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Remove blur for identification

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kkardster

kkardster

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I've got this cell phone image of the vehicle a guy who assaulted me with a sucker punch when I moved up in a car wash line ahead of him. I was stunned at first, but then I decided to try and get a shot of his vehicle's license for identification purposes. Unfortunately,I didn't know that the red-eye flash was on so I was moving the phone when the final image capture fired. By the time I noticed that the shot was bad, he had flipped me off, turned around, and left.

I haven't had much luck trying to reduce the blur - my photo tools appear to be inadequate. Anybody here think they can do better? The truck is obviously a Chevrolet and the gold Chevy bow tie emblem on the truck's grill could aid in alignment.

Thanks in advance for any attempts - good or bad. The store surveillance video is poor and distant as this is a double-queue car wash behind it and was of little use to the Police Department other than to verify my story - sans detail.

Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.
Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.

--
Bruce
You learn something new every time you press the shutter
 
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kkardster said:
I've got this cell phone image of the vehicle a guy who assaulted me with a sucker punch when I moved up in a car wash line ahead of him. I was stunned at first, but then I decided to try and get a shot of his vehicle's license for identification purposes. Unfortunately,I didn't know that the red-eye flash was on so I was moving the phone when the final image capture fired. By the time I noticed that the shot was bad, he had flipped me off, turned around, and left.

I haven't had much luck trying to reduce the blur - my photo tools appear to be inadequate. Anybody here think they can do better? The truck is obviously a Chevrolet and the gold Chevy bow tie emblem on the truck's grill could aid in alignment.

Thanks in advance for any attempts - good or bad. The store surveillance video is poor and distant as this is a double-queue car wash behind it and was of little use to the Police Department other than to verify my story - sans detail.

Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.
Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.
Click to expand...
You might have better luck getting the car wash company to supply the name of the customer if he used a credit card to pay for his car wash. It would take a police report and possibly the police to get the information, but that appears to be a better option than improving this image.

--
Major Jack Reacher, U.S. Army
"Character and morals take years to build, but can be destroyed forever with one terrible mistake".
 
Major Jack Reacher said:
kkardster said:
I've got this cell phone image of the vehicle a guy who assaulted me with a sucker punch when I moved up in a car wash line ahead of him. I was stunned at first, but then I decided to try and get a shot of his vehicle's license for identification purposes. Unfortunately,I didn't know that the red-eye flash was on so I was moving the phone when the final image capture fired. By the time I noticed that the shot was bad, he had flipped me off, turned around, and left.

I haven't had much luck trying to reduce the blur - my photo tools appear to be inadequate. Anybody here think they can do better? The truck is obviously a Chevrolet and the gold Chevy bow tie emblem on the truck's grill could aid in alignment.

Thanks in advance for any attempts - good or bad. The store surveillance video is poor and distant as this is a double-queue car wash behind it and was of little use to the Police Department other than to verify my story - sans detail.

Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.
Chevy Truck - looking for better ID.
Click to expand...
You might have better luck getting the car wash company to supply the name of the customer if he used a credit card to pay for his car wash. It would take a police report and possibly the police to get the information, but that appears to be a better option than improving this image.
Click to expand...
Yeah, lesson learned that hopefully won't be repeated. I should have called 911 immediately and allowed others coming to wash to block him in the queue. Instead, I tried to get a photo and all he did was flip me off, turn around, and drive away.

I did call the police who made a report. We also reviewed video of the queue but there's nothing definitive there. There's no way to connect him to any purchase as he could have paid inside the store, at the gas pump, or may have a prepaid wash card. If he'd have reached the wash, he would have been recorded on cameras pointing at his license plate. I should have called 911, proceeded thought the wash, and then parked my truck where it would block his exit until the authorities arrived.

--
Bruce
You learn something new every time you press the shutter
 
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"Zoom and enhance" is not a real thing no matter how many times you see it on TV or in the movies...;-)

Zoom and Enhance







--
Sometimes the light's all shinin' on me,
Other times I can barely see.
Lately it occurs to me what a long, strange trip it's been.
 
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I tried some online deconvolution software. I only tried one pass on it and no doubt there are others that have more expertise. Might be a path worth exploring with someone who has such software with all the bells and whistles



cc3b0b8e385a42fdaeff60c790846aae.jpg.png



--
John Wheeler
 
R_U_Q_R_U said:
"Zoom and enhance" is not a real thing no matter how many times you see it on TV or in the movies...;-)

Zoom and Enhance
Click to expand...
Thanks for the rebuff, but I'm well aware "zoom and enhance" is a movie gimmick. Just like keeping the caller on the line for a phone trace, which only takes 25 milliseconds nowadays.

I was just hoping there might be someone with experience shifting pixels due to camera movement. It was a long shot to start with.
 
The software you seek does exist as I have seen it on the net several years ago. They actually took several motion-blurred photos and traced the exact motion back and produced a perfect photo, no motion blur at all.

It was at the time something that they were proposing for smartphones but I never saw it put into a phone.

I Googled remove motion blur photo and and got these:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/reduce-camera-shake-induced-blurring.html


https://fstoppers.com/photoshop/how-fix-motion-blur-photoshop-296335

http://smartdeblur.net/

And there were a lot more.
 
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b9a26710e46c4b9c90b51554a7d5f45e.jpg

If You know, how license plates looks like (font, number and shape of letters), maybe this can help.

--
Marcin_3M
 
I tried running this through SRN-Deblur (a research project which I bumped into a while ago). However, even though it did a surprisingly good job for some parts of the image (or rather, less bad job than I assumed :), the licence plate remains a mess.

Actually, since this tool uses neural networks for the details, I'd be a little skeptic about how much I'd trust the result even if it would have yielded something more readable.

SRN-Deblur 'd car
SRN-Deblur 'd car
 
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Mika Y. said:
I tried running this through SRN-Deblur (a research project which I bumped into a while ago). However, even though it did a surprisingly good job for some parts of the image (or rather, less bad job than I assumed :), the licence plate remains a mess.

Actually, since this tool uses neural networks for the details, I'd be a little skeptic about how much I'd trust the result even if it would have yielded something more readable.
Click to expand...
Thanks, Mika! It definitely helps with the vehicle identification. The plate doesn't leave much to work with though. I may have to be content with the fact I wasn't seriously injured. It would have been a shame to possibly ruin two lives over something so petty.

You can see the state of Minnesota smack in the middle of the plate in your image. It's used as a hyphen between three numbers and three letters.

--
Bruce
You learn something new every time you press the shutter
 
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fb3e576b8b4943f4bd6e4cf761de2f8a.jpg



75bcb7cf341441c7a9c22080ca785490.jpg

No idea, how LP in Your place looks like... But some imagination and some deblurring,..

Good look.

--
Marcin_3M
 
I played with Focus Magic for quite a while, but the results I got could be little more than artefacts. If the first character on the tag is actually a "Z", it might be a vanity tag with "Z71", which is a Chevrolet truck option.



3dcb7dc044554251a559e7a1419c2039.jpg



05a73ba34efb47eab6403f78ca3f2e70.jpg



--
 
Hi, Bruce,

Have you settled your situation yet? If so, tell us how it ended.
If not, I can try to give you some advice, or rather, share a tool for working with. To be honest, I haven't worked with such blurry photos, and I don't know if you can make out the numbers. But just in case you can read how to fix blurry pictures.

If it is not difficult for you, please write if your problem has been solved. And if you find another solution, I'd be interested to know.
 
Thanks to all those who gave this a go or recommended programs that might help. I guess there's just not enough to work with to get anything really useful. So, unfortunately, the assailant will get away with it this time. My hope was preventing a next time, but we can only hope there won't be one and he'll not lash out again.

As for myself, I got away with minor injuries to my face that healed up quickly. It's sad to think how such a stupid thing could have ended up much worse. I could have broken my nose or eye socket or worse and if he'd have been caught after that two lives might have changed forever due to his selfishness and hesitance.

In hindsight, I should have allowed him to get bottled up in the lines of vehicles and let the authorities nab him when he finally made it through the car wash. I could have had my vehicle facing his with my bright headlights on when his door opened to [not] let him out.

Lesson learned that will likely and hopefully never be needed again.

--
Bruce
You learn something new every time you press the shutter
 
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Joan Foster said:
Hi, Bruce,

Have you settled your situation yet? If so, tell us how it ended.
If not, I can try to give you some advice, or rather, share a tool for working with. To be honest, I haven't worked with such blurry photos, and I don't know if you can make out the numbers. But just in case you can read how to fix blurry pictures.

If it is not difficult for you, please write if your problem has been solved. And if you find another solution, I'd be interested to know.
Click to expand...
Hi Joan,

Thanks for the tip and interest - see my other post for the unfortunate finish. I downloaded and tried Movavi Photo Editor but couldn't do any better than what others have here.
 
kkardster said:
<<snip>>

In hindsight, I should have allowed him to get bottled up in the lines of vehicles and let the authorities nab him when he finally made it through the car wash. I could have had my vehicle facing his with my bright headlights on when his door opened to [not] let him out.
Click to expand...
And he might have responded with a baseball bat or knife or firearm and cancelled your ticket right then and there.

Better that your confrontation ended, leaving you to go on with your life.

That violent fellow will eventually choose the wrong person to bully.
 
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