She does not understand the computer, why has become the top of the computer research industry flow?

Hello, everyone, I am Fishskin, today I take you to meet a computer goddess, about her story is very interesting!

Let’s start with how I met the goddess.

That is when I do graduation design in the senior year, accidentally selected a subject related to image processing, to do a microscopic image processing and analysis software, simply say is to play maomao.

The finished product looks something like this:

At that time, I was my first contact with image processing, so I searched the Internet for various tutorials. In image processing tutorials, it’s common to have a sample image to show the code executing, such as graying the image, contouring the image, and so on.

After watching several tutorials, I found it interesting that almost every tutorial has the same sample image! Just as the first line of code in any programming language outputs “Hello World.”

This is a standard square scale image of the top half of a beautiful little sister:

Curiosity drove me to search for this picture, and unexpectedly, I found the top flow in computer graphics!

Who is she?

Lena Soderberg (Swedish: Lena Soderberg), born in Sweden on March 31, 1951, was featured in the November 1972 issue of Playboy magazine as the playmate (female model) of the season.

Later, a photograph of her accidentally unexpectedly shot a red! The cropped version of this photo is widely used in the field of digital image processing as an international standard test image, also known as Lena diagram, which is the standard square size picture mentioned above.

Why is it cut? Because, the original picture has part of the body exposed, is not suitable for transmission.

Because of this picture, Lena became the most famous non-professional woman in the computer field, and the goddess of many CV programmers.

How influential is she?

Her influence

Let’s put it this way. In the field of computer graphics, Lena is the most popular test image, and Lena is also known by everyone. As mentioned above, many online image-processing tutorials use a Lena diagram as a sample image for the first lesson, so most image-processing learners will start with this diagram, and you can find all kinds of “broken” Lena diagrams on the Internet.

Lena was invited as a guest of honor at The 50th IS&T (Image Science and Technology) Conference in 1997. At The conference, Lena became The most popular figure, and some even called her “The First Lady of The Internet”. At the conference, she gave a brief speech and was asked by countless fans for autographs and photos.

It is said that Lena’s presence caused a sensation among the attendees, many of whom stared at her picture for decades and were shocked that she really existed!

Today, in the eyes of some computer engineers, Lena is a mythical figure, on a par with the founders of some of the world’s best companies, such as Apple and Facebook. Whether you know her or not, you’ve certainly used the technology created by her photos; Almost every photo you take, every website you visit, even every meme you ever share, has something to do with her!

There is also a JS library for image processing on GitHub, also named Lena.

At this point, do you wonder what Lena did? Why is it so influential?

In fact, Lena is not only not an expert in the field of computer, but also doesn’t understand computer!

Here is her story.

Her story

In June 1973, Alexander Sawchuk, an associate professor of electrical engineering at the Image and Signal Institute at the University of Southern California, and his team were looking for a striking image to test a new image compression algorithm. But the photos in hand are boring. Just then, a man walks in with playboy magazine, the same issue Lena appeared in!

At that time, Lena was young and beautiful, and easily attracted the attention of the professor and team members. So they scanned the centerfold of the issue and used a few of them as a sample image for the study, and the classic 512 by 512 image was born.

Of course, Lena’s photo was chosen not just because of her beauty, but because it was a complex mix of creases, colors, and textures that made it a perfect choice for them to test the algorithm at the time.

When the team distributed a copy of the Lena image to lab visitors, it quickly went viral, and the image of the extremely sexy young model gradually became an industry standard, retweeted and analyzed billions of times, and eventually became the JPEG format we know today! Lena is known as the first Lady of the Internet.

Later, many people in the image processing, compression operation, often use this image as a test sample. Why is that?

First of all, this image contains all the details required by the test standard, smooth block, shadow texture, shadow gradient, color hierarchy, etc., which is very useful for testing various image processing algorithms. What’s more, Lena is very charming both in face and posture! Pictures of beautiful women can also boost research interest among scholars.

Until nearly 20 years later, one day, playboy magazine was surprised to find they were stealing this picture, at first is going to held accountable, but found that this photo is widely used in academic research and education, and non-business profit, so he gave up the rights to and will be open photo instead, encourage more people to use public interest Lena figure. Created outside the law of the human story!

Interestingly, It was not until 1988 (nearly 20 years later) that Lena learned that her photos had been widely used in the field of computer for the first time, and she was very surprised and excited when she was interviewed by some Computer publishing houses in Sweden. This kind of thing in today’s traffic era, simply dare not think, who if red, not a day, the whole network know, the next day reporters will appear at the door…

The current situation of her

After telling the story of Ms. Lena, what about her life now?

Today, the 67-year-old retiree is quietly living a happy, low-key life in his native Sweden. She is said to have been seen in public for the last time in 2015, as a “special guest” at a conference for the image processing industry in Quebec City, and after that she has been difficult to reach.

Wired magazine took the trouble to interview her in the twilight of her life and photographed her in the same pose, 46 years apart.

In an interview, Lena said she was proud of the photo, but that it was now far away. Her son occasionally explains the significance of her image, but as someone who doesn’t know anything about computers, she simply says: “I don’t understand these things, but I think I’m doing a good job.”

Nowadays, Lena’s image mainly appears on the syllabus and programming forums, but I hope everyone will not forget her story and learn more about the development history of computers and the Internet.

Lena’s story was also made into a website, and even my brother found the original image of Lena many years ago in this website!

The picture is too beautiful to imagine, I will not let it out! Have a great weekend

Lena website: www.lenna.org/