Diminished Reality
Definition
Diminished reality is a term used to describe the control over one's reality and the ability to block out real or digital information at will.
History
Diminished Reality is a term coined by Steve Mann to describe a reality that is removes at will certain undesired aspects of regular reality. His billboard blocking heads up display, for instance, helped to diminish the reality that external messages create for the experience of a public person.
Diminished reality technology removes objects from video in real time and sends them back to the viewer, allowing the viewer to perceive that objects are no longer there.
Present
Over time, many humans create their own diminished reality by learning got look only at certain portions of websites or reality, intuitively blocking ads as they go throughout the world.
Going on Facebook with an ad blocker is the digital equivalent of diminished reality. Or going online with an adblocker that turns everything into art.
In reality, you can be standing next to someone that you know but block them out in order to not interacting with reality. The urban eye-slide (see source) -
Wearcam
Steve Mann's Wearcam "allows the wearer of the special eyeglasses to pay more attention to the road. Moreover, by eliminating the need for pencil and paper, roadmaps, or the like, safety is improved because eyes are kept on the road at all times, rather than trying to share attention between a notepad of paper, a map, or the like" [1]
As you can see, the Wearcam uses signal processing to take the advertisement in, turn it white, and then place text on top of it. This way, Steve Mann never has to look down at a device, only at signs in the real world. But instead of the data on those signs being owned by someone else, he owns all of the signs around him. I love this concept.
This highlights a very important difference between augmented reality and computer mediated reality - the ability for something to be taken away from reality vs. the ability to only add to reality.
Diminished Reality Software
"Researchers at Technical University of Ilmenau in Germany have developed “diminished reality” software that can delete an object from live, full-motion video.
The software first reduces the resolution of the object, removes the image, and improves the result (similar to using a smudge tool in Photoshop), then incrementally increases the resolution, improving the result, until the original resolution is restored.
To remove an object from a video, just draw an enclosed loop around it (from video by Jan Herling)
It repeats that for each frame of the video in real time, delivering the final image in 40 ms" [2]
Related Reading
References
- ↑ http://wearcam.org/diminished_reality.htm WearCam.org Diminished Reality
- ↑ http://www.kurzweilai.net/diminished-reality-software-removes-objects-from-video-in-real-time ‘Diminished reality’ software removes objects from video in real time KurzweilAI.net - October 14, 2010.