Some weeks ago, I saw this video on a new picture “resizing” technique. A white paper is also available for those interested in the algorithm.
So why did this video launch quite a buzz? Well, watch the video (if you never saw it), and be amazed by this intelligent resizing of images (changing the aspect ratio, while keeping important parts, and removing other parts). That means you can resize a photo without making the people on it look like aliens, keep the nice parts of a panorama and forget a bit about the rest…
If you want to try it, there is now a live demo available on the net: rsizr.com (flash demo, needs the newest flash plugin to work). After toying with it a bit, I can say it works as well as in the video 🙂
Next step, try it in GIMP! A plugin is available here, and an ebuild here (I’ll probably add it to my overlay for testing too). I have a few pictures that will make great wallpapers, once I have them resized for my screen ratio.
Little update: the seam carver project also provides a library implementing the technology, with a little demonstration application (live this time) called arachne. Ebuild in my overlay for the curious!