Categories: Technology

Ground-breaking system for quickly rendering synthetic objects into legacy photographs

A group of students from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have demonstrated a ground-breaking system that allows a user realistically insert synthetic objects into legacy photographs quickly and easily.

The system requires that the user first annotate an image, pointing out light sources and object boundaries using software-based tools. Once an image in annotated, the system accurately renders synthetic objects placed ‘into’ the photograph, accounting for lighting, shading, reflection, illumination and other individual object properties like transparency, diffuse or specular.

The system has obvious applications in the movie and gaming industry, as well as interior design and user content creation. The video below speaks for itself,

Albizu Garcia

Albizu Garcia is the Co-Founder and CEO of Gain -- a marketing technology company that automates the social media and content publishing workflow for agencies and social media managers, their clients and anyone working in teams.

View Comments

  • very cool! I am assuming the objects would be modeled in a different program and inserted? how are theh new materials scaled/degenerated to match the original image quality? I am interested to follow the development of this program and see the far reaching effects that it can and will have.

  • very cool! I am assuming the objects would be modeled in a different program and inserted? how are theh new materials scaled/degenerated to match the original image quality? I am interested to follow the development of this program and see the far reaching effects that it can and will have.

Recent Posts

Can Bitcoin Be the Key to Ending Perpetual War?

Every now and then, I stumble upon posts such as these here and there: And,…

8 hours ago

The Coming AI Winter: How Physics May Be Leading the Way

Winter(Physics) is Coming It now looks like Large Language Models running on the GPT technology…

8 hours ago

Top 15 LatAm tech journalists and editors of 2024

Latin America’s tech industry is booming, with innovative new startups popping up across the region.…

10 hours ago

G20 announces initiative to crackdown on climate change disinformation

The Global Initiative for Information Integrity on Climate Change claims to 'safeguard those reporting on…

12 hours ago

How GPUs, widely used in gaming, are helping doctors get a better look inside us

In the late 19th Century, physicians began inserting hollow tubes equipped with small lights into…

22 hours ago

Top Five Trends Shaping Gaming in 2025

This year wasn’t exactly what the video gaming industry expected — it declined by 7%…

3 days ago