Originally published December 8 2005
New camera shoots first and focuses later
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The camera, developed in Stanford, Calif., enhances blurred shots by storing information on the light levels. The picture correctly focuses independently of the photographer's ability. The digital technology will also help enhance badly-lit surveillance footage.
THOSE fuzzy family snapshots that make cousin Jane look like the blob from outer space may soon be a thing of the past after the development of a camera that shoots first and then focuses the picture later.
The digital technology will not only help to enhance sports pictures --- when images are often blurred --- but also surveillance footage that is hampered by bad lighting.
The camera, developed by scientists at Stanford University, California, has been designed to enhance blurred shots by storing information on the same light levels when a scene is photographed.
Amateur photographers using film cameras are frequently left with poor quality images caused by movement in the frame, and even the preview screen on a digital camera does not always reveal the extent of blurring.
It is only when photos are downloaded on to a computer that a photographer is able to see if they are sharp.
In a conventional digital camera, a sensor behind the lens records the amount of light hitting millions of tiny spots on its surface.
Professor Pat Hanrahan, of Stanford's computer graphics laboratory, and fellow researchers, have now discovered a means of adjusting the light rays after they have reached the camera, reports New Scientist magazine.
Software can then be used to manipulate the image.
Advances in digital image rendering and analysis have been used to assist many criminal investigations, such as the 2002 murder of Surrey schoolgirl Amanda Dowler.
Videotape of the teenager's disappearance was enhanced using software that allows manipulation of milliseconds of film.
David Breen, a video image analyst, said that the latest advance is an important development.
"A lot of CCTV we are presented with is shabby because it is out of focus, there's bad lighting or it is taken too far away.
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