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Sony Develops TVs That Zoom in for True Close-ups

Posted by samzenpus on from the examine-her-on-the-cellular-level dept.

prakslash writes "Sony has unveiled version 2 of its 'Digital Reality Creation' technology that allows viewers to pan around a TV image and then zoom in. Unlike the current TVs that simply scale the image, Sony's technology does 'true' zooming by digitally enhancing the signal to communicate gloss, depth and texture.

22 of 275 comments (clear)

  1. Digital Zoom is a MYTH! by LostCluster · · Score: 5, Informative

    I refuse to accept "digital zoom" as being any better than just putting a magnifying glass next to the same old low res image.

    Come on, it's trying to create data that just plain isn't coming from the original source, therefore it's nothing but guess and check logic. Sure it my smooth out what it thinks is a rough edge... but that's still only guessing and making up detail that just wasn't there.

    1. Re:Digital Zoom is a MYTH! by fajaboard · · Score: 5, Informative
      If you are familiar with any image processing algorithms then you might find digital zooming easier to swallow. There is a lot of mathematics and statistics involved.

      In fact, it may not only smooth out but actually create rough edges not in the original. Think of the case recently where the girl was kidnapped and the FBI enhanced the kidnapper's image from the crappy surveliance tape.

      The article doesn't specify if it zooms a frozen screen (like a paused image) or during a sequence. Either way it could use past information from previous image frames to enhance the result.

      Its one of those things that you need to actually see to believe the hype.

    2. Re:Digital Zoom is a MYTH! by timmi · · Score: 2, Informative

      I have read about something that allows several "Noisy" Frames to be cleared up into a single clearer one. I believe it was used to read a license plate seen by an ATM camera.

      I think I read about it in Popular Science or Popular Mechanics (Not sure though)

    3. Re:Digital Zoom is a MYTH! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Specifically, look at http://www.sigcom.net/PDF/SIGCOMTPS.pdf, http://www.ece.gatech.edu/research/labs/MCCL/pubs/ dwnlds/YucelITVT02.pdf, or any google search for subpixel video image enhancement.

      The basic idea is to use statistical methods over a series of slightly "jittered" video frames to create a high resolution or high quality still image. When an image in front of the camera is shifted by a non integer number of pixels, the images are lined up exactly with each other so that the edges of pixels overlap each other. Taking the average of these sup-pixel overlapped images at a higher resolution yields a higher quality image than the simple mosaic or blur you would get by scaling or interpolation. If the physical shape and response function of individual camera "pixels" is known, even more accuracy can be contained. The method can probably even be applied to rotating or enlarging/shrinking images of objects as well, but with more complex mathematical models for the motion and camera viewing transformation

      A generic system as described in the article probably uses the frequency information about the image to construct the textures, but it wouldn't be difficult (but processor intensive) to track translational sub-pixel movement of objects and apply the above process to increase the resolution. MPEG already takes advantage of the fact that more compression for fast changes in an image are unlikely to be noticed, so it wouldn't have to improve the moving parts, just the 8x8 blocks that have B frames, since they are relatively unchanging. I bet they will even get a patent on the process, despite the fact that it's been published and I can think up most of the rest within a few minutes...

    4. Re:Digital Zoom is a MYTH! by slackerboy · · Score: 2, Informative

      Have you ever tried to slice a fresh loaf of bread?

      This morning. Cut a couple of slices for my sandwich and one for toast. No big deal. Took me less than a minute for all three slices. (It helps if you've got a good bread knife.)

      --
      Things to do today: See list of things to do yesterday
  2. digital zoom vs real zoom by randomized · · Score: 5, Informative

    real zoom requires additional information, ie higher resolution than tv is capable of displaying. all attempts at "simulation" of higher resolution will result in digital zoom artifacts, that we all are familiar with.

    unless tv has lower resolution than broadcast quality this is as fake as 200X DIGITAL ZOOM.

    --
    -- shortcut - the longest distance between two points.
    1. Re:digital zoom vs real zoom by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2, Informative

      unless tv has lower resolution than broadcast quality

      All consumer TV's have lower resolution than broadcast quality. If you buy a really expensive NTSC TV, it might be able to resolve 600 lines. The NTSC signal is comprised of 720 lines.

      In HD, it's even more drastic. A really expensive HD set might resolve 800 lines of a 1,920-line picture.

      A broadcast monitor that can resolve 1,000 lines costs $40,000.

      --

      I write in my journal
    2. Re:digital zoom vs real zoom by damiangerous · · Score: 4, Informative
      All consumer TV's have lower resolution than broadcast quality. If you buy a really expensive NTSC TV, it might be able to resolve 600 lines. The NTSC signal is comprised of 720 lines.

      Where did you ever get that idea? If that were true broadcast TVs and DVD would look exactly the same. I mean if broadcast TV is already better than a TV could support, how could DVDs possibly improve the picture? I would think anyone who has ever watched a DVD on their television has already empirically proved your statement incorrect.

      In fact, broadcast TV is a far lower resolution than your TV can support (525 scanlines, of which 480 is picutre information, of which 330 is the theoretical max that will be displayed). Rather than try to explain it myself, some very good technical explanations of how it all works can be found here and here.

  3. marketing hype by updog · · Score: 2, Informative

    Please, there's only so much you can do with "digital enhancement". If you don't have the bits of resolution in the first place, I don't care what technology you are using, you're not going to create something from nothing.

  4. official press release by phreakv6 · · Score: 5, Informative

    for those of u wondering which one of Sony's model would come out with this technology.. its SONY WEGA series.. check out the official press release

    --
    fifteen jugglers, five believers
  5. Just another algorithm..... by HonkyLips · · Score: 5, Informative

    There's already at least 12 algorithms around for scaling up an image:

    http://www.digitalanarchy.com/toolbox/toolbox_re si zer.html

    I'm guessing that Sony have simply come up with another one. Regardless of what they claim, you can't "zoom in" on an image with a fixed resolution, you're always going to be using some type of interpolation and this will introduce digital artefacts.

    --
    Putting syrup in coffee is some form of blasphemy.
  6. Good existing zoom implementations by Clown+Jizz · · Score: 5, Informative

    Though it's easy enough to decry digital zoom as a gimmick, and in most cases it probably is, there are some (admittedly, highly specialized) implementations that produce really great results. Look at HQ4x ( http://www.hiend3d.com/hq4x.html )and its associated projects. It's primarily for images which don't breach 256 colors, of course, and it works best on simple shapes, but it's realtime, and it looks fantastic.

    1. Re:Good existing zoom implementations by syukton · · Score: 2, Informative

      I thought I'd seen this technique before, and upon reading to the end of the page I was reminded where: zsnes. Video game emulation. Of course, when you're stretching a 320x288 image to 1024x768 on a 15" or larger screen, you need as much enhancement as you can get. Anyone who hasn't seen this in action should check it out, it is pretty damn cool.

      --
      Reinvent the wheel only at either a lower cost, greater effectiveness, or your own personal enrichment and satisfaction.
  7. Re:Sometimes, you don't want to see the gloss. by PacoTaco · · Score: 2, Informative

    Reminds me of a Slate article from a while back.

  8. Translation: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    It uses interpolation rather than just pixel duplication / binning.

  9. It's a bird, it's a plane... by Effugas · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's superresolution!

    There's actually a whole host of algorithms that go well beyond the junk they throw at us for "digital zoom". The two most applicable algorithms for this particular problem -- increasing the resolution of video above and beyond the source data available in a particular frame -- are temporal integration (collecting data across multiple frames) and superresolution by example (automatically associating and recalling high resolution imagery when a low resolution equivalent is shown). Some example code:

    Temporal Integration: ALE
    Superresolution by Example: Image Analogies -- not automated, but remains one of the cooler pieces of code ever shown at SIGGRAPH.

    From the article, I'm guessing it's another ALE style stacker. They probably needed to write one for their cameras anyway.

    --Dan

    1. Re:It's a bird, it's a plane... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      An explanation of how time-integration superresolution can reconstruct more detail than any single frame: imagine the camera moves slightly from one frame to the next, by half a pixel. The new intensity of each pixel is not exactly the average of the intensities of the two original pixels it was between, unless the left and right halves of each original pixel contributed equally to its total intensity. Thus, the new pixel has a little more information about the intensity at a location between the two original pixels, and by repeating this frame-by-frame, you can extract a genuinely higher resolution image. You're not constructing information out of nowhere; you're using the information in a series of frames to build a single frame that has more information than any individual frame in the composite.

      Example-based superresolution is a little dodgier. What it does is construct a statistical model from high-resolution images of similar subjects. Then when presented with a new image, it uses this statistical model to "fill in the blanks" with statistically-plausible details. That probably wouldn't hold up as forensics in a court of law, because you're filling in the details with information not present in the actual image -- it comes from training images which are supposedly "similar to" what was present but not visible in the actual source. But it has its uses: suppose you train the algorithm with a bunch of text in various fonts. Then you can use it to zoom in on small and unclear text, and because alphabetic characters are all pretty much the same, it does a good job of reconstructing what the original letters probably looked like.

    2. Re:It's a bird, it's a plane... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      I don't have it with me (would have to look it up tomorrow), but I read a paper on Citeseer about Bayesian superresolution methods that work decently even with stills from a handheld digital camera being jittered around; I guess that would fall into your "warping" category. It's definitely better than simple stacking (Bretthorst's book has an good treatment of how stacking loses lots of information).

  10. Re:yet another invention of the (not so ?) obvious by rebelcool · · Score: 4, Informative

    I mean zooming an image is no rocket science

    Yeah, its way harder. At least high quality image interpolation is. Theres been decades of research into it and dozens of different methods have been the topic of phd papers. Lots of high end math and very complex algorithms.

    Ever printed a photo on an inkjet printer? You're seeing a pretty strenuous use of interpolation algorithms there. A typical resolution image coming off of a digital camera only prints at maybe 2 or 3 inches across at the resolution a typical printer operates. So if say, you want an 8x10, your printing software does some serious interpolating.

    And not all printing software is equal, either. The algorithm makes all the difference. Its why you can get a so-so large image out of photoshop's print facilities (that uses bicubic) and a noticably better one from QImage (at the moment, pyramid)

    --

    -

  11. This sounds like a previously-disclosed technology by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    NASA introduced a system called VISAR that has similar image extrapolation capabilities. It's secret is that it's examining hints from the frame you're stopped on as well as the ones before and after it. It also can remove zooms and stabilize shaky images in post-production. Also, there's a system called Retinex that they created with other image processing capabilities.

    I don't think this is mere trollism on Sony's part, but just an implementation of what others have done.

  12. True resolution of inkjet printers is much lower by hung_himself · · Score: 4, Informative

    A typical resolution image coming off of a digital camera only prints at maybe 2 or 3 inches across at the resolution a typical (inkjet) printer operates.

    Not true, because inkjet "resolutions" are really dot densities and not resolution (resolution would be how many distinct dots can you print per inch.) That's why laser printers with nominally "lower resolution" output crisper text. Also the dot density is for a single colour - complex hues such as skin tones have to be simulated by digital halftoning (essentially multiple dots forming larger colour pixels) techniques which reduce the effective resolution several fold depending on the colour being simulated and the accuracy desired. That's why continous tone printers such as dye subs with nominally "lower resolution" can give much sharper colour prints.

    Software would have a major effect on the quality of colour prints from inkjets but that would mostly be from how the halftoning was done rather than the interpolation per se...

  13. Digital TV is MPEG to start with... by blorg · · Score: 2, Informative

    ...and digital PVRs simply record the exact MPEG2 stream sent from the TV station, no additional processing is involved. And at high bitrates you would be hard pushed to identify MPEG2 artifacts in any case (try zooming on on a well authored DVD and identify the artifacts).

    This argument about "lossy compression" comes up again and again. You could say that everything is "compressed" from the original reality; it's a matter of whether you do stupid compression (drop the sampling rate) or intelligent compression (removing things that can't be heard/seen). It's all about getting the maximum perceived audo/picture quality with a given data rate. So, taking the same data rate, would you prefer "uncompressed" 8-bit video at 320x240 say, or MPEG4 "compressed" HDTV at 1920x1080?