A new technique that uses the artificial intelligence methods of machine learning and deep learning is able to create 3-D shapes from 2-D images, such as photographs, and is even able to create new, never-before-seen shapes.
According to the Purdue University researchers, When fully developed, this method, called SurfNet, could have significant applications in the fields of 3-D searches on the Internet, as well as helping robotics and autonomous vehicles better understand their surroundings.
Perhaps most exciting, however, is that the technique could be used to create 3-D content for virtual reality and augmented reality by simply using standard 2-D photos.
“You can imagine a movie camera that is taking pictures in 2-D, but in the virtual reality world everything is appearing magically in 3-D,” Ramani says. “Inch-by-inch we are going there, and in the next five years something like this is going to happen.
“Pretty soon we will be at a stage where humans will not be able to differentiate between reality and virtual reality.”
When fully developed, this method, called SurfNet, could have significant applications in the fields of 3-D searches on the Internet, as well as helping robotics and autonomous vehicles better understand their surroundings.
Perhaps most exciting, however, is that the technique could be used to create 3-D content for virtual reality and augmented reality by simply using standard 2-D photos.
“You can imagine a movie camera that is taking pictures in 2-D, but in the virtual reality world everything is appearing magically in 3-D,” Ramani says. “Inch-by-inch we are going there, and in the next five years something like this is going to happen.
The computer system then learns both the 3-D image and the 2-D image in pairs, and then is able to predict other, similar 3-D shapes from just a 2-D image.
“This is very similar to how a camera or scanner uses just three colors, red, green and blue—known as RGB—to create a color image, except we use the XYZ coordinates,” he says.
Ramani says this technique also allows for greater accuracy and precision than current 3-D deep learning methods that operate more using volumetric pixels (or voxels).
News Source: http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2017/Q3/new-ai-technique-creates-3-d-shapes-from-2-d-images.html
