# SeSDF: Self-evolved Signed Distance Field for Implicit 3D Clothed Human Reconstruction

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2304.00359 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.00359/

## Key facts

- Cited by 15 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 57 of its 75 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 1 Apr 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 57)

- [PointNet: Deep Learning on Point Sets for 3D Classification and Segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.00593/) (2016)
- [DeepSDF: Learning Continuous Signed Distance Functions for Shape Representation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1901.05103/) (2019)
- [Occupancy Networks: Learning 3D Reconstruction in Function Space](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.03828/) (2018)
- [Expressive Body Capture: 3D Hands, Face, and Body from a Single Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.05866/) (2019)
- [3D U-Net: Learning Dense Volumetric Segmentation from Sparse Annotation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.06650/) (2016)
- [Stacked Hourglass Networks for Human Pose Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1603.06937/) (2016)
- [End-to-end Recovery of Human Shape and Pose](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.06584/) (2017)
- [PIFu: Pixel-Aligned Implicit Function for High-Resolution Clothed Human Digitization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.05172/) (2019)
- [Convolutional Occupancy Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.04618/) (2020)
- [Implicit Geometric Regularization for Learning Shapes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.10099/) (2020)
- [PIFuHD: Multi-Level Pixel-Aligned Implicit Function for High-Resolution 3D Human Digitization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.00452/) (2020)
- [Implicit Functions in Feature Space for 3D Shape Reconstruction and Completion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.01456/) (2020)
- [PARE: Part Attention Regressor for 3D Human Body Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.08527/) (2021)
- [Deep Local Shapes: Learning Local SDF Priors for Detailed 3D Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.10983/) (2020)
- [HybrIK: A Hybrid Analytical-Neural Inverse Kinematics Solution for 3D Human Pose and Shape Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.14672/) (2020)
- [ICON: Implicit Clothed humans Obtained from Normals](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.09127/) (2021)
- [ARCH: Animatable Reconstruction of Clothed Humans](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.04572/) (2020)
- [PyMAF: 3D Human Pose and Shape Regression with Pyramidal Mesh Alignment Feedback Loop](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.16507/) (2021)
- [Function4D: Real-time Human Volumetric Capture from Very Sparse Consumer RGBD Sensors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.01859/) (2021)
- [Total Capture: A 3D Deformation Model for Tracking Faces, Hands, and Bodies](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.01615/) (2018)
- [Video Based Reconstruction of 3D People Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.04758/) (2018)
- [PaMIR: Parametric Model-Conditioned Implicit Representation for Image-based Human Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2007.03858/) (2020)
- [Learning to Estimate 3D Human Pose and Shape from a Single Color Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1805.04092/) (2018)
- [Monocular, One-stage, Regression of Multiple 3D People](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.12272/) (2020)
- [STAR: Sparse Trained Articulated Human Body Regressor](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.08535/) (2020)
- [Neural Body Fitting: Unifying Deep Learning and Model-Based Human Pose and Shape Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1808.05942/) (2018)
- [DeepHuman: 3D Human Reconstruction from a Single Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.06473/) (2019)
- [ARCH++: Animation-Ready Clothed Human Reconstruction Revisited](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.07845/) (2021)
- [Learning to Reconstruct People in Clothing from a Single RGB Camera](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.05885/) (2019)
- [Monocular Total Capture: Posing Face, Body, and Hands in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.01598/) (2018)

## Built on by (most cited first, 15 of 15)

- [SIFU: Side-view Conditioned Implicit Function for Real-world Usable Clothed Human Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.06704/) (2023)
- [HumanSplat: Generalizable Single-Image Human Gaussian Splatting with Structure Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.12459/) (2024)
- [Global-correlated 3D-decoupling Transformer for Clothed Avatar Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.13524/) (2023)
- [GaussianVTON: 3D Human Virtual Try-ON via Multi-Stage Gaussian Splatting Editing with Image Prompting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.07472/) (2024)
- [A Survey on 3D Human Avatar Modeling -- From Reconstruction to Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.04253/) (2024)
- [CanonicalFusion: Generating Drivable 3D Human Avatars from Multiple Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.04345/) (2024)
- [Guide3D: Create 3D Avatars from Text and Image Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.09705/) (2023)
- [HumanRAM: Feed-forward Human Reconstruction and Animation Model using Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.03118/) (2025)
- [Multi-hypotheses Conditioned Point Cloud Diffusion for 3D Human Reconstruction from Occluded Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.18364/) (2024)
- [DAGSM: Disentangled Avatar Generation with GS-enhanced Mesh](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.15205/) (2024)
- [HART: Human Aligned Reconstruction Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.26621/) (2025)
- [HSImul3R: Physics-in-the-Loop Reconstruction of Simulation-Ready Human-Scene Interactions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.15612/) (2026)
- [Weakly-Supervised 3D Reconstruction of Clothed Humans via Normal Maps](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.16042/) (2023)
- [COSMU: Complete 3D human shape from monocular unconstrained images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.10586/) (2024)
- [Link to the Past: Temporal Propagation for Fast 3D Human Reconstruction from Monocular Video](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.07333/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We address the problem of clothed human reconstruction from a single image or uncalibrated multi-view images. Existing methods struggle with reconstructing detailed geometry of a clothed human and often require a calibrated setting for multi-view reconstruction. We propose a flexible framework which, by leveraging the parametric SMPL-X model, can take an arbitrary number of input images to reconstruct a clothed human model under an uncalibrated setting. At the core of our framework is our novel self-evolved signed distance field (SeSDF) module which allows the framework to learn to deform the signed distance field (SDF) derived from the fitted SMPL-X model, such that detailed geometry reflecting the actual clothed human can be encoded for better reconstruction. Besides, we propose a simple method for self-calibration of multi-view images via the fitted SMPL-X parameters. This lifts the requirement of tedious manual calibration and largely increases the flexibility of our method. Further, we introduce an effective occlusion-aware feature fusion strategy to account for the most useful features to reconstruct the human model. We thoroughly evaluate our framework on public benchmarks, demonstrating significant superiority over the state-of-the-arts both qualitatively and quantitatively.