Image searching on the web
Posted: Mon Dec 14, 2009 3:48 pmI was recently introduced to a site called Tin Eye via a discussion on Red Bubble about stolen images. This site lets you feed in images via URL, so they need to be on the web, and then will go out hunting for those images on the net. [EDIT] Just looked again and you can upload an image to it and search that way, I haven't read into their privacy policy to see if they keep it or not though. As always, caveat emptor.
The site itself states it's current index is small, but it is growing and certainly one to watch. I fed several of my images into it and it did find them as displayed on iStockPhoto. It is worth noting that on iStock they are watermarked, and I fed in clean versions, so it is resilient to these sorts of minor variations.
I don't know how powerful it may turn out to be, but for those that are concerned about unauthorised use of images, it could be a very powerful tool.
Cheers.
The site itself states it's current index is small, but it is growing and certainly one to watch. I fed several of my images into it and it did find them as displayed on iStockPhoto. It is worth noting that on iStock they are watermarked, and I fed in clean versions, so it is resilient to these sorts of minor variations.
I don't know how powerful it may turn out to be, but for those that are concerned about unauthorised use of images, it could be a very powerful tool.
Cheers.