# LatentAvatar: Learning Latent Expression Code for Expressive Neural Head Avatar

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.01190 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.01190/

## Key facts

- Cited by 50 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 58 of its 99 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 2 May 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 58)

- [Adam: A Method for Stochastic Optimization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1412.6980/) (2014)
- [The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Deep Features as a Perceptual Metric](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.03924/) (2018)
- [A Style-Based Generator Architecture for Generative Adversarial Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.04948/) (2018)
- [Instant Neural Graphics Primitives with a Multiresolution Hash Encoding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.05989/) (2022)
- [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)
- [pixelNeRF: Neural Radiance Fields from One or Few Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.02190/) (2020)
- [Nerfies: Deformable Neural Radiance Fields](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.12948/) (2020)
- [Joint Face Detection and Alignment using Multi-task Cascaded Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1604.02878/) (2016)
- [MVSNeRF: Fast Generalizable Radiance Field Reconstruction from Multi-View Stereo](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.15595/) (2021)
- [Unpaired Image-to-Image Translation using Cycle-Consistent Adversarial Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.10593/) (2017)
- [First Order Motion Model for Image Animation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.00196/) (2020)
- [Face2Face: Real-time Face Capture and Reenactment of RGB Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2007.14808/) (2020)
- [Accurate 3D Face Reconstruction with Weakly-Supervised Learning: From Single Image to Image Set](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.08527/) (2019)
- [Dynamic Neural Radiance Fields for Monocular 4D Facial Avatar Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.03065/) (2020)
- [One-Shot Free-View Neural Talking-Head Synthesis for Video Conferencing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.15126/) (2020)
- [Fast Dynamic Radiance Fields with Time-Aware Neural Voxels](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.15285/) (2022)
- [AD-NeRF: Audio Driven Neural Radiance Fields for Talking Head Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.11078/) (2021)
- [FSGAN: Subject Agnostic Face Swapping and Reenactment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.05932/) (2019)
- [Few-Shot Adversarial Learning of Realistic Neural Talking Head Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.08233/) (2019)
- [Mixture of Volumetric Primitives for Efficient Neural Rendering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.01954/) (2021)
- [Deep Video Portraits](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1805.11714/) (2018)
- [I M Avatar: Implicit Morphable Head Avatars from Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.07471/) (2021)
- [HeadNeRF: A Real-time NeRF-based Parametric Head Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.05637/) (2021)
- [HyperNeRF: A Higher-Dimensional Representation for Topologically Varying Neural Radiance Fields](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.13228/) (2021)
- [Neural Head Avatars from Monocular RGB Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.01554/) (2021)
- [PIRenderer: Controllable Portrait Image Generation via Semantic Neural Rendering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.08379/) (2021)
- [X2Face: A network for controlling face generation by using images, audio, and pose codes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.10550/) (2018)
- [PointAvatar: Deformable Point-based Head Avatars from Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.08377/) (2022)
- [Neural Volumes: Learning Dynamic Renderable Volumes from Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1906.07751/) (2019)

## Built on by (most cited first, 30 of 50)

- [GaussianAvatars: Photorealistic Head Avatars with Rigged 3D Gaussians](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.02069/) (2023)
- [Relightable Gaussian Codec Avatars](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.03704/) (2023)
- [DreamHuman: Animatable 3D Avatars from Text](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.09329/) (2023)
- [MonoGaussianAvatar: Monocular Gaussian Point-based Head Avatar](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04558/) (2023)
- [AvatarReX: Real-time Expressive Full-body Avatars](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.04789/) (2023)
- [GPAvatar: Generalizable and Precise Head Avatar from Image(s)](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.10215/) (2024)
- [GaussianHead: High-fidelity Head Avatars with Learnable Gaussian Derivation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.01632/) (2023)
- [NPGA: Neural Parametric Gaussian Avatars](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.19331/) (2024)
- [Learning Disentangled Avatars with Hybrid 3D Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.06441/) (2023)
- [HeadGAP: Few-Shot 3D Head Avatar via Generalizable Gaussian Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.06019/) (2024)
- [URAvatar: Universal Relightable Gaussian Codec Avatars](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.24223/) (2024)
- [HHAvatar: Gaussian Head Avatar with Dynamic Hairs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.03029/) (2023)
- [Cafca: High-quality Novel View Synthesis of Expressive Faces from Casual Few-shot Captures](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.00630/) (2024)
- [VOODOO 3D: Volumetric Portrait Disentanglement for One-Shot 3D Head Reenactment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04651/) (2023)
- [GaussianHeads: End-to-End Learning of Drivable Gaussian Head Avatars from Coarse-to-fine Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.11951/) (2024)
- [RGBAvatar: Reduced Gaussian Blendshapes for Online Modeling of Head Avatars](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.12886/) (2025)
- [HRAvatar: High-Quality and Relightable Gaussian Head Avatar](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.08224/) (2025)
- [Rip-NeRF: Anti-aliasing Radiance Fields with Ripmap-Encoded Platonic Solids](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.02386/) (2024)
- [VideoRF: Rendering Dynamic Radiance Fields as 2D Feature Video Streams](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.01407/) (2023)
- [Gaussian Eigen Models for Human Heads](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.04545/) (2024)
- [VRMM: A Volumetric Relightable Morphable Head Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.04101/) (2024)
- [VOODOO XP: Expressive One-Shot Head Reenactment for VR Telepresence](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.16204/) (2024)
- [Tri2-plane: Thinking Head Avatar via Feature Pyramid](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.09386/) (2024)
- [PERSE: Personalized 3D Generative Avatars from A Single Portrait](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.21206/) (2024)
- [GAN-Avatar: Controllable Personalized GAN-based Human Head Avatar](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.13655/) (2023)
- [Synthetic Prior for Few-Shot Drivable Head Avatar Inversion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.06903/) (2025)
- [Neural Radiance Field-based Visual Rendering: A Comprehensive Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.00714/) (2024)
- [SEGA: Drivable 3D Gaussian Head Avatar from a Single Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.14373/) (2025)
- [GPHM: Gaussian Parametric Head Model for Monocular Head Avatar Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.15070/) (2024)
- [SingingHead: A Large-scale 4D Dataset for Singing Head Animation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04369/) (2023)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Existing approaches to animatable NeRF-based head avatars are either built upon face templates or use the expression coefficients of templates as the driving signal. Despite the promising progress, their performances are heavily bound by the expression power and the tracking accuracy of the templates. In this work, we present LatentAvatar, an expressive neural head avatar driven by latent expression codes. Such latent expression codes are learned in an end-to-end and self-supervised manner without templates, enabling our method to get rid of expression and tracking issues. To achieve this, we leverage a latent head NeRF to learn the person-specific latent expression codes from a monocular portrait video, and further design a Y-shaped network to learn the shared latent expression codes of different subjects for cross-identity reenactment. By optimizing the photometric reconstruction objectives in NeRF, the latent expression codes are learned to be 3D-aware while faithfully capturing the high-frequency detailed expressions. Moreover, by learning a mapping between the latent expression code learned in shared and person-specific settings, LatentAvatar is able to perform expressive reenactment between different subjects. Experimental results show that our LatentAvatar is able to capture challenging expressions and the subtle movement of teeth and even eyeballs, which outperforms previous state-of-the-art solutions in both quantitative and qualitative comparisons. Project page: https://www.liuyebin.com/latentavatar.