Article 13 : What does it mean for photos ?

analytic, commercial stock, content, editing, Facebook, filter, flickr, getty, Instagram, news, photo sharing, photojournalism, Pinterest, research, Social Media, technology, UGC June 22, 2018 Paul Melcher Leave a comment

Just this past week, the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs approved amendments to EU’s Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market. Among which is included the infamous Article 13 which ” creates an obligation on information society service providers storing and giving access to large amounts of works and other subject-matter uploaded by their users to take appropriate and proportionate measures to ensure the functioning of agreements concluded with rightsholders and to prevent the availability on their services of content identified by rightsholders in cooperation with the…

Announcing The 2018 Photo Print Buying Survey study

analytic, big data, content, editing, mobile, Mobile Photo Connect, photo merchandise, research, Social Media, study, transaction June 8, 2018 Hans Hartman 1 Comment

The photo print products use case: A relic of the past? Or teeming with new opportunities? It’s been four years since we conducted our last photo print product survey. Given how dramatically the world of photo taking, enhancing and sharing has changed since, we decided to measure today’s consumers’ behavior and opinions regarding buying photo print products, resulting in The 2018 Photo Print Buying Survey study, announced today. What are the dramatic changes that could very well have changed consumers’ photo print product buying behavior? Not only are consumers taking…

What you missed at the 2018 LDV Vision Summit

analytic, AR, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented reality, computer vision, Content Recognition, Facial recognition, imaging, Interface, LDV Summit, PhotoTech, technology, visual recognition, VR June 4, 2018 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

Every year one enters the hallway of the SVA Theatre in the heart of New York thinking that there is no way the organizers of the LDV Vision Summit can outperform the previous year. And every year you step out two days later, happily disappointed that your prediction was wrong. The combination of the organizing team’s ( Evan Nisselson, Serge Belongie, and Rebecca Paoletti) talent to surface captivating speakers and the topic ( visual tech) seemingly boundless reach into almost every vertical, makes this event…

LDV Vision Summit ’18: 10 questions to an AR research scientist : Facebook

AR, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented reality, computer vision, content, Content Recognition, Facebook, in-image, interview, LDV Summit, mobile, research, Social Media, technology, visual recognition May 8, 2018 Paul Melcher Leave a comment

With the fifth edition of the LDV Vision summit right around the corner ( May 23-24, discount tickets available on the right =>), we approached some of the speakers to get a hint of what they are working on and what they will be speaking about. First of the series is Krishnan Ramnath, Research Science Manager and Technical Lead Mobile at Facebook whose work for the social media platform is pioneering how most humans will experience AR in the years to come: – A little about…

Flickr / Smugmug: The frog that ate the bull

advertising, content, editing, flickr, google, Instagram, mobile, photo organizing, photo sharing, PhotoTech, prosumer, Social Media, transaction April 23, 2018 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

Flickr’s acquisition by Smugmug, if anything, has reminded us that the grandfather of photo sharing site is not dead. Yet. Almost hidden in the weekend lull, the news surprised almost everyone paying attention to this space: It’s been a long while since Flickr grabbed the headlines. But beyond the unconventional lack of details, what does this acquisition forecast? Let’s look at the available numbers. Smugmug and Flickr, while sharing photos as a common denominator, have not much in common. With 90 million monthly users, Flickr is 18 times bigger…

Going blockchain? Two imaging examples

advertising, Blockchain, commercial stock, content, finance, imaging, marketing, Marketplace, PhotoTech April 11, 2018 Hans Hartman Leave a comment

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking at the Global Blockchain Forum and immersing myself in this for me mostly new world of ICO seekers, self-proclaimed investors, blockchain developers, VCs suffering from FOMO, and libertarians and anarchists from all over the world for which the prime method of communication is Telegram – because you never know who’ll be looking over your shoulder… And yes, there were two interesting implementations of blockchain in the imaging world. [If you also have one or are working on one, please let me know so we could possibly…

10 questions to a founder: Imatag

advertising, analytic, Brands, content, Content Recognition, editing, flickr, interview, license, marketing, PhotoTech, Social Media, technology March 13, 2018 Paul Melcher Leave a comment

Publish an image online today and there is a very good chance that within a few days, there will be hundreds, if not thousands of copies of it throughout the internet. None, unfortunately, will bear any information on who is the creator and how he/she can be found. This is not just an issue for professional photographers, who make a living by licensing images, but anyone who creates visuals to communicate, like marketers or social media manager. Because with each reuse comes the damaging potential…

is Unsplash the new Instagram ?

Adobe, advertising, Brands, commercial stock, content, editing, Instagram, investment, marketing, Marketplace, Microstock, Pinterest, Royalty free, Shutterstock, UGC February 26, 2018 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

About a week ago, Unsplash announced that they had raised $7.25 million, along with plans to bring cryptocurrency to its free stock photo service. While most see their move as a potential Shutterstock killer, Unsplash could end up becoming a potent competitor to Instagram, Pinterest, and Snap as they share more DNA . A short review of the hard numbers as those are explicit enough: Over 2,083 Unsplash photos are viewed across the web every second. 1,231 API partners ( include: Trello, Medium, InVision, Google Slides, Lonely…

10 Questions for a Founder : TruePic

analytic, Artificial Intelligence, computer vision, content, Content Recognition, interview, mobile, photojournalism, Social Media, technology, UGC, visual recognition February 6, 2018 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

With each iteration of Photoshop, it is easier and easier to alter images, making it impossible to spot the alterations. Soon, with AI generated images taking over in many fields, it will be impossible to trust if an image is an actual photograph or a complete fabrication. Photography is in danger of losing its essential tie to reality and truth. Enters TruePic. With an array of patented technologies, the company offers a solid counterbalance to this seemingly unstoppable wave of reality-altering technologies. It certifies that a photograph is 100%…

2 research that will change photography forever

analytic, Artificial Intelligence, Brands, commercial stock, computer vision, Content Recognition, Facial recognition, getty, photojournalism, PhotoTech, research, Shutterstock, technology, visual recognition January 19, 2018 Paul Melcher 2 Comments

A couple of research papers were recently published, both touching on advancement in computer vision and machine learning. While research papers are a common occurrence in this field, these two are worth reviewing a bit deeper, as their implication will have a wide impact once they mature. The first is a research organized by Nvidia for presentation at the upcoming International Conference on Learning Representation to be held in Vancouver this coming April. The purpose is to build a more efficient GAN by growing both the generator and discriminator progressively.…