Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin
Tineye, a new way to search images (tineye.com)
26 points by dcurtis on Sept 12, 2008 | hide | past | favorite | 12 comments


How do they do it? That's what I want to know.

It really does work - and even finds rotated images.


Yes, I tested it too and it's very nice! It finds images with differences in color, and even superposed text, etc, just as promised in the video. Amazing, really.

Maybe it calculates some kind of hash on every image, an then it looks for images that are at a distance lower than n to such hash? But I don't know any hashing system for images that could work this way... could anyone explain?

Edit: a fingerprint is mentioned in the video, so I guess there is some kind of hashing system after all.


I've had a program that did this for my on-disk pictures for a long time: DupDetector (http://www.photo-freeware.net/dupdetector.php). I'm sure they have some form of documentation on their algorithm somewhere...


Comparing a predefined list of pictures to each other is totally different from pre-generating a hash of some sort that can match any image.

An idea I had was some sort of contour tracing, that will track each contrast path in the image, and then create a code the defines it in terms of changes in direction of the contour - that will handle rotations.

You make a large number of those for each contour in the image. Then match new images against that list.


Why do I have to give an email and make an account to run a search?


I wonder if they got the name "tineye" from the Mistborn fantasy series:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistborn

Tineyes are allomancers who can burn tin to enhance their senses.


do it for video and music and I'll be really impressed


Login for the lazy:

email: alex57399829@nybella.com

pass: 1234567890


is this alex p4n1c that hacked the AiD forum?

It would be good to hear from you. Use the form on the forum... http://www.buddhamind.info/aid/forum/profile.php?action=user...


1234567890


1234567890


way to go, Leila!




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: