Reuters new facial recognition video search

The new Reuters video search tool is one of the more impressive things I’ve seen in a while. Working with facial recognition specialists Viewdle, they’ve done a remarkably good job of indexing 600-odd hours of footage for beta-testing purposes. Type in a person’s name, and they’ll link you directly to recent Reuters footage featuring that individual. Not only that, but it’ll link you directly to that person’s first appearance in the relevant clip; and give you ‘bookmarks’ to jump to other appearances in the same video. Simple idea… but it actually works.

I really like the ‘search suggestions’ auto-completion function; type in a few letters of your search query, and not only will it show you any matching names it recognises, but it also shows you a thumbnail image of the person’s face. By far the most useful example of ‘autocomplete’ I’ve seen so far.

2 thoughts on “Reuters new facial recognition video search”

  1. Google has something similar simon. was in beta, may not be live yet >>
    [Do a search], go into the address bar and stick this on the end of the URL: &imgtype=face. Go to that URL and you’ll see just image search results of people.
    You can also search for news results: Append &imgtype=news.

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