  The testing of Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) has become increasingly important
as DNNs are widely adopted by safety critical systems. While many test adequacy
criteria have been suggested, automated test input generation for many types of
DNNs remains a challenge because the raw input space is too large to randomly
sample or to navigate and search for plausible inputs. Consequently, current
testing techniques for DNNs depend on small local perturbations to existing
inputs, based on the metamorphic testing principle. We propose new ways to
search not over the entire image space, but rather over a plausible input space
that resembles the true training distribution. This space is constructed using
Variational Autoencoders (VAEs), and navigated through their latent vector
space. We show that this space helps efficiently produce test inputs that can
reveal information about the robustness of DNNs when dealing with realistic
tests, opening the field to meaningful exploration through the space of highly
structured images.
