# A Multi-purpose Realistic Haze Benchmark with Quantifiable Haze Levels and Ground Truth

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2206.06427 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.06427/

## Key facts

- Cited by 9 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 46 of its 82 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 13 Jun 2022.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 46)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [Faster R-CNN: Towards Real-Time Object Detection with Region Proposal Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1506.01497/) (2015)
- [End-to-End Object Detection with Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.12872/) (2020)
- [Mask R-CNN](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.06870/) (2017)
- [Feature Pyramid Networks for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.03144/) (2016)
- [You Only Look Once: Unified, Real-Time Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1506.02640/) (2015)
- [The Cityscapes Dataset for Semantic Urban Scene Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1604.01685/) (2016)
- [MobileNets: Efficient Convolutional Neural Networks for Mobile Vision Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.04861/) (2017)
- [SSD: Single Shot MultiBox Detector](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.02325/) (2015)
- [Fast R-CNN](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1504.08083/) (2015)
- [Perceptual Losses for Real-Time Style Transfer and Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1603.08155/) (2016)
- [YOLOv3: An Incremental Improvement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.02767/) (2018)
- [Rich feature hierarchies for accurate object detection and semantic segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1311.2524/) (2013)
- [YOLOv4: Optimal Speed and Accuracy of Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.10934/) (2020)
- [FCOS: Fully Convolutional One-Stage Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.01355/) (2019)
- [YOLO9000: Better, Faster, Stronger](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.08242/) (2016)
- [Objects as Points](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.07850/) (2019)
- [YOLOX: Exceeding YOLO Series in 2021](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.08430/) (2021)
- [EfficientDet: Scalable and Efficient Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.09070/) (2019)
- [LoFTR: Detector-Free Local Feature Matching with Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.00680/) (2021)
- [Path Aggregation Network for Instance Segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.01534/) (2018)
- [Benchmarking Single Image Dehazing and Beyond](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.04143/) (2017)
- [R-FCN: Object Detection via Region-based Fully Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1605.06409/) (2016)
- [DehazeNet: An End-to-End System for Single Image Haze Removal](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1601.07661/) (2016)
- [FFA-Net: Feature Fusion Attention Network for Single Image Dehazing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.07559/) (2019)
- [NAS-FPN: Learning Scalable Feature Pyramid Architecture for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.07392/) (2019)
- [Multi-Scale Boosted Dehazing Network with Dense Feature Fusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.13388/) (2020)
- [The Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Benchmark: Object Detection and Tracking](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.00518/) (2018)
- [OTA: Optimal Transport Assignment for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.14259/) (2021)
- [Densely Connected Pyramid Dehazing Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.08396/) (2018)

## Built on by (most cited first, 9 of 9)

- [Multiview Aerial Visual Recognition (MAVREC): Can Multi-view Improve Aerial Visual Perception?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04548/) (2023)
- [HazyDet: Open-Source Benchmark for Drone-View Object Detection with Depth-Cues in Hazy Scenes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.19833/) (2024)
- [Archangel: A Hybrid UAV-based Human Detection Benchmark with Position and Pose Metadata](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.00128/) (2022)
- [SynFog: A Photo-realistic Synthetic Fog Dataset based on End-to-end Imaging Simulation for Advancing Real-World Defogging in Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.17094/) (2024)
- [Enhancing Skin Disease Diagnosis: Interpretable Visual Concept Discovery with SAM](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.09520/) (2024)
- [WeatherProof: Leveraging Language Guidance for Semantic Segmentation in Adverse Weather](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.14874/) (2024)
- [Adaptive Sensitivity Analysis for Robust Augmentation against Natural Corruptions in Image Segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.01425/) (2024)
- [VLMs Guided Interpretable Decision Making for Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.13881/) (2025)
- [Remote Sensing Image Dehazing: A Systematic Review of Progress, Challenges, and Prospects](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.20289/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Imagery collected from outdoor visual environments is often degraded due to the presence of dense smoke or haze. A key challenge for research in scene understanding in these degraded visual environments (DVE) is the lack of representative benchmark datasets. These datasets are required to evaluate state-of-the-art vision algorithms (e.g., detection and tracking) in degraded settings. In this paper, we address some of these limitations by introducing the first realistic hazy image benchmark, from both aerial and ground view, with paired haze-free images, and in-situ haze density measurements. This dataset was produced in a controlled environment with professional smoke generating machines that covered the entire scene, and consists of images captured from the perspective of both an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and an unmanned ground vehicle (UGV). We also evaluate a set of representative state-of-the-art dehazing approaches as well as object detectors on the dataset. The full dataset presented in this paper, including the ground truth object classification bounding boxes and haze density measurements, is provided for the community to evaluate their algorithms at: https://a2i2-archangel.vision. A subset of this dataset has been used for the ``Object Detection in Haze'' Track of CVPR UG2 2022 challenge at http://cvpr2022.ug2challenge.org/track1.html.