Deconvolution

To answer a recent question on the meaning of the term "deconvolution," I'll refer you to several texts referenced in the following citation from the world's greatest on-line source of information: "In optics and imaging, the term "deconvolution" is specifically used to refer to the process of reversing the optical distortion that takes place in an optical microscope, electron microscope, telescope, or other imaging instrument, thus creating clearer images. It is usually done in the digital domain by a software algorithm, as part of a suite of microscope image processing techniques. Deconvolution is also practical to sharpen images that suffer from fast motion or jiggles during capturing. Early Hubble Space Telescope images were distorted by a flawed mirror and could be sharpened by deconvolution.

The usual method is to assume that the optical path through the instrument is optically perfect, convolved with a point spread function (PSF), that is, a mathematical function that describes the distortion in terms of the pathway a theoretical point source of light (or other waves) takes through the instrument.[3] Usually, such a point source contributes a small area of fuzziness to the final image. If this function can be determined, it is then a matter of computing its inverse or complementary function, and convolving the acquired image with that. The result is the original, undistorted image.

In practice, finding the true PSF is impossible, and usually an approximation of it is used, theoretically calculated[4] or based on some experimental estimation by using known probes. Real optics may also have different PSFs at different focal and spatial locations, and the PSF may be non-linear. The accuracy of the approximation of the PSF will dictate the final result. Different algorithms can be employed to give better results, at the price of being more computationally intensive. Since the original convolution discards data, some algorithms use additional data acquired at nearby focal points to make up some of the lost information. Regularization in iterative algorithms (as in expectation-maximization algorithms) can be applied to avoid unrealistic solutions.

When the PSF is unknown, it may be possible to deduce it by systematically trying different possible PSFs and assessing whether the image has improved. This procedure is called blind deconvolution.[3] Blind deconvolution is a well-established image restoration technique in astronomy, where the point nature of the objects photographed exposes the PSF thus making it more feasible. It is also used in fluorescence microscopy for image restoration, and in fluorescence spectral imaging for spectral separation of multiple unknown fluorophores. The most common iterative algorithm for the purpose is the Richardson–Lucy deconvolution algorithm; the Wiener deconvolution (and approximations) are the most common non-iterative algorithms."

1. O'Haver T. "Intro to Signal Processing - Deconvolution". University of Maryland at College Park.
2. Wiener N (1964). Extrapolation, Interpolation, and Smoothing of Stationary Time Series. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-73005-7.
3. Cheng PC (2006). "The Contrast Formation in Optical Microscopy". Handbook of Biological Confocal Microscopy (Pawley JB, ed.) (3rd ed. ed.). Berlin: Springer. pp. 189–90. ISBN 0-387-25921-X.
4. Nasse M. J., Woehl J. C. (2010). "Realistic modeling of the illumination point spread function in confocal scanning optical microscopy". J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 27 (2): 295–302. doi:10.1364/JOSAA.27.000295.

Adobe Camera Raw 7

Here's a snapshot of Adobe Camera Raw 7's Basic tab. Notice anything different? I thought that you would.

Putting this amount of luminosity control within ACR is so cool. I'm liking CS6 already.

Photoshop CS6 Beta: Training for your test drive

Want to get a head start on the next generation of digital imaging? First, download the Photoshop CS6 Beta. Then, check out the these tutorials to discover the revolutionary new features.

Enjoy.

New Features in CS6

If you are interested in a concise list of the new features in CS6, click here.

Remember, it's a beta ... so the shipping version will be a bit different. And ... as always ... validate your tools before using them for casework.

Enjoy.

Photoshop CS6 Operating System Support

This just in from Jeffrey Tranberry: "I’m pleased to announce that we’ll be providing official support for Windows XP, in addition to Windows 7, with Photoshop CS6.

We know that some of our Windows customers were concerned about Photoshop CS6 dropping Windows XP support similar to Lightroom 4.

We will, however, be dropping official support for Windows Vista (Please note: although Windows Vista is not officially supported, we do not restrict users from installing and using Photoshop CS6 on their Vista Systems)

Why is Photoshop CS6 still supporting Windows XP?

Quite simply, Photoshop’s user base is much different than Lightroom’s and many more of our customers are still on Windows XP. However, the number of our customers on XP is decreasing and we expect to see more and more of our customers to migrate to Windows 7 and Windows 8.

Macintosh

On the Mac side, we made the decision to end support for Macintosh systems that are not 64-bit capable. See related Apple documentation: How to tell if your Intel-based Mac has a 32-bit or 64-bit processor?

Apple is no longer supporting 32-bit hardware with their latest operating system, Mac OS X 10.7 (Lion), so it makes sense for us to follow suit.

Current recommendations and future guidance

Our current recommendation for the best Photoshop experience is to use 64-bit hardware and Operating Systems, specifically Mac OS X 10.6.x (Snow Leopard) or 10.7.x (Lion) for Macintosh and Windows 7 64-bit for Windows PCs.

We’re actively working with Apple to create a great Photoshop experience with future releases of OS X, including the recently announced Mac OS 10.8 (Mountain Lion).

We’re also working with Microsoft to also create a great Photoshop experience with Windows 8 for when it becomes available ..."

Enjoy.

Adobe Photoshop CS6 Beta

The world’s best digital image editing software is about to get even better. Explore Adobe® Photoshop® CS6 beta for a sneak preview of some of the incredible performance enhancements, imaging magic, and creativity tools we are working on. Discover for yourself why Photoshop CS6 software will be a whole new experience in digital image editing.

Here's the link to the public beta site.

Enjoy.

Shooting tethered?

Even though I don't recommend Lightroom for law enforcement use, it's still a valuable tool for photographers. With the newest marketing campaign from Hasselblad, a reader writes in confused about tethering.

Purchasers of the H4D will get Lightroom 4 as part of the package. That's cool. But, the H4D doesn't tether with LR4 ... yet.

From Hasselblad: "The Hasselblad and Lightroom plan does not mean that Hasselblad's Phocus software is being phased out.

Said Russell-Fish: "We will continue to support our proprietary Phocus software. This new agreement is about providing choice for our customers. Lightroom has the advantage of familiarity with photographers, digital operators and enthusiasts worldwide. Phocus still offers high-end imagists some highly specialised tools and remains an integral element of our Multi-Shot cameras as well as our Phocus Mobile application, which enables wireless connectivity for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. We are also working on solutions to tethering and batch processing challenges, and integration of those solutions is not far off."

Click here to learn more about tethering.

Click here for a list of supported cameras.

Enjoy.

Is a badge on Foursquare worth your life?

This just in from the US Army: "There are a number of location-based social media applications and platforms, including Foursquare, Gowalla, SCVNGR, Shopkick, Loopt and Whrrl, currently on the market. They use GPS features, typically in the user's phone, to publish the person's location and offer rewards in the form of discounts, badges or points to encourage frequent check-ins.

Security risks for the military:

A deployed service member's situational awareness includes the world of social media. If a Soldier uploads a photo taken on his or her smartphone to Facebook, they could broadcast the exact location of their unit, said Steve Warren, deputy G2 for the Maneuver Center of Excellence, or MCoE.

"Today, in pretty much every single smartphone, there is built-in GPS," Warren said. "For every picture you take with that phone, it will automatically embed the latitude and longitude within the photograph."

Someone with the right software and the wrong motivation could download the photo and extract the coordinates from the metadata.

Warren cited a real-world example from 2007. When a new fleet of helicopters arrived with an aviation unit at a base in Iraq, some Soldiers took pictures on the flightline, he said. From the photos that were uploaded to the Internet, the enemy was able to determine the exact location of the helicopters inside the compound and conduct a mortar attack, destroying four of the AH-64 Apaches.

Staff Sgt. Dale Sweetnam, of the Online and Social Media Division, said geotagging is of particular concern for deployed Soldiers and those in transit to a mission.

"Ideally, Soldiers should always be aware of the dangers associated with geotagging regardless of where they are," he explained.

General hazards for family members:

While especially relevant for those in the military, cautions about geotagging extend to anyone who uses that feature.

Facebook is in the process of rolling out Timeline, a new layout that includes a map tab of all the locations a user has tagged.

"Timeline presents some unique security challenges for users who tag location to posts," Sweetnam said.

"Some of those individuals have hundreds of 'friends' they may never have actually met in person, he explained. "By looking at someone's map tab on Facebook, you can see everywhere they've tagged a location. You can see the restaurants they frequent, the gym they go to everyday, even the street they live on if they're tagging photos of their home. Honestly, it's pretty scary how much an acquaintance that becomes a Facebook 'friend' can find out about your routines and habits if you're always tagging location to your posts."

Most of the applications let people limit who can see their check-ins to friends or friends of friends.

"A good rule of thumb when using location-based social networking applications is do not become friends with someone if you haven't met them in person," Sweetnam said. "Make sure you're careful about who you let into your social media circle."

Even if there is nothing classified about an individual's location, a series of locations posted online over the course of a month can create a pattern that criminals can use.

"We live in a different world now," Warren said.

"If someone were going to get a hold of your phone, they could figure out a lot about who you are. It's like a beacon that's always out there communicating with towers and plotting your moves on a computer somewhere. Literally, if you don't turn off that feature on your phone people are going to be able to recreate your whole day."

Ways to stay safe:

"In operations security, we talk about the adversary," said Kent Grosshans, MCoE OPSEC officer. "The adversary could be a hacker, could be terrorists, could be criminals; someone who has an intent to cause harm. The adversary picks up on pieces of information to put the whole puzzle together."

Grosshans suggests disabling the geotagging feature on your phone and checking your security settings to see who you're sharing check-ins with.

"If your husband's deployed and you go ahead and start posting all these pictures that are geotagged, now not only does an individual know your husband's deployed and he's not at home, but they know where your house is," he said.

Ultimately, it's about weighing the risks.

"Do you really want everyone to know the exact location of your home or your children's school?" Sweetnam said. "Before adding a location to a photo, Soldiers really need to step back and ask themselves, 'Who really needs to know this location information?'"

Grosshans said it's as important to Soldiers as to family members.

"Be conscious of what information you're putting out there," he said. "Don't share information with strangers. Once it's out there, it's out there. There's no pulling it back."

Enjoy.

Daubert, Frye … or Both? Tracking Florida’s Buy-In

This just in from the BullsEye Blog: "For the second consecutive year, the Florida legislature is considering a bill that would change the standards for admission of expert witness testimony in Florida state courts. Slowly inching its way through the legislature, the bill suffered setbacks on March 8 when Senate amendments altered the language – and ostensibly the bite – of the original bill approved by the House in February.

At issue is whether Florida should adopt its own statutory version of Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Daubert, and throw out the long-standing Frye standard currently employed in Florida state courts. If you’re waiting to see which direction Florida will ultimately go regarding the current Frye v. Daubert debate, don’t hold your breath. Opinions differ across the board, and the ultimate answer, if any, may be a little of both. ..."

"On February 24 the Florida House voted to approve HB 243, which sought to amend section 90.702 of the Florida Statutes by conforming the standards for admission of expert testimony in Florida state courts to those used in federal courts. Specifically, the bill sought to require that admission of expert testimony in Florida state courts be held to the same standards contained in Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and factors articulated in Daubert.

Florida currently uses the Frye standard in evaluating the admissibility of expert witness testimony. The Frye standard – considered by many to be less stringent than its federal counterpart – generally focuses on whether the underlying scientific principles are sufficiently established to have gained general acceptance in their field.

The original House bill sought to openly reject the Frye standard and replace it with the federal factors enumerated in Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and the standards spelled out by the U.S. Supreme Court in Daubert and its progeny. ..."

"On March 8th, the amended version of the bill was adopted and passed by the Senate. The amended bill now awaits action from the House. If ultimately enacted into Florida law, the bill is slated to take effect July 1, 2012. ..."

Click here to read the rest of the story and find out what the folks are saying about this development.

Enjoy.

Law Enforcement Forensics Day at Photoshop World

This just in from Adobe's John Penn II:

Save the Date! Friday, March 23, 2012

You are invited to join Adobe and leading digital forensics experts for a full day of training. At this unique event, we will take you deep into topics that will help you become more effective in photography and using Adobe Photoshop® and other tools for digital media analysis and investigation.

You will learn about:
• Advances in the science of image verification and the detection of manipulation
• Advanced camera technologies, including high-resolution crime-scene capture
• Photographic techniques
• Video, still, and audio workflows for investigations
• Accurate image color capture and calibration
• Digital media analysis with Photoshop
• Forensic artist use of Photoshop... and more

Speakers include:
• Dr. Richard Vorder Bruegge, FBI senior photographic technologist
• Kevin Connor, President, and Hany Farid, CTO, of Fourandsix Technologies
• Glenn Miller, Forensic Artist at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
• John Penn, Adobe Sr. Solutions Architect for Law Enforcement
• Additional speakers TBA

Who should attend:
• Law Enforcement
• Investigators
• Forensic Professionals

Click here for more info or to register for the event.

Enjoy.

Verifeyed? Not really

I received an e-mail from the folks at Verifeyed.com. They asked to speak with me about their service and how it might apply to forensics.

They claim: "In order to authenticate an image using VerifEyed you must upload the original file unaltered as the device took it. This includes not rotating the image. VerifEyed does have a massive database of device signatures (we estimate 80% of images taken covered) but the technique itself uses multiple methods to authenticate." OK, what do you mean by "unaltered?" Can an image be altered and still be authentic? I'd say yes, but more on this later.

They go on to say, "Image authentication without using watermarks and signatures (called the passive or blind approach) is regarded as a new direction and does not need any explicit prior information about the image. The decision about the trustworthiness of an image being analyzed is based on fusion of the outcomes of separate image analyzers."

Needless to say, I was intrigued.

They sent me a trial code and I got out some simple images to throw at their tests. The first round's images were to test images downloaded from Facebook. I used images from my own account. Images that I either took with my own cell phone, or from my camera ... uploaded to my account ... then downloaded to my computer. I these cases, I'm either in the picture or the photographer ... and the camera is mine. Verifeyed.com reported these as not "Verifeyed" but didn't say why (there's no report function).

But wait ... these are my pictures. I'm in most of them. Just because Facebook's script processed it for transport doesn't make it inauthentic - the image's content and context are still the same. Under California's evidence code, I can stipulate as to the authenticity of them because I'm either in them or I took the picture.

Nevertheless, on to test two. I've got some JPEG stills that I saved from a DVR for one of my classes. I uploaded these and Verifeyed.com reported these as not "Verifeyed." Again, no report or reason as to why not. But, I exported the stills and they're authentic. What gives?

In my conversation with their sales and tech crew, it seems that the version that I was testing works almost exactly like JPEGSnoop. It looks at signatures vs. an internal (to them) database. Naturally, with Facebook, there'll be a signature change (as I've already documented). With DVR stills, there's no possible way a signature based solution will be able to keep up with the many different manufacturers and models out there.

They mentioned that getting into "forensics" was a new thing for them, that their primary market was the insurance industry and on-line dating sites. Ouch. Imagine this ... you take a picture of your family next to your new car. You upload the image to Facebook. The next day, your car is totaled with your phone in it. Phone's gone. Car's gone. You download the car's image from Facebook and send it to your insurance adjuster as proof that your car was fine before the crash. They upload your JPEG to Verifeyed.com and it says, "not Verifeyed." Claim denied. What are you to do?

As problematic as this is for the insurance industry, imagine unleashing this on the criminal justice system. Ouch. I'd rather not.

They said that they'd do deeper/additional testing on my images and get back to me with a better, more detailed report. That was almost a month ago. Now, their web site is down.

I'd say that Verifeyed.com is not verified.

Enjoy.

Does Daubert Equal Summary Judgment?

This just in from the BullsEye Blog: "It seems much legal attention has been devoted to Daubert lately – and with good cause. From the 1st Circuit’s Milward opinion last March allowing a less stringent “weight of the evidence” methodology – an approach previously rejected in a 5th Circuit case – to a reported increase in challenges, Daubert seems to be dominating legal headlines.

As the role of experts becomes all the more critical in the world of litigation, many legal commentators are now pondering if a Daubert challenge has become the new summary judgment. In cases requiring expert testimony, courts seem progressively willing to “connect the dots” between a Daubert challenge and summary judgment. Quite simply, failing a Daubert challenge and the resulting exclusion of an expert’s testimony can mean dismissal on summary judgment – and the end of the road for your case.

This is precisely what happened in Bielskis v. Louisville Ladder, Inc. , when plaintiff Raymond Bielskis, who was injured when a scaffold he was standing on collapsed, brought a products liability action against the scaffold’s manufacturer. The district court decided to grant defendant manufacturer’s motion for summary judgment after barring testimony of plaintiff’s expert on grounds the expert’s methodology failed to meet Daubert factors. On appeal the 7th Circuit upheld the decision – concluding that without the testimony of his expert, Bielskis lacked the evidence needed to keep his case afloat, and therefore dismissal on the summary judgment motion was proper.

In cases that require expert testimony to sustain a cause of action or prove a material fact at issue, the message courts are giving is loud and clear – make sure your experts utilize reliable methodology and can withstand a Daubert challenge. Otherwise, your case may be over before it ever begins.

Already this year another U.S. District Court case worthy of Daubert-related discussion may have taken the rationale behind the Bielskis decision one step further. Decided this January, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts excluded an expert’s testimony after a Daubert hearing and then promptly granted summary judgment sua sponte – which means literally “of its own will or motion; voluntarily” – without waiting for a current summary judgment motion from the other side.

The case involved a class action securities fraud case. Plaintiffs had asserted a “fraud-on-the-market” theory of recovery, alleging that misleading reports on which class investors relied in purchasing AOL stock artificially inflated the price and caused investors to suffer harm when the price of the stock declined. To prove their theory of recovery, plaintiffs’ expert relied on an “event study” prepared to measure the impact of defendants’ allegedly misleading statements on the value of the AOL stock. Upon defendants’ motion to preclude the expert’s opinion, the judge convened a full Daubert hearing.

At the conclusion of the hearing, the court found that pervasive fatal flaws in the expert’s methodology rendered his study and testimony inadmissible. In doing so, the court further determined that plaintiffs could not raise a triable issue of fact on loss causation, and without further ado granted summary judgment sua sponte in favor of defendants.

It is worth noting that defendants had made an earlier motion for summary judgment which was denied under a different judge who had retired from the bench before disposition of the case, but the transferring judge didn’t wait for the defendants to bring or renew such a motion. Rather, perhaps in reconsideration of the earlier denied motion, he simply determined that summary judgment was appropriate – and then granted it.

The court was well within its statutory authority – FRCP 56 gives courts latitude to grant summary judgment independent of any motion, following notice and a reasonable time to respond. Although usually accomplished through the motion of a party, the rule authorizes a court to grant summary judgment on its own accord. The Committee Notes on Rules for the 2010 Amendment add clarification, stating “…the court may grant summary judgment for the nonmoving party; grant a motion on legal or factual grounds not raised by the parties; or consider summary judgment on its own.”

Regardless of the rationale behind the judge’s decision in Bricklayers, both this case and Bielskis are deserving of attention from attorneys and experts alike – failing a Daubert challenge can trigger the end of your case under summary judgment, and the courts have wide latitude in making that decision.

For attorneys, it has never been more crucial to choose an expert who utilizes reliable methodology and can withstand a Daubert challenge. Be sure you know your expert’s history and purview of testimony experience, and vet him or her thoroughly to make sure that the scientific methodologies utilized are based on accepted principles in the industry.

Is too much emphasis being placed on experts to make or break a case?

Do you think failing a Daubert challenge should result in dismissal of a case on summary judgment?"

Enjoy.

Daubert Challenges Up 250%

This just in from the BullsEye Blog: "Are Daubert challenges really weeding out “junk science” and “pseudoscience” in the courtroom, or could it be that they are actually scaring off good, competent experts? Given the numbers alone, one can’t help but wonder.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1999 decision in Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, which established that the criteria set forth in Daubert applied to other types of expert testimony – not just that of a scientific nature – the number of Daubert challenges has risen sharply. While some increase may not be too surprising – after all, the Kumho decision expanded the pool of experts subject to Daubert criteria – what has perhaps left experts and attorneys scratching their heads is the sheer increase in the number of challenges.

According to a PricewaterhouseCooper study, which looked at Daubert challenges post Kumho, the number of Daubert challenges to all expert witness types increased dramatically in the first decade of 2000. The study looked at federal courts and state courts utilizing Daubert and revealed that Daubert challenges to all types of experts have exploded – in the year 2000 the study noted 253 Daubert challenges, and that figure jumps to 879 in the year 2010 – amounting to an almost 250% increase. In fact, 2010 marked the year with the most Daubert challenges ever.

As if those figures aren’t daunting enough, 2010 showed a 49% success rate of Daubert challenges to expert witnesses of all types, either in whole or part. The good news, if there is any, is that the percentage of successful challenges remained fairly stable over the first decade of 2000.

The increase in Daubert challenges has occurred despite the fact that the number of filings, at least in federal court, has remained consistent over the same time period. For example, using information obtained from a website maintained by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts which tracked a 12 month period ending March 31, the year 2001 saw 254,523 total civil cases filed in U.S. District Courts, compared to 282,307 cases filed in 2010. Although a slight increase in filings from 2001 to 2010 is noted, it is hardly in keeping with the almost 250% increase in Daubert challenges measured using roughly the same time frame. U.S. Court of Appeals filings for that same time period were also fairly stable – in 2001 there were 56,067 cases filed as compared to 56,790 in 2010 ..."

"How does coming face to face with a Daubert challenge affect an expert’s future usability?

Failing a Daubert challenge has the potential to be damaging to an expert. Whether a challenge is successful or not, once made, it’s on the record and at minimum throws up a yellow flag for the attorney.

That’s in part because a Daubert challenge goes to the very heart of the scientific methodology an expert uses to reach his or her conclusions – not to the actual conclusions reached – and therefore arguably has the greatest potential for lasting long-term harm. Even more troubling is the fact that sometimes an expert isn’t even aware that there was a challenge until well after the fact – after all, unlike the parties to an action, the expert witness has no true advocate or legal standing in the courtroom. He or she may not even find out about the challenge until after the case is settled or decided, and all the parties, attorneys, and other players in the courtroom have closed their briefcases and gone home.

There is room for argument that, rather than as a method of raising the bar for scientific reliability, Daubert is becoming a federal litigation rite of passage which may be subject to misuse, is scaring off experts, and is almost certainly increasing costs of litigation for everyone.

Convince us Daubert challenges are working – or tell us why they aren’t in the comments below. Would you utilize an expert previously challenged under Daubert? Why or why not?"

Click here to read the rest of the story.

Enjoy.

Three Things to Know About Rule 26

This just in from the BullsEye Blog: "In the world of expert witnesses, staying up to date on Rule 26 is vital. Not following requirements for disclosure and expert reports can break your case.

1. Not Following Directions Can Get You Banned

Earlier this year in Walter International Products Inc. v. Salinas, six expert witnesses were barred from testifying because they did not submit a report according to FRCP 26.

“I was very concerned and shocked when I read that the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed an earlier decision striking six experts from testifying at trial,” said expert witness Eugene Peterson of Advise & Consult. “After all, my livelihood is based upon the fact that I write expert reports and testify in court.”

The court stated, “Each witness must provide a written report containing a complete statement of all opinions to be expressed …Any party that without substantial justification fails to disclose this information is not permitted to use the witness as evidence at trial unless such failure is harmless.”

2. Following Directions Includes Having a Complete Expert Report

According to FRCP 26(B), “the report must have:

• A complete statement of all opinions the witness will express and the basis and reasons for them
• The facts or data considered by the witness in forming them 
• Any exhibits that will be used to summarize or support them 
• The witness’s qualifications, including a list of all publications authored in the previous 10 years 
• A list of all other cases in which, during the previous 4 years, the witness testified as an expert at trial or by deposition 
• A statement of the compensation to be paid for the study and testimony in the case.” 

Cases in which an expert simply consulted do not need to be included, just as articles published more than ten years ago don’t have to be listed."


Click here to read the rest of the story.

Enjoy.

29.97 frames per second?

A helpful student recently pointed out that at the rate of 29.97 frames per second, it would take slightly longer than a second to complete scanning a full 30 frames.

Great observation on his part. But, he wanted to know why. ... Ouch.

To answer the question, we need a bit of a history lesson. When the NTSC (and others) were playing with adding colour to the TV signal in the 1950s, they only had 6MHz of space to play with. With the monochrome system already in place, they had to figure out a way to get the colour in there, within the same space, and make it compatible with the existing equipment.

For those that sat in high school math class thinking, "I'll never need math once I leave school," hang on ... you will.

NTSC B/W line frequency was 15,750 hertz. The folks that were working on this problem found that info modulated on the carrier frequency seemed to be grouping itself around the harmonics of the line frequency, leaving places on the carrier where no info was being carried.

What's a harmonic? A harmonic is a frequency that changes by adding the initial/fundamental frequency to itself, again and again. It would look like 1, 2, 3, 4 ... as one gets added into the mix each time. It's different than doubling ... which would look like 1, 2, 4, 8 ...

Empty spaces were found at the odd harmonics of half the line frequency (7,875 lines per second). Thus, info could be inserted in these spaces without causing interference. Inserting the colour info into these spaces meant that the new colour system would be compatible with the old B/W system.

But ... they chose the 455th harmonic as the color subcarrier frequency (reasons edited out for brevity). The audio carriers were set at 4.5MHz above the video carrier for all TV stations. This means that regardless the TV station's video carrier frequency, the audio carrier was 4.5MHz above it. As a result, they found that the color subcarrier placed in the 455th harmonic caused interference around 900 kilohertz that was visible as black and white wavy lines running through the picture.

To solve the problem, they slowed the existing line frequency by 16 lines to 15,734 per second. All TV sets were built to receive signal within 1% of the line frequency, so that 16 line adjustment wouldn't cause a problem.

This tiny adjustment produced a new frame rate of 29.97 frames per second.

Wow. That was a mouth full. There's obviously more to it than my simplified version. If you're interested, I could recommend a few good books on the subject.

Enjoy.

Thankfully, there's video

From the NY Daily News: "Less than a month after getting busted for allegedly trying to run over a cop, a city worker left court Thursday a free man thanks to video evidence that showed him to be a careful driver.

Felony charges against John Hockenjos, 55, accused of driving at a "high rate of speed," causing the officer "to jump out of the way," were thrown out after a surveillance tape showed the Brooklyn man slowly pulling into his driveway and the cop not even flinching.

"I was very worried. These were very serious charges against me," the MTA engineer said after his ordeal ended. "I was facing seven years in prison."

Officer Diego Palacios made the allegation Feb. 5 after responding to a call by Hockenjos's neighbor.

The driveway of the Sheepshead Bay home is the subject of a long-running civil court fight between Hockenjos and the neighbor.

"The people are moving to dismiss for lack of evidence and in the interest of justice," prosecutor Danit Almog said in Brooklyn Criminal Court Thursday morning.

“There's a larger issue here," said Hockenjos’ lawyer Craig Newman. "You have a police officer who doesn't have the right temperament or judgment to be wearing a badge who's still out there."

The NYPD has confirmed that the Internal Affairs Bureau is looking into the matter.

A summons for disorderly conduct against Hockenjos's wife, Irena, 51, stemming from the same incident, is still pending.

The couple said they are still reeling from the arrest.

"I'm traumatized," said John Hockenjos. "It was the worst experience of my entire life."

He said his lack of trust in the local precinct prevents him from calling cops for help "so I feel vulnerable."

Newman warned that other arrestees may be less fortunate than his client.

"Most cases have no video of what happened," the lawyer said."

ed. note: It's amazing to think of the times that I'm asked if I've ever worked for the defense - as if there was something wrong with that. In this case, and any other like it, I'd gladly work in the defense of an innocent person.

Behind the Splash Screen: Meet John Penn II

A few years ago, John Penn II was invited to attend the Internet Crimes Against Children Conference and share his knowledge as a Photoshop Engineer. The experience changed his life. Now he is a Senior Solutions Architect helping law enforcement agencies around the world use Photoshop to combat the exploitation of children. Watch his interview by clicking here.

Enjoy.

Eleventh Circuit Rules Defendant Cannot Be Compelled to Divulge Encryption Passphrase

From Forensic Focus: "... the Eleventh Circuit has held that a defendant’s “decryption and production of the hard drives’ contents would trigger Fifth Amendment protection because it would be testimonial, and that such protection would extend to the Government’s use of the drives’ contents.”

"... Assuming the Government has a right to inspect all portions of the hard-drives, based on probable cause to believe they were an instrumentality of a crime, then it is appropriate to begin the Fifth Amendment analysis. Under the Fifth Amendment, “[n]o person … shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” The courts have consistently interpreted this provision as “protect[ing] a person . . . against being incriminated by his own compelled testimonial communications.” Fisher v. United States, 425 U.S. 391, 409 (1976). Thus, to be afforded the protection, the statement must be: (1) compelled, (2) testimonial in nature, and (3) serve to incriminate the declarant in a criminal proceeding. If these elements are met, the declarant has the right “not to answer questions put to him in any proceeding, civil or criminal, formal or informal, where the answers might incriminate him in future criminal proceedings.” Lefkowitz v. Turley, 414 U.S. 70, 77 (1973) ..."

"... In this case, there was no dispute that defendant had care, custody, and control of the computers and hard-drives. As the sole owner, no one else could have created the encrypted volumes, and the Eleventh Circuit’s opinion does not indicate that defendant claimed someone else had created those volumes. Therefore, it is not clear to me why defendant’s mere knowledge of the passphrase is an admission of guilt, any more than it would be to surrender the a key hanging about his neck, or to surrender the combination code to a safe in a home, that was properly within the scope of a valid search warrant (as these hard-drives were). Knowledge of the passphrase is not an element of the crime, but rather possession of child pornography. (Conversely, a murderer’s knowledge of the secret location of his victim’s grave would be incriminating, because only the murderer would know that location). Therefore, although the court intoned, “the Government appears to concede, as it should, that the decryption and production are compelled and incriminatory,” I don’t agree that the act of decryption and production, by itself, is incriminatory (even though the fruits of that production could contain evidence that is incriminating).

That leaves the question of whether the passphrase is testimonial. The Court noted, “an act of production can be testimonial when that act conveys some explicit or implicit statement of fact that certain materials exist, are in the subpoenaed individual’s possession or control.” Yet, as noted above, it is uncontroverted that defendant had exclusive care, custody, and control of the encrypted volumes, and knows the passphrase, regardless of whether those volumes contain contraband. Citing United States v. Hubbell, 530 U.S. 27 (2000) and Fisher v. United States, supra, the court relied upon the so-called “foregone conclusion” doctrine, which posits that an act of production is not testimonial—even if the act conveys a fact regarding the existence or location, possession, or authenticity of the subpoenaed materials—if the Government can show with “reasonable particularity” that, at the time it sought to compel the act of production, it already knew of the materials, thereby making any testimonial aspect a “foregone conclusion.” I contend that exception is here met, because it is not in dispute that the contraband was traced back to three separate IP addresses in different hotel rooms rented by defendant, and that there was no other plausible repository for those files to exist but his computer equipment, and this satisfies the “reasonable particularity” requirement."

It's an interesting case in that passwords are present in DVRs as well. Could some crime witnessed by a defendant's DVR be found hiding behind a password?

Click here to read the whole article.

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41 mega pixel camera phone?

Nokia recently made a shocking announcement - they're marketing a 41MP camera phone, the Nokia 808 PureView.

"The Nokia PureView Pro imaging technology is the combination of a large, super high resolution 41Mpix with high performance Carl Zeiss optics. The large sensor enables pixel oversampling, which will be explained in detail in this paper but in a nutshell it means the combination of many pixels into one perfect pixel. PureView imaging technology is the result of many years of research and development and the tangible fruits of this work are amazing image quality, lossless zoom, and superior low light performance."

It's a Europe-only release. But, who knows ... Check out the technology here.

Enjoy.

FSS Closure: Forensics on trial

From the UK's Justice Gap blog: "... The Law Society also expressed concern about the maintenance of quality standards and accreditation. Of particular concern was ‘the risk that unqualified and unaccredited police laboratory staff’ would screen materials before sending on fior expert analysis. Such laboratory staff are not required to comply with accreditation standards (namely ISO 17025) and are not covered by the Forensic Science Regulator. ‘Given the need for police forces to reduce expenditure, we are concerned that there is likely to be a reduction in the number of investigations where forensic science is used. That would cause a contraction in the forensic science market leading to reduced areas of expertise. It would also increase the likelihood of miscarriages of justice and the failure of the justice system to provide justice to victims.’ ‘We are going back to practice in the 1970s when I ended up paying out of my own pocket for forensic scientists to do work for me because we could not get work done under a legal aid certificate.’ Alasdair Logan, the defence lawyer who acted in the Guildford 4 and Maguire 7 cases and who sits on the Law Society’s human rights committee.

The CCRC, in evidence prepared for the House of Commons’ science and technology committee, argued that it its closure would ‘undoubtedly lead to miscarriages of justice not being corrected’.

Under the Criminal Appeal Act 1995, section 17 the CCRC has sweeping powers to obtain material held by public bodies and that includes files, materials and samples held by the FSS. Since 2005 it has requested that the FSS preserve or make available material on at least 150 occasions. It has no such power to recover such material from private providers. Shockingly the Commission wasn’t even consulted on its closure. The CCRC has agreed with a clause in the framework agreement which governs the contracts for the provision of private forensic services which, according to case review manager group leader Matt Humphrey, ‘replicates the section 17 powers’. ‘Obviously a contractual right is second best to a statutory power,’ he commented. He said that the CCRC was ‘actively discussing’ the possibility of statutory powers with the MoJ ..."

Click here to read the whole article.

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The Reduction Human Error in Forensic Analysis

A recent report from NIST on Latent Print Analysis sheds some light on potential human errors in all forensic disciplines.

Here's some of the report's suggestions:

• Urging management at forensic service provider facilities to foster a culture in which it is understood that some human error is inevitable and that openness about errors leads to improvements in practice;
• Documenting latent print examinations at a detail level that would permit another examiner to assess the accuracy and validity of the work; 
• Requiring agencies that employ latent print examiners to establish requirements and guidelines for reporting, documentation, and testimony that are reviewed for each examiner at least annually; and
• Intensely preparing print examiners and other forensic experts to give credible and accurate testimony in trials, stressing skills such as using lay language, creating visuals that can easily be understood, and thinking clearly under cross-examination. 

The working group also identified a number of future steps that should be taken to advance the error reduction effort, including: prerequisite educational and skill standards for examiner training; continuing education, mentoring, and accreditation/certification programs; research to integrate automated systems into the early stages of print analysis; and a comprehensive testing program for ensuring examiner competency and proficiency.

An open and shut case

From the UK Guardian: "...The fear is that the ongoing marketisation of forensics will inevitably lead to loss of quality. Alastair Logan predicts a proliferation of what he calls 'toy labs' where work done quickly, cheaply and without quality checks (such as ISO 17025) as police respond to their own pressures to cut costs. "One has only to recall the handling of exhibits in the Stephen Lawrence case to know how poor training and understanding affect the detection of crime," Logan reflects.

Nigel Hodge is a forensic scientist and former reporting officer at the FSS's Chepstow lab. He believes that scrapping the FSS will undermine the development of a sector previously bolstered by the public service ethos of the FSS. "While individual forensic scientists may be primarily concerned with issues relating to justice, the companies that employ them are driven by commercial motives: maximisation of profit, increasing market share, brand identity etc," he reckons.

Then there is what Hodges calls "the whole business of trade secrets" where a forensic services provider develops a new technology this puts him at a competitive advantage. "There is a danger of a 'black box' situation developing where information is put into a system by forensic scientists, and 'evidence' pops out of the other end but where no one really knows what goes on in between." Forensic science shouldn't be like "a secret recipe for fried chicken", he adds. Quite ..."

It's a good thing that here in the US, we have Daubert and Frye - in other words, we scientists have to prove that our methods aren't novel and are reliable and repeatable.

Click here to read the whole story.

Enjoy.

FSS Report from the House of Commons

Here's an interesting read, the UK House of Commons report on the closure of the Forensic Science Service: "...Final conclusions

239. There are many factors to take into consideration when determining what has caused the dire financial position of the FSS. We consider the most significant factor to be the shrinking forensics market, driven by increasing police in-sourcing of forensic science and a forensic procurement framework that drove down prices and did not adequately recognise the value of complex forensic services.

240. The stabilisation of the external forensics market is now of crucial importance. For this to be achieved, the Government must do two things. First, further police in-sourcing of forensic science must be curbed. Second, the National Forensic Framework Agreement, and any successor framework, must be revised to reflect that some forensic science services cannot be commoditised easily into products and ensure that the true costs of forensic services are reimbursed to providers. Without stability through regulation, a properly competitive market cannot be realised. A shrinking market provides no incentive for further investment or growth from any forensic science provider. The success of forensic science providers and their willingness to invest further in forensic science will be threatened if action is not taken to stabilise the market.

241. The process whereby the Government reached a decision on the future of the FSS was taken on legal and commercial bases. If legal and commercial grounds were the only relevant considerations, the Government's decision to close the FSS would be reasonable. However, it is clear that such a decision should not be taken on purely legal and commercial grounds.

242. The Government did not consider enough evidence in its decision-making. The impacts on research and development, on the capacity of private providers to absorb the FSS's market share, on the future of the archives and on the wider impacts to the criminal justice system appear to have been hastily overlooked in favour of the financial bottom line. Examining the possible impacts of a decision after the decision has been made contradicts the concept of evidence informing policy.

243. Proper consideration should now be given to what resources might be irretrievably lost to the UK with the closure of the FSS, including the FSS's archives and the intellectual wealth residing within its scientists. We have seen no detailed plan outlining the transition and the future of the FSS's staff, archives, work and assets.

244. While there would be merits in retaining the FSS as a completely public agency of the Home Office that focuses on R&D, training of forensic scientists, establishing quality standards and maintaining archives, we are not convinced that the separation of forensic science research and provision would necessarily be the ideal solution, because research efforts should feed into and improve service provision. In response to this report we ask for the views of the Government and Transition Board on this matter.

245. The transition deadline of March 2012 is extremely challenging and we are not confident that an orderly transition can be achieved by this date. The Government should extend this deadline by at least six months. Extending the transition deadline would enable the Government to consult on, and determine, what its wider strategy for forensic science should be. The FSS should be supported during this period. The FSS transition should be carefully monitored to ensure that it does not further contribute to market instability or lead to a diminution of service to the criminal justice system. Continuing to support the FSS during this period may add additional costs to the public purse, but we consider that it should be seen as a price worth paying ..."

Click here to read the whole report.

Enjoy.

Stressing Demeanor Credibility: Continued Impacts of Melendez-Diaz for Forensic Scientists

From Ronald K. Bullis, Ph.D., J.D., via ForensicMag: "Forensic scientists begin their testimony even before they speak their first words. Even before they take the oath or recite their qualifications, the jury is assessing their credibility by their demeanor. Simply put, demeanor evidence is the body’s compass, pointing in the direction of credibility. It includes gestures, intonations, posture, mannerisms, eye movements, inflections, and expressions. Judges and juries listen and look very closely to demeanor evidence to assess the credibility of forensic testimony. Research has repeatedly shown that demeanor evidence significantly determines court decisions.1 Recently the U.S. Supreme Court has reinforced the importance of demeanor evidence in the 2009 case of Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts.

That decision required forensic scientists to personally testify to their research and conclusions. The Melendez-Diaz Court based its decision on the 6th Amendment’s Confrontation Clause and stressed the essential practice of jurors to see and to hear people testify, not just examine affidavits. Forensic Magazine has tracked the progress and discussed the significance of the Melendez-Diaz case for forensic scientists.3 Before Melendez-Diaz, it was common practice for forensic scientists to submit their results by affidavits. This will no longer be the standard practice. Forensic science testimony now requires as much attention to the manner in which they testify as to their scientific research. It is no longer enough to be good scientists, forensic experts need to be effective communicators.

Because it is unlikely they will have had testimony training or education in their formal schooling, forensic scientists will need to get additional training, particularly in communication and persuasion skills, human relations, and relaxation techniques. ..."

Continue reading this article by clicking here.

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Omnivore in the news

Here's a link to an article in the latest edition of Evidence Magazine about processing the video from the Vancouver hockey riots. The real star of that show was Ocean Systems' Omnivore. It really made things easy.

Enjoy.

Facebook is Primary Source for Compromising Information

From the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML): "If your status is separated or going through a divorce, you might want to stay off Facebook. An overwhelming 81% of the nation’s top divorce attorneys say they have seen an increase in the number of cases using social networking evidence during the past five years, according to a recent survey of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML). Facebook holds the distinction of being the unrivaled leader for online divorce evidence with 66% citing it as the primary source.

“Going through a divorce always results in heightened levels of personal scrutiny. If you publicly post any contradictions to previously made statements and promises, an estranged spouse will certainly be one of the first people to notice and make use of that evidence,” said Marlene Eskind Moses, president of the AAML. “As everyone continues to share more and more aspects of their lives on social networking sites, they leave themselves open to much greater examinations of both their public and private lives in these sensitive situations.”

Overall, 81% of AAML members cited an increase in the use of evidence from social networking websites during the past five years, while just 19% said there was no change. Facebook is the primary source of this type of evidence according to 66% of the AAML respondents, while MySpace follows with 15%, Twitter at 5%, and other choices listed by 14%. "

If you'd like to know more about the image authentication tools and techniques that I use for Facebook images, or if you're interested in smart phones as evidence, feel free to drop me a line.

Enjoy.

Video Evidence frees Philadelphia man

From the Phily Daily News: "Riddled with bullets, Timothy "Banger" Ross lay faceup in the doorway of his North Philly home as his family watched the color drain from his face and a pool of blood ooze onto the floor beneath him.

Moments earlier on Oct. 7, 2009, a hail of gunfire had flown through the doorway. One shot came so close to striking Ross' 14-year-old sister in the head that it ripped off one of her braids.

Ross' frantic family knew exactly who did it: Amin Speakes, then 21, who had fought with Ross two hours before the shooting. The cops soon scooped up their man.

What the family and police didn't know at the time, though, is that Speakes had what some would call a rock-solid alibi - two time-stamped videos that placed him miles away from the shooting.

The District Attorney's Office viewed the video and decided to put Speakes on trial anyway.

Denied bail, Speakes turned 22, then 23, while awaiting trial behind bars, often playing chess alone.

Finally, after two years and three months, a jury last month found Speakes not guilty of first-degree murder. Instead of spending the rest of his life in prison, he was finally a free man.

"Here I am facing charges, and I didn't have no clue about what happened," Speakes, 23, said during a recent interview in his attorney's office. "That 'not guilty' verdict made me what I am. If I didn't hear that verdict, I wouldn't be here."

Speakes' case is disturbing not just because he sat in jail for so long for a crime he was cleared of, but also because it begs the question: If the jury got it right, how did the police and District Attorney's Office get it wrong?

"There was just a lot of burying their heads in the sand and not wanting to open their eyes to what really happened here," defense attorney David Nenner said. "This has been a rare experience in my career, where there is video evidence that exonerates somebody. It's not something I typically see."

Click here to continue reading the story.

Enjoy.

Open the flood gates?

This from forensic mag: "... Our scientific understandings have improved in recent years, and the effect of that has to be to say, 'We've got some innocent people who've been declared guilty based on misunderstandings,'" said John Hall, director of analysis and research for the National Fire Protection Association.

For example, decades ago, it was common for investigators to conclude an accelerant like gasoline was used if a fire burned particularly hot. In fact, the new arson science has found no such correlation, experts say. Another mistaken assumption: A V-shaped pattern on a wall of a burned building is proof of arson. All it shows is where a fire started.

One of the biggest arson cases to come under attack is that of Cameron Todd Willingham, convicted in a 1991 fire in Texas that killed his three daughters. He was executed in 2004. But some experts since then have testified that the blaze was probably accidental ..."

This story begs the obvious question, as science changes / evolves, do we necessarily re-examine our work in prior cases? Who makes that call? It's an interesting article.

Enjoy.

Source Monitor and Program Monitor overview

Hey Jim. I can't get Premiere Pro to show my videos smoothly. What gives?

Check out this link and find out how to set up the Source and Program monitors.

Enjoy.

Workflow and overview for exporting from Premiere Pro

You can export video from a sequence in the form best suited for further editing or for a viewing audience. Premiere Pro supports export in formats for various uses and target devices.

Click here to explore all of the options.

Enjoy.

Night time photography anyone?

Recently, Los Angeles County debated / passed a "Dark Skies" ordinance. Essentially, folks out where I live, and several other rural/agricultural areas in the county, must make sure that their exterior lights don't really illuminate anything - making the area dark.

That got me thinking about long-exposure photography and timesapes. Here's a good link if you're looking to do this type of photography.

Enjoy.

Will Houston get a new crime lab next year?

From KHOU.com: "After years of scandal, the police department will no longer run Houston’s crime lab, Mayor Annise Parker said Wednesday.

The promise is among the initiatives she will elaborate on next week during her inauguration speech. Parker was reelected in November and will begin her second term in January.

But during an interview Wednesday with KHOU 11 News, Parker stressed that the city would have an "independent" crime lab by the end of 2012.

Since 2002, HPD has faced criticism for thousands of untested rape kits and other mismanaged evidence.

Though the lab has improved in the last few years, Parker said, "it’s as much about perception as reality."

Currently, the lab is downtown at police headquarters in the 1200 block of Travis. The mayor is still deciding where the new one would be located and how much it would cost.

"This is not at all an effort to save money," Parker said. "This is about an effort to achieve objective justice. And when you consider that longstanding problems in the crime lab have cost the City of Houston millions and millions of dollars to fix, this is not something where we can cheap out."

There’s long been talk of a regional crime lab – an option Parker said she preferred—but the city and the county haven’t agreed on how to pay for it.

In the meantime, Parker said the current space within HPD was "inadequate."

Parker said there was a possibility the city and the county could share a location in the future. But even if a deal was reached, she said, the integration would need to be phased in over several years since the county couldn’t handle all of the city’s caseload right away.

"I can have an independent crime lab while we still work toward a regional crime lab," Parker said. "I believe it ought to report to a board of nonaffiliated scientists, who can make sure that the lab does objective work."

But critics are skeptical of whether any appointed board would be objective.

"Just because it’s out from underneath HPD does not mean it’s independent," said Randall Kallinen, an outspoken civil rights attorney. "It would also have to be free from Houston government as well to be truly independent."

Enjoy.

Experts in the news

Here's an interesting case involving expert testimony gone really wrong: "... With regard to the judge’s finding that the case was exceptional, the Federal Circuit said it was justified by the facts, explaining that MarcTec: “(1) acted in bad faith in filing a baseless infringement action and continuing to pursue it despite no evidence of infringement; and (2) engaged in vexatious and unjustified litigation conduct that unnecessarily prolonged the proceedings and forced Cordis to incur substantial expenses.”

As part of its finding of litigation misconduct, the Federal Circuit cited MarcTec’s reliance on “untested and untestable” expert testimony. “Although we agree with MarcTec that exclusion of expert testimony under Daubert does not automatically trigger a finding of litigation misconduct, and in most cases likely would not do so, we find that the circumstances of this case were sufficiently egregious to support an award of attorney fees,” the court said.

With regard to the judge’s award of expert witness fees, the Federal Circuit concluded that this was within the judge’s “inherent authority” and that the circumstances of the case justified such an award.

“This is particularly true given that: (1) Cordis was forced to incur expert witness expenses to rebut MarcTec’s unreliable and irrelevant expert testimony which was excluded under Daubert; and (2) the amount Cordis was required to expend on experts was not compensable under § 285,” the court explained. “Because MarcTec’s vexatious conduct and bad faith increased the cost of litigation in ways that are not compensated under § 285, we find that the district court did not abuse its discretion in awarding expert fees to Cordis.”

The case is MarcTec, LLC, v. Johnson & Johnson and Cordis Corporation, Case No. 2010-1285 (Federal Circuit, Jan. 3, 2012) ..."

Read the whole article by clicking here.

Enjoy.

Is Quality Assurance Important?

Illinois seems to think that Quality Assurance serves an important purpose: "The Illinois State Police (ISP), Division of Forensic Services, Forensic Sciences Command employs a strict internal quality control program to ensure all ISP forensic scientists maintain proficiency in their forensic specialty and that the quality of their case work is consistent with our high standards.

Through its Quality Assurance Program, the Forensic Sciences Command has identified a potential quality concern that could impact some latent fingerprint analysis. Specifically, the Forensic Sciences Command has identified a quality concern regarding work performed by one of ISP’s forensic scientists. The ISP is currently performing a comprehensive review to determine the scope of the concern and is taking measures to remedy any effect it may have. The cases under review do not involve any fingerprint misidentification.

The ISP has notified all the State's Attorney offices for which the scientist analyzed evidence to make them aware of the situation. As part of our remediation process, analysis previously performed by the scientist will be reviewed, and reanalyzed, as necessary. Results of any reanalysis will be reported to the agency which originally submitted evidence to the laboratory, per our normal reporting protocol."

Enjoy.

John Nack's response to the Creative Cloud issues

Here's the post from John Nack on the Creative Cloud issues: "In November Adobe announced Creative Cloud subscriptions, a new combination of CS desktop apps, cloud services, and touch tools. Unfortunately, on the whole we’ve done a poor job of explaining the real benefits to customers, leading to considerable confusion & concern. I’m sorry for the pain that’s resulted.

First, let’s be clear: Adobe does well when you do well. Subscriptions have to be good for customers, or they’re not going to be good for Adobe–period.

What sucks is that the very real advantages of subscriptions (most notably, faster access to feature improvements) have gotten drowned out by the perceived disadvantages. The whole story is clumsy because Adobe hasn’t announced a CS6 version, or any real details about pricing, etc. Now’s not the time for that (sorry–I wish we could share more right now), so I can only ask for your patience. Subscriptions will be more interesting & attractive than you might think, so please stay tuned.

Meanwhile, I’m pleased to say that Adobe has announced a new introductory upgrade offer for customers using CS3/CS4:

The old deal: If you were on CS4 or earlier at the time CS6 shipped, getting a subscription would be the only way to upgrade to CS6.
The new deal: If you’re on CS3 or CS4 when CS6 ships, you’ll have until the end of 2012 to upgrade to CS6. You can of course choose a subscription option, and we think you’ll want to.
Bottom line: During 2012, you don’t have to buy CS5 just to buy CS6 ..."

Bottom line for law enforcement ... start your discussions now on this development. This is far from over.

What is The Adobe Creative Cloud?

In case you missed it, here's some info on The Adobe Creative Cloud:

"The Adobe Creative Cloud consists of:

•Desktop Applications — Every tool that is currently in Adobe Creative Suite Master Collection, such as Photoshop®, InDesign®, Illustrator®, Dreamweaver®, Premiere® Pro, After Effects®, as well as innovative new tools that are currently in beta, such as Adobe Edge and Muse.
•Touch Apps – Starting with the six Adobe Touch Apps announced at MAX , 2011 – Adobe Collage, Adobe Kuler, Photoshop Touch, Adobe Debut, Adobe Proto and Adobe Ideas.
•Services – A version of Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite for delivering interactive publications on tablets, a tier of Adobe Business Catalyst for building and managing websites, and access to cloud-based fonts for website design from our acquisition of Typekit.
•Community –Collaboration features that allow members to share their creative work with other Creative Cloud members and forums to discuss and inspire new ideas.

We are excited to announce that membership to the Adobe Creative Cloud will be available in the first half of 2012 at a price of $49.99 per month for individuals and $69.99 per month per seat for workgroups, both for an annual plan."

Law Enforcement and Government users will need to have a serious conversation about Adobe's new direction. Cloud based systems have had some major issues.

Stay tuned.

Kelby talks about Adobe's new upgrade plan

From Scott Kelby's blog back in November: "...it’s my understanding that when the next version of Photoshop and the Creative Suite is released, if you do not already own Photoshop version CS5 or CS5.5 (or the 5 or 5.5 Creative Suite):

(a) You will not be eligible to upgrade to Photoshop CS6 (or the CS6 Creative Suite). Instead the only way to get Photoshop CS6 at that point will be to repurchase the entire product again at its full price (presumably $699 US). If you’re a CS4 Creative Suite User, you’ll have to buy the entire suite all over again to move to CS6.

(b) For Photoshop CS4, or CS3 users, their only real option is to pay to upgrade now to CS5.5 (though you are offering a 20% upgrade discount upgrade until the end of the year), and then to pay again to upgrade when Photoshop CS6 is released, or sign up for your new monthly subscription plan...."

"...Those users who didn’t upgrade to CS5 or 5.5, either couldn’t afford the upgrade, or couldn’t justify the upgrade, or they would already be on CS5 or 5.5. But now you’re kind of holding us hostage—–you’re making us buy something we don’t need now, just so we will still have the option to get something that we may want (CS6) when it is released without buying it all over again from scratch. You’re playing hardball with your customers—either upgrade twice or you’re out. That’s not the Adobe we know.

I have always felt that Adobe was very customer centric, and that their decisions were based on what’s best for their customers, but in this particular instance I can’t see how cutting off CS4 and CS3 users, and making them either pay two upgrades in a row, or pay the full retail price to get CS6, benefits anybody but Adobe ..."

Click here to read more.

Enjoy.

Upgrading CS3 and CS4 to CS6

This from Adobe: "We’re very excited about the upcoming release of Adobe® Creative Suite® 6 software and Adobe Creative Cloud™. CS6 will be a major new release of our creative desktop tools, with huge improvements for every type of creative professional. Adobe Creative Cloud will be our most comprehensive creative solution ever, giving members access to all of the CS6 desktop software plus additional services, new tools, Adobe Touch Apps, and rich community features. In addition, Creative Cloud members will receive continuous upgrades and updates to all products and services as part of their membership.

With these great new releases coming in the first half of 2012, we want to make sure our customers have plenty of time to determine which offering is best for them. Therefore, we’re pleased to announce that we will offer special introductory upgrade pricing on Creative Suite 6 to customers who own CS3 or CS4. This offer will be available from the time CS6 is released until December 31, 2012. More details on this offer, as well as any introductory offers for existing customers to move to Creative Cloud membership, will be announced when CS6 and Creative Cloud are released later this year.

Read the details about our Creative Suite upgrade policy.
Learn more about Adobe Creative Cloud."

Enjoy.

Milwaukee hopes images of dead can heat up cold cases

This just in from CNN: "The Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's Office is taking a drastic and admittedly desperate step in its effort to clear cold cases, some stretching back to 1970.

Law enforcement officials have long posted sketches or clay models - and more recently, digital reconstructions - of unidentified persons in hopes that a friend or loved one might recognize the deceased and help police identify them. Taking its lead from Las Vegas, Milwaukee County is taking it a step further and releasing actual photos of the deceased.

It sounds gruesome - and it is, if you peruse the Milwaukee medical examiner's unidentified persons site - but forensic investigator Michael Simley says that in the 17 cases featured, authorities have run out of options.

"They were born with a name, and they deserve to have that name in death," Simley said. "This is the best way to get that information out there to the public."

Just because bodies are found in Milwaukee County doesn't mean the deceased lived there. They may have been a homeless transient or perhaps a visitor, so Simley wanted to create a database anyone could search.

It's a twist on the U.S. Justice Department's NamUs system, which is a database of unidentified human remains. The database, which contains more than 8,000 cases, is searchable by sex, race, body features, dental information or other characteristics.

There are many systems like NamUs. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, South Carolina Coroner's Association, New York State Police, Texas Department of Public Safety and even the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are among the law enforcement entities that post their John and Jane Does online, but they rely on reproductions of the deceased.

Milwaukee and Las Vegas appear to be the only U.S. cities whose police are posting photos of the actual bodies. The University of Milan in Italy, via its Laboratory of Forensic Anthropology and Odontology, also maintains a website that uses actual photos.

A news release from the Clark County, Nevada, Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner states that since 2003, when it launched its own website and designated a group of investigators to handle cold cases, it has identified the remains of 30 people. The site says 152 remain to be identified, the oldest case dating back to 1969.

Milwaukee's site has yet to yield any identifications, but Simley noted it has only been live for a few weeks.

Simley knew the Milwaukee venture "may not sit well with some people," he said, so he took great care in how he arranged the site, putting up two pages of graphic content warnings before a visitor can view photos of the deceased. He decided the actual photos were a necessity after considering that all other leads in these cases had been exhausted and that sketches and clay composites can sometimes be inaccurate.

"Nothing quite describes a face like a picture of a face," he said ..."

Click here to read the whole article.

Enjoy.

Judge cites 'unusual' issues, calls off sentencing for Spokane officer convicted in beating

This just in from TheRepublic.com: "A federal judge on Thursday called off the sentencing for a police officer convicted of using excessive force in a mentally disabled man's death, citing "unusual" circumstances for the move.

The order from U.S. District Court Judge Fred Van Sickle also paved the way for attorneys for police officer Karl F. Thompson to seek a new trial in the 2006 death of janitor Otto Zehm. The judge said a letter from a forensic video analyst that came "out of the blue" prompted the change.

The analyst, who was retained by prosecutors several years ago, decided that prosecutors had not fulfilled their duty to disclose any evidence he generated that showed Thompson was not guilty, the judge wrote.

In his order, the judge said "the analyst decided that, in his opinion, the government's disclosures are incomplete and inaccurate" but he had signed a confidentiality agreement that prevented him from discussing his work with people not associated with the government.

The court on Dec. 20 ordered prosecutors to release the analyst from the confidentiality agreement.

Prosecutors sent the judge a letter rejecting the allegation that they failed to accurately disclose the analysis to Thompson's defense lawyers. They also refused to release the analyst from his confidentiality agreement.

Van Sickle said "the circumstances giving rise to this order are unusual." There are no established procedures for dealing with a case in which an expert witness seeks release from a confidentiality agreement, he wrote.

But "the analyst's allegations raise serious constitutional issues," the judge said. "(Thompson) is entitled to a reasonable opportunity to investigate them."

Thompson's lawyers already have filed a motion for a new trial, claiming judicial error and juror misconduct during November's trial in Yakima, where the case was moved because of extensive publicity. The case badly damaged relations between Spokane police and residents.

In addition to vacating Thompson's scheduled sentencing on Jan. 27, the judge ruled that Thompson's defense team has 30 days to investigate the issues raised by the analyst, and has until Jan. 24 to supplement its motion for a new trial.

Thompson was convicted of violating Zehm's civil rights by using excessive force and then lying about it to investigators. Zehm, 36, died two days after the beating that involved numerous police officers.

Zehm, a schizophrenic, was the subject of a police search after two teenagers reported he might have stolen money at an ATM. It was later reported he had committed no crime. Thompson, the first officer to respond, found Zehm inside a convenience store. Surveillance video showed Thompson rushing up to Zehm with little or no warning, knocking him to the ground and repeatedly striking him with a police baton.

According to investigators, other officers later hogtied and sat on Zehm, who died without regaining consciousness. A medical examiner concluded Zehm died from lack of oxygen to the brain due to heart failure while being restrained on his stomach.

Thompson, who is free pending his sentencing, faces up to 20 years in prison. The 64-year-old Vietnam War veteran has spent 40 years as a law enforcement officer.

Spokane County officials had declined to press charges against him, prompting the federal government to step in. The case sharply divided Spokane residents, with some saying Thompson acted appropriately and others saying it was a clear sign of a police department that was out of control.

The case was a factor in the November defeat of Mayor Mary Verner, the recent resignation of police chief Anne Kirkpatrick and a recall campaign launched against Tucker ..."

Click here to read the article.

Enjoy.

I told you so

Here's an interesting article from the Hartford Courant.

Here's a quote to set the stage: "The top two DNA scientists at the state's embattled crime lab have fashioned robust second careers as expert witnesses in criminal trials by racking up large amounts of compensatory time, then drawing on that comp time so they can pursue their side work on some weekdays." Where's the causality in this statement? Where's the follow-up analysis?

Here it is: "The practice has long been accepted, even encouraged, by former lab directors as a way to bolster the lab's reputation and credibility. But with the lab now (the modifier "now" means that it wasn't always this busy) toiling under one of the country's worst backlogs of untested crime-scene evidence, including DNA from hundreds of rapes and other felonies, Carll Ladd's and Michael Bourke's use of comp time is coming under increasing scrutiny." - the boss approved the practice. It wasn't always this busy. Staff and budgets haven't kept up with requests for service. Where's the story here? Wait, there's more ...

"A review by The Courant of their time sheets shows that Ladd took 64 full or partial days off from the state lab on comp time over the last two years. Bourke took 52 full or partial comp days off during that same period." - which means that Ladd worked at least 42 extra days during that time period (overtime), for which the compensation wasn't cash but time off. Bourke worked 34 extra days (overtime). Notice the complaint isn't that the two aren't working for their OT compensation - it's what they are doing with their free time. Where's the analysis of how many cases were presented years back vs. now vs. staff?

What isn't being said here is why aren't they being paid cash for their OT work? "Ladd said that he had offered to take a lump sum payment for some of the accrued time instead of taking it off in comp days, but that the state refused." When government goes broke, they pay OT in time instead of cash. Why are they broke? Why can't they hire? That's an easy one ... but is it Ladd and Bourke's fault?

Most civil servants have contractual limits as to how many hours they can bank. At my government job (City of LA MOU 2), I can officially bank 240 hours of comp time. Management will start sending people home after banking 150 hours. This means that I work OT for time - not cash. I then get to take it off later when it's convenient for both me and the city. That time off request has to be approved up the chain of command. I assume that Ladd and Bourke have the same situation.

What also goes unsaid in the article's first page (yes, they rather interestingly hide the follow-up on page two ... but you have to find out how to get there) is the fact that there aren't enough experts to go around. Think of the amount of cases that there are out there. The trier of fact needs as much help as it can get. You couple that with a trained expert idling at home burning comp time and ... I fail to see the correlation between sending the two experts home because the agency can't pay for OT (and what they do with their free time) and the agency's backlog. Clearly they're working a bunch of extra hours. Either appropriate more money for cash OT or hire more analysts (or contract out to a private lab).

I'm hearing more of these types of stories lately. There's no easy fix. But the solution isn't to go after folks for what they do with their free time.

Enjoy.

U.K. shows way forward on expert accountability

From the LawTimesNews: "... According to a recent Law Times story, Canadian lawyers are split over a British ruling that abolished the rule granting expert witnesses immunity from lawsuits (see “U.K. ruling spurs debate on expert immunity,” April 18).

But on which side of the debate do the experts fall in the ensuing discussion over Jones v. Kaney? As an orthopedic spine and trauma surgeon who has been an expert medical witness for both plaintiffs and defendants, I say bring it on.

I agree with Victoria lawyer Erik Magraken, who told Law Times the decision “is a welcome development from the perspective of accountability. . . . Being an independent expert can be lucrative and plays an important role in our system.”

In short, Britain has lifted the 400-year-old old rule decreeing that expert witnesses were free from the threat of liability if they made a mistake in their testimony. Now they can be liable. I like Britain’s approach because everyone, including expert witnesses, should be responsible for their actions.

That may seem simplistic, but if Canada adopted this approach, I would have no problem. It’s only fair. For example, if I assault someone on the street, I should pay the price.

By the same token, if I make an error or I provide care that’s below standard, I should be held responsible and I am. I don’t see why that responsibility should disappear because I’m now acting as an expert on the witness stand in court.

Having said that, there has been a development within this area as part of the revised Rules of Civil Procedure enacted Jan. 1, 2010, related to advocacy and bias. The changes deal with Form 53, something every medical expert witness has to sign before proceeding ..."

Click here to read the rest of the story.

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Fingerprint evidence called into question again.

From the New Scientist: "Fingerprints were once the cornerstone of forensic identification. Now a report into a miscarriage of justice has renewed pressure on print examiners to improve their methods, while two new studies reveal the extent of their fallibility. The results could change the fingerprint profession worldwide.

The Fingerprint Inquiry was launched by the Scottish government after detective Shirley McKie was acquitted of perjury. Flawed fingerprint analysis was the only evidence against her. The report, published on 14 December, concludes that human error was to blame and voices serious concerns about how fingerprint analysts report matches. It recommends that they no longer report conclusions with 100 per cent certainty, and develop a process for analysing complex, partial or smudged prints involving at least three independent examiners who fully document their findings.

The recommendations lay bare fundamental problems which have demanded attention for decades, says Jim Fraser, a forensic scientist at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, UK. In interviews with 400 fingerprint experts from around the world, he found that 80 per cent believe fingerprint identifications are reliable. And although several recent cases have hinted that fingerprint analysis should be treated with caution, it remains a mainstay of forensic identification.

Following calls to address forensic methods by the US National Academy of Sciences in 2009, a team led by Itiel Dror of University College London has investigated the weaknesses in fingerprint examination. In one study, they looked at whether allowing examiners to see a suspect's print when analysing one taken from a crime scene - common practice in fingerprint labs - would influence their judgement.

They gave 20 analysts from different countries 10 crime-scene prints, five of which were accompanied by a suspect's prints, and asked them to count "minutiae", or distinguishing characteristics, in the crime-scene prints. Seeing a suspect's print usually reduced the number of minutiae found. Examiners also identified different minutiae. Another group, of 10 analysts, differed in their conclusions about 10 prints when shown the same set several months later (Forensic Science International, DOI: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2010.10.013). Dror likens it to a doctor giving two diagnoses - one benign, one fatal - for the same X-ray image.

In a separate study, he looked at how automated fingerprint identification systems (AFIS), which are commonly used to trawl print databases and provide a list of possible matches, could sway judgement. He gave 23 examiners a print and AFIS lists of possible matches - but in some of the lists the position of the actual match on the list was changed ..."

Click here to continue reading.

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Discrete Cosine Transform

From MSU: "... Transform coding constitutes an integral component of contemporary image/video processing applications. Transform coding relies on the premise that pixels in an image exhibit a certain level of correlation with their neighboring pixels. Similarly in a video transmission system, adjacent pixels in consecutive frames2 show very high correlation. Consequently, these correlations can be exploited to predict the value of a pixel from its respective neighbors. A transformation is, therefore, defined to map this spatial (correlated) data into transformed (uncorrelated) coefficients ..."

Click here to read more.

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Ill. Supreme Court: Police must preserve video evidence even in misdemeanor cases

From the Chicago Tribune: "The Illinois Supreme Court says video has become so common in law enforcement that police must preserve it as evidence even in misdemeanor cases.

The court upheld sanctions Friday in a case where police erased video of a drunken driving arrest. The defendant told prosecutors she intended to fight the charges and wanted the video, but police still followed their policy of destroying videos after 30 days.

As punishment, the trial judge barred the arresting officer from testifying about anything that took place when his squad-car camera was running.

Cook County prosecutors appealed, saying that would cripple their case.

But the Supreme Court says the video should have been saved and the judge was within his rights to limit testimony when that didn't happen."

Enjoy.

JPEG Snoop

I posted this to ImpulseAdventure's site to ask a question about JPEGSnoop: "Take a photo with your camera. Upload it to Facebook. Download it from Facebook. Run the downloaded image through JPEGSnoop.

The software will show it as edited. Essentially, Facebook recompresses the image on your computer before it uploads it to their servers. Gone are the markers from your camera.

Other than the recompress - there's no actual "editing" as most people use the term. Nothing added or deleted to the photo.

What are your thoughts on this? Is it possible to refine the terms? Something like this could be listed as double quantization - resaved? How about a DCT histogram to point to the integrity of the image in spite of the double quantization?

Here's their response:
"You're absolutely right Jim... The term "edited" is used very loosely. Really, all that is meant is "not-original". As it is incredibly hard to differentiate simple resaving (recompression) from an edit+resaving, I haven't made any efforts to report "double quantization". I'm definitely open to ideas on suitable terminology. Of course most people are interested in determining if an image has been altered in the more general sense of the word (ie. modified to misrepresent reality), rather than simple resaving, resizing, etc. Regarding the DCT histogram, what type of data were you thinking could be interesting from a histogram perspective? Thanks!"

From North Korea, an Altered Procession

Here's an interesting piece of photo editing from North Korea courtesy of the NY Times.

Enjoy.

Merry Christmas

I want to take the opportunity to thank everyone for their support over the years.

Here's to you. Happy Holidays!

Enjoy.

Stanley Cup riot suspects await first day in court Wednesday Read it on Global News: Stanley Cup riot suspects await first day in court Wednesday

This just in from GlobalBC: "...Looters stole $424,000 worth of merchandise from the store once the heavy-duty glass and security gate was smashed by the mob. Damage to the store was $225,000 and Powell said they are still working with the company’s insurers to see what will be covered under their policies.

He said they have passed on their state-of-the-art security video footage to police, who took over 5,000 hours of riot footage to a special lab in Indianapolis, and will have the company’s security experts ready to appear in court if needed.

Powell said they have clear video of the first looters coming in to the store after the doors and windows were destroyed.

“They had a shopping list,” Powell said, adding they hope to recover some of the stolen items. “They were stealing specific products, specific brands. It was like a boxing day sale with no cash register.”

Powell said London Drugs has been careful to provide footage they believe will stand up to any defence lawyers’ challenges.

“Our track record is over 90 per cent conviction rate once we show the video,” he said past shoplifting cases. “I have great faith in the justice system.”

Click here to read the rest of the story.

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The murder of Police Officer Peter Figoski

Here are a few stories about the senseless murder of Police Officer Peter Figoski:

Why was he freed to kill? - NY Post editorial.

Fallen Finest - NY Post.

NYPD HERO COP KILLED BY RECENTLY-RELEASED VIOLENT FELON WITH A WARRANT - theblaze.com

Post launches fund for hero cop’s daughters - NY Post

Please keep the Figoski family in your thoughts and prayers.