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Photography website PetaPixel reports that researchers affiliated with Google and MIT have devised an algorithm that automatically removes reflections and obstructions from photographs, provided multiple frames are captured. Even more intriguing: this algorithm can also recover a reflected image.
Differences between the reflections/obstructions and the scene can be detected and extracted by comparing all the different shots, resulting in one clear photo of the obstruction-free background scene, and one clear photo of the extracted obstruction (e.g. a reflection or fence).
Now that's where things get even crazier: the algorithm is able to provide clear photos of what reflections show....
The MIT Technology Review provides more details about the algorithm:
Michael Rubinstein, a research scientist at Google who worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Microsoft Research while some of the work was conducted, says the basic principle behind the algorithm is the phenomenon of motion parallax....
Tianfan Xue, lead author of the paper and a graduate student at MIT, says that in addition to reflections on windows and chain-link fences, the algorithm can correct for a number of different kinds of obstructions on windows like raindrops or dirt.
Fairly impressive! Does this have the potential to become a new standard tool for photographers, or will this appeal primarily to cameraphone-toting consumers?
(Score: 3, Informative) by inertnet on Thursday August 06 2015, @11:14PM
Can't wait to have this available in GIMP.
The GIMP website seems to be unavailable right now "Domain not active.": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10015700/ [ycombinator.com]
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday August 07 2015, @02:36AM
Had me scared there for a second.
The GIMP website [gimp.org] was good to go when I just checked it.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday August 07 2015, @05:04AM
domain not active is what I see as well.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday August 07 2015, @05:47AM
Strange... I just had to verify subsequent postings... I am now getting "Domain not active" as well. Really odd. It *was* there. Now its not.
Maybe I got tripped up on a cached copy of the webpage?
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Friday August 07 2015, @09:23AM
The website is back up again, but no mention of the black out. Apparently the domain registration had expired. Hopefully the original owners got it back, but I'm suspicious enough to check the next version thoroughly before installing it.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday August 07 2015, @12:00PM
I just looked at the provided link. I'm not familiar with the normal website, but the current thing requires javascript to show anything, and looks fishy to me. I suppose that that *could* be the normal way that they run their page, but it's not something I would trust.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2, Informative) by anubi on Saturday August 08 2015, @06:12AM
The GIMP website did not require me to run JavaScript.
The redirection that did nothing but tell me "Domain not active" did.
I just rechecked before posting. GIMP *appears* to be up and running again.
Like others said, I would be wary for a while until others do a few downloads and verify against known good copies.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]