
AI-powered cameras make thermal imaging more accessible - rmason
http://www.engadget.com/2016/04/18/flir-and-movidius-ai-thermal-camera-module/
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icanhackit
I've got one of FLIR's cheaper thermal imagers and every time the issue of
rain or snow comes up when discussing the limitations of self-driving cars I
wonder why we hadn't already paired thermal sensors with machine learning.

The thermal sensor might not tell you much in isolation - you can see what's
warm in contrast to the surrounding environment, but moving objects give away
a lot of information. A person moves a certain way and has a certain heat
signature, as does a cat, another car, a person on a bicycle.

I recall an interview with a (relatively) young James Cameron after he'd made
the movie Aliens. He said that they spent a lot of time simplifying the Alien
outfit, making it easy for performers wearing the costumes to move more
freely, to help make their movement appear more alien or insect-like and less
like a human struggling to stride in an outfit. To paraphrase him, the mind
only needs a few pixels of movement information to understand what it's
looking at. The loss of detail in the outfit was trivial compared to
triggering the part of the human mind that associates certain movements with
caution.

An array of fairly humble low-ish resolution thermal sensors around the car
paired with AI could be done with a cost in parts not much higher than USD 1k.

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RealityVoid
I believe Bosch is working on this - thermal cameras for autonomous cars. I
heard they even built their own sensors and chips for this.

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daveguy
Ahh I was hoping this would be an alternative to FLIR. Their tech is awesome,
but I can't wait until it goes off patent. They have those monopoly prices.
What should be a $20 module is $200+. I hope this "smart" camera addition
doesn't give them a patent extension -- 20 years is plenty of time for
monopoly pricing.

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RealityVoid
I know some startups are working on this. For example:

[https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ebeall/hemavision-
smart...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ebeall/hemavision-smart-
thermal-imaging-with-computer-vis/description)

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jamesrom
"Just add AI" is this decades "Just add Social Networking".

