Personal imaging and lookpainting as tools for personal documentary and investigative photojournalism

Abstract

A means and apparatus for covert capture of extremely high-resolution photorealistic images is presented. The apparatus embodies a new form of user-interface – instead of the traditional “point and click” metaphor which was thought to be the simplest photography had to offer, what is proposed is a “look” metaphor in which images are generated through the natural process of looking around, in a manner that does not require conscious thought or effort. These “lookpaintings” become photographic/videographic memories that may, at times, exceed the quality attainable with even large and cumbersome professional photographic film cameras, yet they may be captured through a device that resembles ordinary sunglasses. The method is based on long-term psychophysical adaptation using a covert sunglass-based reality-mediating apparatus, together with two new results in image processing. The first new result is a means of estimating the true projective coordinate transformation between successive pairs of images, and the second is that of estimating, to within a single unknown scalar constant, the quantity of light arriving at the image plane. Furthermore, what is captured is more than just a picture. The resulting environment map may be explored by one or more remote participants who may also correspond and interact with the wearer during the actual shooting process, giving rise to computer supported collaborative (collective) photography, videography, shared photographic/videographic memory, etc.