My camera gives me descriptions too, but they're in terms of quantized frequency coefficients of 8x8 squares.
Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
51–60 of 83 posts
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#52Here is an idea, translate the text into a picture. An API will take text and generate a representation of the description using images from the web via google image search.
There's been some interesting efforts at that already. eg:
WordsEye constructs 3d images from text descriptions http://www.wordseye.com/
Sketch2Photo takes a crude annotated sketch, and creates a composite image: http://cg.cs.tsinghua.edu.cn/montage/main.htm
The output of wordseye isn't great - it looks a bit 90's POV-Ray. Sketch2Photo does a nicer job - more like automated photoshopping - but needs more assistance on the placement of objects in the scene.
I'm sure there's others.
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does the human race have to have griefers? Why can't we all just get along and have cool sci-fi tech without people trying to game it?
Well, let's draw a distinction here. The above isn't griefing, it's simple capitalism. It exists for some reason other than aggravating people and/or wasting their time. You might also have griefers who would put out text-photographs like: ________________________________ / \ |+------------------------------+| || This is a picture of how I || || just want to tell you how || || I'm feeling, gotta make you || || unders…
Except that might not be used by 'griefers' instead it could be a love note between two lovers.
'Greifers' is just a subjective term depending on which chair you're sitting in to watch the performance.
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#54Add speech synthesis and this would be an awesome camera for the blind.
http://vizwiz.org/ > VizWiz is an iPhone app that allows blind users to receive quick answers to questions about their surroundings. VizWiz combines automatic image processing, anonymous web workers, and members of the user's social network in order to collect fast and accurate answers to their questions.
Just had a go: it's great!
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does the human race have to have griefers? Why can't we all just get along and have cool sci-fi tech without people trying to game it?
Well, let's draw a distinction here. The above isn't griefing, it's simple capitalism. It exists for some reason other than aggravating people and/or wasting their time. You might also have griefers who would put out text-photographs like: ________________________________ / \ |+------------------------------+| || This is a picture of how I || || just want to tell you how || || I'm feeling, gotta make you || || unders…
Its annyoing but I rather have cool stuff and people abusing at then not having that stuff at all.
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Absolutely. for example, a big challenge for blind people is interacting with devices in the environment that report status via visual signals. For example, a blind coffee fiend I know can't tell what state his fancy espresso machine is in ("brewing", "out of beans") without sighted help to read the little display. He would happily wait a few minutes to get someone to tell him - it's quicker than waiting for his wife…
Thanks for this. Now I'm trying to think of ways that you could actuate thin metal rods, so that you could transform a greyscale picture into a sort of texture-photograph, so that you could "see" details by placing a hand atop it. If the rods are needle-thin you could probably get a reasonable resolution on it, and even have some brightness/contrast sliders on the side to help -- but it seems like the real problem is…
If you built it, I think you'd find the real problem is having enough resolution in your fingertips to work out what the hell the picture is about.
Lots of people who become visually impaired later in life can't read Braille as their fingertips aren't sensitive enough, especially if they did manual work earlier in their life. Working out a picture is even harder.
As a side note about this, William Moon invented 'Moon script' which was a kind of simplified alphabet in embossed writing to help visually impaired people read. It was invented a little before Braille invented the raised dot patterns, and even after Braille became popular, Moon still had it's niche for those who didn't have the resolution for Braille. As Moon was based on the Roman alphabet, it was also easier to learn for people who'd been able to read then lost their sight.
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, let's draw a distinction here. The above isn't griefing, it's simple capitalism. It exists for some reason other than aggravating people and/or wasting their time. You might also have griefers who would put out text-photographs like: ________________________________ / \ |+------------------------------+| || This is a picture of how I || || just want to tell you how || || I'm feeling, gotta make you || || unders…
Except that might not be used by 'griefers' instead it could be a love note between two lovers. 'Greifers' is just a subjective term depending on which chair you're sitting in to watch the performance.
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Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#58Amazing - the meta concepts behind the "Descriptive Camera" are limited only by the imagination, the resolution of the sensing devices, the ubiquity/bandwidth of the data pipe, and the ability to manage/train the backend human workforce and maintain a consistent level of quality. I'm pretty certain, that within 3-5 years, a billion dollar company will emerge using the basic concepts captured by the "descriptive camer…
This already exists- remember Google Goggles? Except in this implementation it's a little more hipster/artsy since it prints it out for you on receipt paper.
Honestly, as a camera, it is a step backwards. Photographs efficiently capture many times more information than a simple text description.
However, what it is a good demonstration of is the growing cognitive abilities of image-reading machines.
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#59Let me see if I understand this technology correctly: you take a picture of something, mail the picture to someone, somewhere, they write a quick summary of the picture and mail that back to be printed out on what appears to be a thermal receipt printer.
Wat?
Re: Descriptive Camera: A camera that prints a description, not an image
#60Can someone build a version of this that prints snarky descriptions of certain pictures? Give it a libertarian political slant and a vegan diet. Only good things can come of this.