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posted by LaminatorX on Wednesday October 08 2014, @04:21PM   Printer-friendly
from the unblinking-eye dept.

Rob Smith blogs on his recent experience with Google's photo album product that unexpectedly synthesized two photos to generate a new image of something that never happened. We are now at the point where software is capable of automatically "photoshopping" images without any direct human interaction.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Alfred on Wednesday October 08 2014, @04:28PM

    by Alfred (4006) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @04:28PM (#103649) Journal

    Digital photos have lost cred here. maybe the little cred they have left. If I was on a jury in todays world I would have to dismiss any and all photo evidence.
    If I am shown a compromising photo of a politician I will have to say "yeah, he probably would do that but this doesn't prove that he ever did."

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @04:57PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @04:57PM (#103667)

      That is spot on , if you cannot say the evidence is reliable , it looses all value. If they can setup such software and use it .. imagine how many people can now be blackmailed /
      This is not great stuff this is terrible stuff

    • (Score: 2) by hoochiecoochieman on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:37PM

      by hoochiecoochieman (4158) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:37PM (#103675)

      Forensics can easily detect if a photo is fake or not. I think it hasn't changed.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:58PM

        by maxwell demon (1608) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:58PM (#103687) Journal

        The better the algorithms become, the harder it will become to detect fakes. Especially if the fake was done intentionally, and thus all signs of manipulation are removed as far as possible.

        --
        The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
      • (Score: 2) by SlimmPickens on Wednesday October 08 2014, @08:10PM

        by SlimmPickens (1056) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @08:10PM (#103752)

        Forensics can easily detect if a photo is fake or not.

        It won't be easy in a situation like that, where the ambient light temperature is the same, the perspective is the same, only minimal changes.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:42PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:42PM (#103676)

      So called "Lie Detectors" lost credibility a long time ago but they still affect people's jobs and freedom. Considering it will be far easier to produce such false photographic evidence then you will see them in use on a far wider scale to frame people and governments. Not to mention further CGI improvements could well make Hollywood smile over the possibility of not sharing their money with actors.

      Probably someone at an alphabet soup agency somewhere daydreaming about how to turn the floor of Congress into a holographic display.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by jcross on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:51PM

      by jcross (4009) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @05:51PM (#103683)

      Photos, digital and otherwise, have had more credibility than they deserve right from the start. Even with no overt manipulation, and setting aside their limited representation of actual light fields, they're inherently removed from their temporal and spatial context. I think the widespread awareness of digital photo editing and the lies it can tell is doing us a service here.

      See this for an interesting example of how taking photos out of their context can be misleading:

      http://www.rubensalvadori.com/index.php/project/photojournalism-behind-the-scenes/ [rubensalvadori.com]

    • (Score: 1) by Zappy on Thursday October 09 2014, @08:05AM

      by Zappy (4210) on Thursday October 09 2014, @08:05AM (#103941)

      At least some Nikon DSLR models cameras sign the images and so can be vetted as "original". It wouldn't surprise me if Cannon did something similar.

  • (Score: 2) by paulej72 on Wednesday October 08 2014, @06:54PM

    by paulej72 (58) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @06:54PM (#103708) Journal
    The only difference I can see from the synthesized photo and the better one where is wife is smiling is the position of the author's hand. His facial expression does not change. Why did algorithm need to create a "better" pict. This system works best for those picts where someone has their tongue out or blinked than the the one in the given example.
    --
    Team Leader for SN Development
    • (Score: 1) by pnkwarhall on Wednesday October 08 2014, @07:33PM

      by pnkwarhall (4558) on Wednesday October 08 2014, @07:33PM (#103731)

      "A better pic" is obviously subjective, but study paintings by "the Masters" -- you'll soon realize that the strength/effectiveness of a composition lies in a large part in things like the positioning of limbs (generally in the context of relationships with other elements of the painting).

      Whether image composition modification has any place in photo-editing software is really the gist of the article. It's not just about "fixing red-eye"-type changes like you reference -- it's about creating moments that never happened. To me, the "best" pictures are the ones that lie somewhere in the limbo between posed and candid. It's the details that make most images memorable -- altering them would be a betrayal of the moment.

      --
      Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @08:20PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 08 2014, @08:20PM (#103756)
    If Google would take my search queries and synthesize photos based on various things I regularly search for then this could be a rule 34 goldmine.