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#visualmicrophone#signalprocessing#rollingshutter

The Visual Microphone: Passive Recovery of Sound from Video

Abe Davis's Research

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  • Presented by Abe Davis, MIT researcher
  • May be out of date. Uploaded 12 years ago, in an area where tools change fast.

Intermediate. Assumes working knowledge.

1.9M views12 years ago1 recommendation

AI and machine learningSecurityComputer visionPrivacy and surveillance

MIT researchers demonstrate how to recover high-quality audio from silent video by analyzing microscopic vibrations of physical objects.

The Visual Microphone: Passive Recovery of Sound from Video by: Abe Davis Michael Rubinstein Neal Wadhwa Gautham J. Mysore Fredo Durand Wialliam T. Freeman Project webpage: people.csail.mit.edu/mrub/VisualMic/

Why it's here

1 person recommends this

What people say. Pointed to by engineers as a fascinating demonstration of recovering audio from video using rolling shutter and signal processing.

eesmithon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Prostitution cases dismissed because cops’ cameras mistakenly recorded audio”

"security cameras outside of stores" would be in public areas, yes? The Lifehacker link you pointed to says "Generally speaking, you have the right to record video in all public spaces without need of consent." Now for the fun part - it can be possible to extract audio from video, by careful processing of the small motions the sound induced in objects in the frame. See link to this video . High-speed camera is best, but at the end they show how a regular consumer-level camera can also be used.

lawryon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Periscope by Twitter”

Remember even if you mute your microphone, it's still possible to extract audio from the video you are streaming: link to this video

anfractuosityon Hacker News • Mentions

On “If you watch closely enough, everything is a speaker”

See this - link to this video They show audio captured from a 60fps video from a DSLR exploiting the rolling shutter. I'm not sure if you can use less than 60fps though?

ehsankiaon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Show HN: Lipreading with Deep Learning”

You can do it with video too, even: link to this video Also, this is only tangentially related, but you can also see through walls using WiFi: link

bbbobbbon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Spies can eavesdrop by watching a light bulb's vibrations”

Here similar experiment, 6 years ago: link to this video If you think that actual government agency cannot do even more easily with better equipment in 2020 you're kidding yourself.

spyderon Hacker News • Mentions

On “WiFi Could Become an Invisible Mass Surveillance System”

with a high speed camera any vibrating reflective object like a potato chips bag can become a microphone: link to this video