We propose a novel consistent max-covering scheme for
human pose estimation. Consistent max-covering formulates
pose estimation as the covering of body part polygons
on an object silhouette so that the body part tiles maximally
cover the foreground, match local image features, and satisfy
body linkage plan and color constraints. It uses high
order constraints to anchor multiple body parts simultaneously;
the hyper-edges in the part relation graph are essential
for detecting complex poses. Because of using multiple
clues in pose estimation, this method is resistant to cluttered
foregrounds. We propose an efficient linear relaxation
method to solve the consistent max-covering problem. Experiments
on a variety of images and videos show that the
proposed method is more robust than locally constrained
methods for human pose estimation.