No more distorted faces with content-aware resizing

Summary: If you hadn't seen the new image scaling techniques of Shai Avidan and Ariel Shamir yet, take a look at the video above and be impressed.  I was already impressed with it two weeks ago when I first saw it but the more I look at it the more I like it.

Content aware resizingIf you hadn't seen the new image scaling techniques of Shai Avidan and Ariel Shamir yet, take a look at the video above and be impressed.  I was already impressed with it two weeks ago when I first saw it but the more I look at it the more I like it.  Adobe seems to agree since they went out and hired Shai Avidan.

Image scaling has been one of my pet peeves and I've always hated how wide screen TVs scaled 4:3 images in a distorted way (or how regular TVs scaled wide screen).  It would be interesting to see if this technology could be applied in real-time 24 or 30 frames per second to video.  The Photoshop users will probably be happy to get a plug-in soon.

Topics: Hardware, Enterprise Software, Software

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  • (nt) Very cool

    .
    toadlife
    • Yup, it does take liberties with the background though

      Yup, it does take liberties with the background though and it will be challenging applying this to a video and keeping consistency over the frames. Some scenes may have important objects that stretch all the way across the screen and there's no way to keep the geometry pure. This is still very cool though.
      georgeou
  • RE: No more distorted faces with content-aware resizing

    Well no more distorted faces as long as you mark them or the image is suitable for face recognition.

    This is brilliant. I spend a significant amount of my time cropping, scaling and removing objects from images for use in eLearning modules. This would save a lot of time and the results look better than you can achieve manually (at least without spending hours and hours).

    Like you, I put up with the way wide screen TV deals with 4:3 images - most of the time expanding them so the top and the bottom is trimmed. As you said, this technique would be extremely useful if it could be done in real time and although I don't use Photoshop, I can certainly use a Photoshop plugin for PhotoImpact - looking forward to this getting out of the labs.
    tonymcs@...
    • I will only crop or deal with black bars. I can't stand stretching

      I will only crop or deal with black bars. I wouldn't mind having a compromise crop/black bars where you crop a little and have smaller black bars.

      I can't stand stretching them out. Some of the TVs will stretch edges even more than center and it has a weird fish-eye lens effect.
      georgeou
  • RE: No more distorted faces with content-aware resizing

    Must cool George
    D T Schmitz
    • Most cooliou

      nt
      D T Schmitz
  • It will be interesting

    to see how many "updated" photos appear on the web. The algorithm used works very well, but I'm wondering if something will be lost in the pixels.
    THEE WOLF
  • Pretty cool tool for designers

    The images look fine from that distance but I wonder
    what they look like up close and how well they print.

    Also loved the ability to scrub people out of pictures. I
    would imagine you could scrub other objects out as
    well?

    Awesome!
    Kid Icarus-21097050858087920245213802267493
  • Want to try that hands-on?

    Hi,
    If you are looking for a software to try out seam carving, take a look at http://www.thegedanken.com/retarget

    The program that you can download there (for Windows and Linux, and free) is already highly optimized concerning speed, and apart from enlarging or decreasing image size you can also use masks to protect or delete certain parts of your image.

    Have fun,
    Irmgard
    Irmgard
  • Looking for a software to try that hands-on?

    Hi,
    If you are looking for a software to try out seam carving, take a look at http://www.thegedanken.com/retarget

    The program that you can download there (for Windows and Linux, and free) is already highly optimized concerning speed, and apart from enlarging or decreasing image size you can also use masks to protect or delete certain parts of your image.

    Have fun,
    Irmgard
    Irmgard