Video enhancement has become a staple of crime shows like the “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” series, where analysts fine-tune grainy images taken from security tape to identify people’s faces or cars’ license plate numbers.
Enpiction Image Technologies LLC, located in the Quonset Industrial Park, took a product to market last fall that would eliminate the need for such a middleman to decipher video images after the fact.
The company’s IPM-1000 is a module that can be attached to cameras that automatically enhances videotape in real-time – meaning the personnel that monitor tapes won’t have to deal with static-filled shots or people captured only in silhouette.
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“Security gets bad quality from security cameras all the time,” said Charles Anastasia, vice president of sales for Enpiction. “There’s all these cameras, but a lot of times, there’s nothing actually on the scene when an incident is occurring.”
Anastasia was among the participants at the Security Technology Expo at Los Alamos National Lab in New Mexico earlier this month. He presented the IPM-1000 image-processing module to the gathering of more than 60 nuclear security professionals representing the Los Alamos, Sandia and Oakridge national laboratories and other Department of Energy facilities and was pleased to find that the Rhode Island-bred product held its own when surrounded by state-of-the-art security technology.
The module plugs into security cameras and Anastasia said the technology is less costly for companies when compared with the cost of upgrading to a high-resonance video system. The module improves visibility and hidden features in surveillance video and compensates for poor image quality by using contrast enhancement in a manner similar to the human eye. Anastasia said the effect, trademarked as “Virtual Illumination” technology, can have applications in both perimeter and public venue surveillance, as well as in infrastructure protection.
People and objects that may have been lost in the shadows of a security video or completely in silhouette due to entryway lighting from a window or doorway can be easily seen and recognized on tape. Most importantly, Anastasia said the device operates with “no perceptible time difference,” in other words, what a security guard or law enforcement sees on the screen is happening in real-time.
Enpiction has been working on developing the technology since 1997, but saw more general interest rise for their product after the Sept. 11 attacks raised security concerns everywhere.
Anastasia is now the only paid employee of Enpiction, although three employees worked on the product development phase of the project, which was funded by a larger manufacturing company in Wisconsin.
The company wanted to begin implementing video-based controls, but found its workers couldn’t perform the necessary detections from the video they were given.
Anastasia said while the product certainly has applications for homeland security, the IPM-1000 is being heavily marketed to the industrial and commercial security segment it was developed for, including marine ports and financial institutions.
He has plans to attend several more expositions through 2004.
The company has found several clients since they first started selling the module commercially in September, including one Fortune 500 oil company which Anastasia said needed to improve the quality of night vision around the perimeter of their oil refinery facility.
“They could have stepped up the actual lighting of the area,” Anastasia said. “But then there’s issues of nuisance light pollution and a pretty significant energy cost.”
Even with the best video cameras available, Anastasia said issues would still exist with lighting around entryways (people standing in front of open doors or windows tend to be seen in silhouette) or sun reflecting off water in the afternoon.
And while the module makes a difference in enhancing night vision, Anastasia said when a scene is bright, there will always be areas that are still in the shadows.
Right now, Enpiction is selling two versions of essentially the same product,
a primary line for general commercial use and a “ruggedized” version featuring
moisture resistance for use in the oceanographic and marine industries.
