of visual cues presented in the boundary detection output are different from the ones in contour drawings, and also the artistic style is ignored. We address these issues by collecting a new dataset of contour drawings and proposing a learning-based method that resolves diversity in the annotation and, unlike boundary detectors, can work with imperfect alignment of the annotation and the actual ground truth. Our method surpasses previous methods quantitatively and qualitatively. Surprisingly, when our model fine-tunes on BSDS500, we achieve the state-of-the-art performance in salient boundary detection, suggesting contour drawing might be a scalable alternative to boundary annotation, which at the same time is easier and more interesting for annotators to draw.

Key facts. Cited by 67 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). First posted on arXiv 2 Jan 2019.

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Citing papers per year: 2021: 11; 2022: 11; 2023: 12; 2024: 14; 2025: 15; 2026: 4.

67 papers.

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2022Learning to generate line drawings that convey geometry and semanticscited by 82
2024Instruct-Imagen: Image Generation with Multi-modal Instructioncited by 65
2022CLIPascene: Scene Sketching with Different Types and Levels of Abstractioncited by 63
2022CLIPasso: Semantically-Aware Object Sketchingcited by 57
2023DiffSketcher: Text Guided Vector Sketch Synthesis through Latent Diffusion Modelscited by 54
2023Breathing Life Into Sketches Using Text-to-Video Priorscited by 47
2023Control3D: Towards Controllable Text-to-3D Generationcited by 46
2024RT-Sketch: Goal-Conditioned Imitation Learning from Hand-Drawn Sketchescited by 41
2022Adaptively-Realistic Image Generation from Stroke and Sketch with Diffusion Modelcited by 39
2021More Photos are All You Need: Semi-Supervised Learning for Fine-Grained Sketch Based Image Retrievalcited by 38
2021Sketch Your Own GANcited by 37
2021Dense Extreme Inception Network for Edge Detectioncited by 37

38 more

2023Picture that Sketch: Photorealistic Image Generation from Abstract Sketchescited by 34
2024SketchAgent: Language-Driven Sequential Sketch Generationcited by 30
2022A Sketch Is Worth a Thousand Words: Image Retrieval with Text and Sketchcited by 28
2021Adversarial Open Domain Adaptation for Sketch-to-Photo Synthesiscited by 24
2022Partially Does It: Towards Scene-Level FG-SBIR with Partial Inputcited by 20
2021Emergent Graphical Conventions in a Visual Communication Gamecited by 16
2025Thinking with Visual Abstract: Enhancing Multimodal Reasoning via Visual Abstractioncited by 15
2025SwiftSketch: A Diffusion Model for Image-to-Vector Sketch Generationcited by 14
2022Improving Fairness in Image Classification via Sketchingcited by 11
2023DiffSketching: Sketch Control Image Synthesis with Diffusion Modelscited by 10
2025Multi-Object Sketch Animation with Grouping and Motion Trajectory Priorscited by 9
2021Deep Image Synthesis from Intuitive User Input: A Review and Perspectivescited by 8
2024Sketch-guided Image Inpainting with Partial Discrete Diffusion Processcited by 7
2025LOTS of Fashion! Multi-Conditioning for Image Generation via Sketch-Text Pairingcited by 7
2022SketchBetween: Video-to-Video Synthesis for Sprite Animation via Sketchescited by 6
2021'CADSketchNet' -- An Annotated Sketch dataset for 3D CAD Model Retrieval with Deep Neural Networkscited by 5
2022High-Quality Pluralistic Image Completion via Code Shared VQGANcited by 5
2023Learning Geometry-aware Representations by Sketchingcited by 5
2024LineArt: A Knowledge-guided Training-free High-quality Appearance Transfer for Design Drawing with Diffusion Modelcited by 5
2025Composite Sketch+Text Queries for Retrieving Objects with Elusive Names and Complex Interactionscited by 5
2023Towards Interactive Image Inpainting via Sketch Refinementcited by 4
2023Sketch Video Synthesiscited by 4
2024Representative Feature Extraction During Diffusion Process for Sketch Extraction with One Examplecited by 4
2024What Sketch Explainability Really Means for Downstream Taskscited by 4
2024Stylized Face Sketch Extraction via Generative Prior with Limited Datacited by 4
2021Sketch-based Creativity Support Tools using Deep Learningcited by 3
2024Semantic Image Synthesis with Unconditional Generatorcited by 3
2024CraftSVG: Multi-Object Text-to-SVG Synthesis via Layout Guided Diffusioncited by 3
2025WIR3D: Visually-Informed and Geometry-Aware 3D Shape Abstractioncited by 3
2026Deep Sketch-Based 3D Modeling: A Surveycited by 3
2025CoProSketch: Controllable and Progressive Sketch Generation with Diffusion Modelcited by 2
2021XCI-Sketch: Extraction of Color Information from Images for Generation of Colored Outlines and Sketchescited by 1
2022Towards Practicality of Sketch-Based Visual Understandingcited by 1
2022A Creative Industry Image Generation Dataset Based on Captionscited by 1
2024SketchTriplet: Self-Supervised Scenarized Sketch-Text-Image Triplet Generationcited by 1
2024SketchRef: a Multi-Task Evaluation Benchmark for Sketch Synthesiscited by 1
2025Computationally Efficient Diffusion Models in Medical Imaging: A Comprehensive Reviewcited by 1
2025ShadowDraw: From Any Object to Shadow-Drawing Compositional Artcited by 1

50 most cited of 67 All 67 (JSON)