Source 丨 Programmer Software Library
How do I remove mosaics from pictures or videos?
Since the mosaic was made, everyone has been sad and happy!
If you want to post some pictures or videos on social software, there are some more private things, then you need to use mosaic technology to cover up, protect your own privacy or other people's privacy is very good!
For example, when the news shoots and reports on the arrest scene of some criminals, the heads of criminals will be coded (marked with mosaics), and the main purpose of the code is to protect the privacy of criminals.
However, there are also some movie videos marked with mosaics that may "anger" some netizens!
For example: look at the following picture, understand !!!
However, a 43-year-old island man recently used AI technology to remove 18 banned video mosaics and sell them everywhere. Public opinion in the island country is in an uproar!
The island man was so powerful that he first bought the software to remove the mosaic and then sold it on his own website, and the advertising words he thought of for himself were:
"Let's get rid of the mosaic and enjoy the clear film"
After that, interested guests place an order through the website, and he will remove the mosaic of the films sold on the market.
His manual fee is 1320 yen (about 74 yuan) for 120-minute AV, including 1000 yen (about 56 yuan) for downloading the original AV, and about 2320 yen (about 130 yuan) for 1 film.
According to the police, the suspect provided the business of removing the mosaic on his website, and after the customer provided the video, the suspect used artificial intelligence to remove the mosaic at a price of 2300 yen per part.
From December last year to August this year, a total of about 12,000 services were provided, and after deducting costs, it received about 11 million yen (about 620,000 yuan) in illegal income.
After being caught, he admitted to uploading 10 images of adults with AI decontamination mosaics on the site in January and selling more than 10,000 pieces of processed adult video content.
The police arrested him not only for spreading obscene materials, but also for allegedly infringing on the copyright of the original production company by reprocessing the original work without the authorization of the original production company.
In fact: AI technology restoration is similar to PS retouching, it is not a real restoration, but the use of AI technology to refine the image covered by mosaics, calculate the original color and shape, etc. It's like everyone guessing a puzzle!
Among them, one of the famous popular actresses who was infringed, Yuya Mikami, said on Instagram: "My unhandled works have become a hot topic, in fact, this is made with AI, which is a pity"!
The multi-disciplinary application of anti-mosaic techniques
In fact, the technique of removing mosaics is not limited to repairing pictures or videos, but is also widely used in other fields.
Nvidia worked with MIT, as well as ARTIFICIAL researchers at Aalto University, to create a project called Noise2Noise.
Noise2Noise is very suitable in the medical field, such as for MRI image scanning, which can be used for image noise reduction, so that doctors can view sharper images.
Introduction to the software for removing mosaics
At present, there are two anti-mosaic software that are more popular, namely JavPlayer and PULSE.
JavPlayer uses deep learning's video super-resolution variability algorithm to sample each frame of the video, and then restores the pixels of the mosaic through an AI algorithm.
Because this software restores the image through a large number of CPU and GPU AI operations, the mosaic blur is re-sharpened, and then interpolated to compensate for the loss of the source image.
However, JavPlayer can only repair thin-code videos, which means that the mosaic grid is larger and the missing pixels are relatively small, so that the interpolation compensation for image error will be smaller.
Duke University's method of going to mosaic is different, they developed an algorithm called PULSE, although it is also used in the video super-resolution algorithm, can turn low-resolution images into high-definition, but it is not filled with pixels, but Mr. into a large high-definition image, and then reduce the image resolution of the picture to compare with the original image, from which to find the most matched image.
In just a few seconds, the PULSE algorithm can boost a low-resolution image of 16×16 pixels to a level of 1024×1024, which works really well.
However, the restored image has a large error with the original image, such as the following Obama who played mosaic, but became a white person after using the PULSE algorithm.
To put it simply, the PULSE algorithm is to synthesize a photo that matches the original image the most through the AI algorithm, rather than repairing and restoring on top of the original image, which is still very different from JavPlayer.
Reference: NetEase, Tencent, etc