Microsoft releases AutoCollage 2008

Get rid of the scissors and glue

5 September 2008 15:08 GMT / By Verity Burns

Microsoft Research has launched a new deskop application called AutoCollage 2008 that will save the hassle of scissors and glue when you're trying to create a photo collage.

Instead, with just a few clicks, you can get a bunch of your photos from an event or party automatically made into a single collage image that you can print, use as an e-postcard, turn into your desktop background or email to family.

AutoCollage is an advanced computer vision and image processing program which organises pictures into a collage by using object recognition and face detection. It picks the most interesting part of your pictures, crops them to suit and uses the natural features in the picture to know where to blend images together.

It picks photos that are representative of the overall theme, so avoids duplications or picks specific people depending on the selection of photos. It also chooses photos that will look good blended together, rather than one which dominates the overall collage.

AutoCollage is available worldwide on a 30-day free trial. An unrestricted version is also available to purchase in the UK and US only at this time from the Microsoft website for £19.90.

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