# Fossil Image Identification using Deep Learning Ensembles of Data Augmented Multiviews

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.08062 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.08062/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 11 of its 58 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 16 Feb 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 11 of 11)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [Very Deep Convolutional Networks for Large-Scale Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1409.1556/) (2014)
- [Grad-CAM: Visual Explanations from Deep Networks via Gradient-based Localization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1610.02391/) (2016)
- [EfficientNet: Rethinking Model Scaling for Convolutional Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.11946/) (2019)
- [Going Deeper with Convolutions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1409.4842/) (2014)
- [MobileNets: Efficient Convolutional Neural Networks for Mobile Vision Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.04861/) (2017)
- [Learning Deep Features for Discriminative Localization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.04150/) (2015)
- [Inception-v4, Inception-ResNet and the Impact of Residual Connections on Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1602.07261/) (2016)
- [Neural Architecture Search with Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1611.01578/) (2016)
- [Designing Network Design Spaces](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.13678/) (2020)
- [A Survey of Convolutional Neural Networks: Analysis, Applications, and Prospects](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.02806/) (2020)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [ProtoConNet: Prototypical Augmentation and Alignment for Open-Set Few-Shot Image Classification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.11845/) (2025)
- [GePBench: Evaluating Fundamental Geometric Perception for Multimodal Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.21036/) (2024)
- [ForamDeepSlice: A High-Accuracy Deep Learning Framework for Foraminifera Species Classification from 2D Micro-CT Slices](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.00912/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Identification of fossil species is crucial to evolutionary studies. Recent advances from deep learning have shown promising prospects in fossil image identification. However, the quantity and quality of labeled fossil images are often limited due to fossil preservation, conditioned sampling, and expensive and inconsistent label annotation by domain experts, which pose great challenges to training deep learning based image classification models. To address these challenges, we follow the idea of the wisdom of crowds and propose a multiview ensemble framework, which collects Original (O), Gray (G), and Skeleton (S) views of each fossil image reflecting its different characteristics to train multiple base models, and then makes the final decision via soft voting. Experiments on the largest fusulinid dataset with 2400 images show that the proposed OGS consistently outperforms baselines (using a single model for each view), and obtains superior or comparable performance compared to OOO (using three base models for three the same Original views). Besides, as the training data decreases, the proposed framework achieves more gains. While considering the identification consistency estimation with respect to human experts, OGS receives the highest agreement with the original labels of dataset and with the re-identifications of two human experts. The validation performance provides a quantitative estimation of consistency across different experts and genera. We conclude that the proposed framework can present state-of-the-art performance in the fusulinid fossil identification case study. This framework is designed for general fossil identification and it is expected to see applications to other fossil datasets in future work. The source code is publicly available at https://github.com/houchengbin/Fossil-Image-Identification to benefit future research in fossil image identification.
