# DeblurDiff: Real-World Image Deblurring with Generative Diffusion Models

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.03810 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.03810/

## Key facts

- Cited by 8 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Inverse problems and image restoration, one of 14 directions in Diffusion models.
- Builds on 34 of its 50 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 6 Feb 2025.

## Placed in

- Diffusion models / [Inverse problems and image restoration](https://mlsanity.com/diffusion/inverse-problems-and-image-restoration/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 34)

- [Attention Is All You Need](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.03762/) (2017)
- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.11239/) (2020)
- [High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.10752/) (2021)
- [The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Deep Features as a Perceptual Metric](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.03924/) (2018)
- [Diffusion Models Beat GANs on Image Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.05233/) (2021)
- [Adding Conditional Control to Text-to-Image Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.05543/) (2023)
- [SAM 2: Segment Anything in Images and Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.00714/) (2024)
- [Photo-Realistic Single Image Super-Resolution Using a Generative Adversarial Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1609.04802/) (2016)
- [Restormer: Efficient Transformer for High-Resolution Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.09881/) (2021)
- [MUSIQ: Multi-scale Image Quality Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.05997/) (2021)
- [Exploring CLIP for Assessing the Look and Feel of Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.12396/) (2022)
- [Uformer: A General U-Shaped Transformer for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.03106/) (2021)
- [Multi-Stage Progressive Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.02808/) (2021)
- [Deep Multi-scale Convolutional Neural Network for Dynamic Scene Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.02177/) (2016)
- [Simple Baselines for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.04676/) (2022)
- [MANIQA: Multi-dimension Attention Network for No-Reference Image Quality Assessment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.08958/) (2022)
- [ResShift: Efficient Diffusion Model for Image Super-resolution by Residual Shifting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.12348/) (2023)
- [DeblurGAN-v2: Deblurring (Orders-of-Magnitude) Faster and Better](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.03826/) (2019)
- [Scale-recurrent Network for Deep Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.01770/) (2018)
- [Rethinking Coarse-to-Fine Approach in Single Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.05054/) (2021)
- [Pixel-Aware Stable Diffusion for Realistic Image Super-resolution and Personalized Stylization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.14469/) (2023)
- [SRFlow: Learning the Super-Resolution Space with Normalizing Flow](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.14200/) (2020)
- [Deblurring by Realistic Blurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.01860/) (2020)
- [Efficient Frequency Domain-based Transformers for High-Quality Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.12250/) (2022)
- [Efficient and Explicit Modelling of Image Hierarchies for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.00748/) (2023)
- [Spatio-Temporal Filter Adaptive Network for Video Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.12257/) (2019)
- [Hierarchical Integration Diffusion Model for Realistic Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.12966/) (2023)
- [Multiscale Structure Guided Diffusion for Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.01789/) (2022)
- [On the Connection between Local Attention and Dynamic Depth-wise Convolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.04263/) (2021)

## Built on by (most cited first, 8 of 8)

- [Generative Refocusing: Flexible Defocus Control from a Single Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.16923/) (2025)
- [CreativeVR: Diffusion-Prior-Guided Approach for Structure and Motion Restoration in Generative and Real Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.12060/) (2025)
- [Moment-Reenacting: Inverse Motion Degradation with Cross-shutter Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.22423/) (2026)
- [PG-ControlNet: A Physics-Guided ControlNet for Generative Spatially Varying Image Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.21043/) (2025)
- [Learning to Refocus with Video Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.19823/) (2025)
- [Diffusion Algorithm for Metalens Optical Aberration Correction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.12689/) (2025)
- [Restoration-Aligned Generative Flow Models for Blind Motion Deblurring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.08854/) (2026)
- [DeblurNVS: Geometric Latent Diffusion for Novel View Synthesis from Sparse Motion-Blurred Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.01315/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Diffusion models have achieved significant progress in image generation. The pre-trained Stable Diffusion (SD) models are helpful for image deblurring by providing clear image priors. However, directly using a blurry image or pre-deblurred one as a conditional control for SD will either hinder accurate structure extraction or make the results overly dependent on the deblurring network. In this work, we propose a Latent Kernel Prediction Network (LKPN) to achieve robust real-world image deblurring. Specifically, we co-train the LKPN in latent space with conditional diffusion. The LKPN learns a spatially variant kernel to guide the restoration of sharp images in the latent space. By applying element-wise adaptive convolution (EAC), the learned kernel is utilized to adaptively process the input feature, effectively preserving the structural information of the input. This process thereby more effectively guides the generative process of Stable Diffusion (SD), enhancing both the deblurring efficacy and the quality of detail reconstruction. Moreover, the results at each diffusion step are utilized to iteratively estimate the kernels in LKPN to better restore the sharp latent by EAC. This iterative refinement enhances the accuracy and robustness of the deblurring process. Extensive experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art image deblurring methods on both benchmark and real-world images.