For
humans, video [data] is
a source of information about objects and activities captured
by a video-camera. This is because human brain is able to perform many Video
Recognition tasks.
For
computers, video [data] is
nothing but a collection of changing in time numbers (colour
intensities)... unless a computer is able to perform Video
Recognition tasks.
"Video
Recognition" is a term that was introduced by Dr. Gorodnichy
in to name a new area of
science and technology that deals with recognition of objects and activities in
video (Refs. www.videorecognition.com and www.computer-vision.org/VideoRec07).
Other
definitions of this area include: Intelligent
Video, Video Analytics, Video Analysis and Content Extraction, Perceptual
Vision. It also related to recently established technology known as Smart
Cameras.
Read about
another term introduced by Dr. Gorodnichy: "Face
Processing in Video".
The
applications of automated
Video Recognition are enormous and highly demanded. - If you have a TV,
VCR, web-cam, DVD, or any other video playing or storing device (which you
do), you likely need it too!
-
Video
data vs. Still imagery: Natural trade-off between temporal vs. spatial
resolution
What evades
attention of most Video Technology users and developers is the fact that video
data is critically different from still imagery -
it is, by nature, of high
temporal resolution and low spatial resolution (e.g 1000 frames,
320x240 each showing a face), whereas still imagery is the opposite (eg.
one 1600x1200 picture of a face). Hence the
algorithms developed for recognition in still imagery, of which there have
been many developed over the last several decades, may
not be simply transferred to video domain.
This is what
makes finding solutions in
Video Recognition very challenging and interesting at the same time - the unique
niche it occupies in
research space. - Not only the traditional expertise inImage
Processing and Computer
Vision is required, but also
that in Machine Learning & Pattern
Recognition, as well as in Neurobiology and Artificial
Neural Networks.
Real vs.
fake intelligence: easy to test
What also
makes research in Video Recognition even more fascinating is the affordability
and accessibility of it. Everybody has access to video of some sort now. -
Web-cams, handheld cameras, PDA's, internet-streamed videos and archived
digitized videos provide abundance of media to be analyzed. This makes
testing and demonstrating the value of Video Recognition technology easy -If
your Video Recognition software is as intelligent as you claim, just make it
available for others to try!
This is what
Dr. Gorodnichy did - instead of just showing "nice" snap-shots
or pre-recorded demonstrations, which is what most "Intelligent
Video" companies still do, he made his prototypes freely available for
public download and testing. And the word spread around - by 2003 his work is
mentioned in "Recent
Advances in Computer Vision" along with major Computer Vision Labs of
USA, by 2004 it is rated over such computer giants as IBM,
Microsoft, Apple, HP by a
Brazilian review journal "Planeta
digital", and by 2006 his technical pages have been visited by
over a half a million visitors worldwide.
-
NRC
Video Recognition Systems (VRS) project - act of visionary
"At
right time at right place" -
that's how Dr. Gorodnichy felt back in 2001 when, having a freedom of choosing a
new research direction within a newly formed Computational
Video group of the National Research Council of Canada (NRC)
and realizing that the "Era
of real-time video processing" has
just arrived and searching for the best fit for his two-sided expertise (PhD
on Neural Intelligence and PhD
on Robot Vision), he established a new project focused on
real-time processing and recognition of video data.
This
project, first called Perceptual Vision (www.perceptual-vision.com)
and then renamed to Video Recognition Systems (www.videorecognition.com),
became the first in Canada and one of the first in the world with the focus on
developing technologies for real-time
automated understanding of video data.
This was an
act of visionary. - Dr. Gorodnichy is quoted from his 2001's
submission to a computer vision conference: "Our
presentiment is that soon most laptops will be equipped with build-in ‘eye’
(camera) above the screen" and five year later indeed such laptops
appeared in the stores. Now,
his vision is still the same and shared by more and more people and
organizations worldwide:
"Video
Technology is becoming the main information media of the century.
Video Recognition is becoming the core of the Video Technology".
-
Following the
termination of the Video Recognition Systems project by NRC in November 2007 due
to Work-Force Alignment, Dr.
Dmitry Gorodnichy played a critical role in founding the new section within Canada
Border Services Agency's Science & Engineering Directorate, where the NRC
Video Recognition expertise and knowledgebase related to the needs of the agency
is transferred to. The new section, named Video Surveillance and Biometrics
section (VSB) has been created in January 2009 to become the first within
the GoC to provide highest-level expert support in both Biometrics and Video
Analytics.
At
the same time, to safeguard the NRC Video Recognition expertise and
knowledgebase that is not related to the border services needs of the agency,
such as Nouse® Hands-free
Interface,
which has been relied upon by many people worldwide and, in particular, by
Ottawa Long-Care facilities,
in November 2007, Dr. Dmitry Gorodnichy and his wife Alexandra Gorodnichy
(MBA) incorporated a company IVIM
Inc., to whom Nouse® has
been transferred. See
more: at www.Nouse.ca
