Researchers at GRAIL, the Graphics and Imaging Laboratory of the University of Washington, are finding great ways to enhance the video quality of a static scene using still photographs.

The work presents a system for automatically producing a wide variety of video enhancements and visual effects. Unlike traditional visual effects software (e.g., After Effects, Shake, Boujou, etc), the system is completely automatic and no manual labor is required from the user. The major limitation of the work is that it can currently handle only videos of static scenes (i.e., videos shot with a moving camera but containing no moving objects in the scene). Efforts are being made to lift this restriction in future work.

A joint research project between Adobe and the University of Washington have produced fascinating tools to manipulate video. Most interesting of all is the drag tool, shown at 02:34, where the user is able to pull a person’s head in different directions while the video plays. To achieve this an image analysis is performed and different points in the video are tracked, after which the objects are then distinguishable away from the rest of the scene. The person’s head is turned to the side at a different point in the timeline, only the drag tool takes these frame segments and copies it to the current segment of time line. The tool can only manipulate the objects in the video in ways that occur at any point in the time line. You could not, for example, make the character poke his tongue out, as this doesn’t happen at any point during the video. Nevertheless, these are great breakthroughs in video manipulation.

More stop-motion animation, but this time in the traditional sense. This amazing piece by Carlos Lascano shows a blend of stop-motion and 2D animation to create a story of life and love. Perhaps what is most striking about this video is its realism achieved through the use of dust particles, most apparent 00:45 when the young girl sits next to the window and at 01:55 with the elderly couple.

I wanted to achieve an organic look, away from the perfection found in computer drawing, so I used only real objects and hand-drawing that were later composed in After Effects. Many of the organic textures such as particles, drops, autumn leaves, etc, were carefully filmed over a green background in uncompressed full HD at 1920 x 1080.

Comprised entirely of still photographs taken in quick succession, Notte Sento is a stop-motion short film by Daniele Napolitano, shot with a Canon EOS 30D camera.

A girl misses her train to Milan and is set to wait overnight in Rome until dawn. However, a chance encounter with a guy changes her plans and the night lights of the capital turn into the background to a tender love story. An extraordinary chemistry made of knowing glances and small gestures fills the few instants that separate them both from the sunrise.

A jaw-dropping trailer for the new Star Trek movie, directed by J.J. Abrams, creator of Lost. His attempt at rebooting the Star Trek franchise looks promising with an awesome imploding planet at 01:03. To fully appreciate the trailer check the HD version.