I'm currently working on finding time to get my webpage updated. I'm also working on learning PHP and MySQL, because I have a new job as a student programmer. Check my Resume in the menu on the right to learn more. Also notice I added two writing samples, and all the poster I've authored and co-authored if you're interested in hiring me! You can also check out my personal blog! All the links are in the menu to the right.
This year I am a senior. That means a fourth year or last year student (whichever comes first?). As a requirement for my graduation (which happens next May, brr!), I am supposed to spend the entire year (both semesters) doing research on a project, make some discoveries (or write a cool program etc.) and publish them. By publish I don't mean in a real publication necessarily, although that would be great, but for the school. In any case, right now I have two ideas, and I'm inclined to pick the first one as being more feasible and publishable (and more "academic"), although the second one has its merits too (it's cool and a lot of people who have no experience in the field would probably be more excited about it than about the other one).
- My first idea is Image Near-Duplicate Detection: on a collection of images, given a new image, determine whether it's a modified copy of other images in the collection. The work to be done on this idea is basically improving on already existing methodologies, or finding a similarity measure that hasn't been used before and proving its superiority to already established means (or using it in conjunction with them). It is an interesting project, has good chances of actually being published (in a dedicated publication) and can be done entirely in Matlab (that is I know exactly what to do it in).
- The other idea is 2D Freeform to 3D Model Conversion: a way to create 3D models by drawing in 2D and/or using 2D strokes. The beautiful part about this project is that anyone can understand it-- use a computer algorithm to transform 2D drawings, maybe in connection to some predefined strokes, into 3D models that can be imported into 3D graphics software such as Maya, Blender or 3D Studio Max for further editing. It would be especially cool since at my small liberal arts college, there are a lot of artists that could appreciate such a project. There has been significant work on this idea also, but what is fun about it is that it gives me an opportunity to be really creative -- the way the transformation is done can be anything! The problem is that if it is anything, then it might not be publishable in a serious publication. Also, I have no idea what to write the program in, and the project might require me to buy at least a tablet for it.
In fact, I believe the main difference between the two ideas is that one is more likely a research idea,
whereas the other one is more of an implementation idea. Neither one is necessarily better suited for a senior project since a senior project can be either a research application or an implementation application. I am still in doubt, and I have to decide pretty fast.
I also have to write about what I've been doing last summer, but maybe in a new post. You can look at the Clemson poster to get an idea before that.
