SFU develops a better way to make faces anonymous in news videos

Instead of blurring people’s faces in news reports, a research team from SFU’s School of Interactive Arts and Technology (SIAT) is using an artificial intelligence painting technique to anonymize a person’s outward appearance without losing the emotions they express. A Google/Knight Foundation grant funded researchers from journalism, computer science, cognitive science, fine art and anthropology, who have created a completely new way to anonymize interview subjects and scenes in regular and 360 video. In July, Steve DiPaola and Kate Hennessy from SIAT, with Taylor Owen from UBC’s school of journalism, demonstrated the process at a Journalism 360 event in New York.