A New Face for Privacy

I a little late with this but it is just too cool not to share. Kevin Kelly has some great examples of a new technique to obscure the identity of people who happen to appear in pictures of public spaces. Software is used to replace different areas of a given face using a “stock” library of other faces. The results are freaky cool.

Of course, the great thing about technology developed for one purpose is the inevitable other applications.

This can be useful for home use. Instead of swapping from a library of random strangers, the software can substitute faces taken from a set of images taken at about the same time. So if you are taking pictures at a birthday party of a group of restless children the software can swap their faces with versions of themselves with better or different expressions (smiles, no red eye) until you get a group picture you like (no one blinking).

I can’t help but think, though, that this is equally possible with straight up, automated photo manipulation. The examples displayed are undoubtedly cool, but I said “freaky cool” because the end result is a face composed of other faces. Other real faces. Like the woman who had the world’s first face transplant. Or like the Woo classic Face/Off. But in the end, do you really need to use real parts to obfuscate the face? I’m willing to bet there’s some niffty apps already in existence (or soon to be) that would be able to do the job just as well without having to pull in random, authentic pieces. GIMP plugin, anyone?