Microsoft Turns 2-D Photos Into Realistic Talking Heads

A group of researchers at Microsoft is working toward creating more realistic avatars--in essence, computerized "talking heads" that are more human and less creepy than those we've seen in the past. (And, incidentally, much less scary than those talking baby commercials.)

Now, Microsoft is able to paste a 2-D photographic image onto a 3-D mesh model that can be created with Kinect. Then, the desired speech is entered into a text field, and the talking head comes to life. This system reduces the computation needed for photo-realism to be achieved in real-time.

Microsoft researchers envision this photo-real talking head software to become popular in video gaming, speech-to-speech translation and more. The avatars could even be used as computerized talk show hosts on television or a friendly interface for your smartphone that can read email, text messages and news stories.