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pp. 4515-4532
S&M4579 Research paper https://doi.org/10.18494/SAM5891 Published: August 20, 2026 DFRE-Net: a Dual-branch Cross-feature Fusion with Regional Enhancement Network for Image Inpainting [PDF] Rongrong Gong, Ronghao Luo, Minzhi Yuan, Yuehong Tian, Dengyong Zhang, and Yan Li (Received August 26, 2025; Accepted July 21, 2026) Keywords: big date, image inpainting, learning-based fusion technique, cross-feature fusion
Image inpainting is a critical task in computational intelligence, particularly in AI-driven big data environments, where it involves synthesizing missing image content based on available information to restore occluded or damaged regions. As a learning-based fusion technique, image inpainting leverages AI to intelligently reconstruct missing or corrupted areas. To overcome the limitations of existing approaches, where convolutional neural networks (CNNs) struggle with global semantic coherence and Transformers lack sensitivity to fine local details. In this paper, the authors introduce DFRE-Net, a dual-branch cross-feature fusion network with regional enhancement for high-fidelity image inpainting. The encoder adopts a computationally intelligent dual-branch architecture: a CNN branch with multiscale residual connections extracts high-frequency details, whereas a Transformer branch captures long-range contextual relationships. The decoder incorporates a Cross-feature Fusion Module (CFFM), utilizing multidilation depthwise separable convolutions for adaptive local-global feature integration, and a Regional Enhancement Module (REM) with mask-guided optimization to reduce foreground-background interference. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art models on the Paris StreetView, Places365, and CelebA-HQ datasets, validating the effectiveness of cross-architecture feature fusion in addressing complex occlusion inpainting tasks.
Corresponding author: Yan Li![]() ![]() This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Cite this article Rongrong Gong, Ronghao Luo, Minzhi Yuan, Yuehong Tian, Dengyong Zhang, and Yan Li , DFRE-Net: a Dual-branch Cross-feature Fusion with Regional Enhancement Network for Image Inpainting, Sens. Mater., Vol. 38, No. 8, 2026, p. 4515-4532. |