In CaseGuard Studio, you can choose from dozens of preset effects that let you transform the look and feel of your redaction.
CaseGuard’s effects have intuitive sliders that allow you to easily set your redaction to your liking.
Shapes overview
To get started, make sure you’re working in one of the three redaction modes (Manual Redaction, Object Tracking, Automatic Detection) on your video or image file.
To choose the shape, select the shape from the dropdown in the Tool Properties Panel. Within CaseGuard, five shapes are available:
- Rectangle
- Triangle
- Circle
- Ellipse
- Diamond
Optionally, you can set the effect options. Click the inverted arrow next to the effect buttons to view additional options for each tool.
Effects overview
Blur Effect
The Blur tool blurs hard edges in an image. It makes it easy to blur the image or the video of a given object.
Rectangle Shape
Circle Shape
Ellipse Shape
Pixelate Effect
Add pixel division of a given object.
Sharpen Effect
Sharpen – Pixel improvement of a given object.
Contrast Effect
Contrast – Change in the brightness of different colors of a single or series of objects or persons.
Magnifier Effect
Magnifier – Enhancement of selected imagery, providing a “closer” view of a person, object, or activity under review.
Rotate Effect
Rotate – Allows for the rotation of a selected segment within the video.
Flip Horizontally Effect
Flip Horizontally – Allows for a selected segment within the video to be flipped upside down.
Flip Vertically Effect
Flip Vertically – Allows for a selected segment within the video to be swapped in the opposite direction.
Empty Effect
Empty – Provides for a hallowed shape to surround a given person or object.
Filled Effect
Filled – Provides a shape that has been colored in full, typically to redact an object or person. Color selection can be made in the Border & Fill Properties column.
Text Effect
Text – Provides a box that you can type into to mark case numbers, dates, suspect information, etc.
Gray Scale Effect
Gray Scale – Provides gray scale of the selected area within frame.
Invert Colors Effect
Invert Colors – Inverts the given colors of the selected area within frame.
Dilate Effect
Dilate – Provides a “bleaching” effect within the selected area of all colors.
Erode Effect
Erode – Provides a darkening effect within the select area of all colors.
Color Correction Effect
Color Correction – Provides automated and minor color correction. Many people refer to this correction as a “softening” of the colors within the selected area.
Color Equalizer Effect
Color Equalizer – Provides an equalization of the various pixels in the selected area. This is used routinely with video from low-light/no-light environments, where it’s harder to establish objects and activities through traditional video review.
Add Color Effect
Add Color – This is used to add more color from the RGB scale in the selected area.
Subtract Color Effect
Subtract Color – This is used to remove color from the RGB scale in the selected area.
Remaining Color Effect
Remaining Color – This is used to produce solid coloring around dense objects, to establish their full pattern within the selected area. This enhancement uses a concept whereby it evaluates the selected area on the RGB scale and decides of the values of the colors present, and then provides a sliding scale for each color for you to adjust until you achieve the desired effect.
Gaussian Blur Effect
Gaussian Blur – A blurring effect that emphasizes image noise and detail reductions within a selected area.
Median Blur Effect
Median Blur – A blurring effect that removes fine edges, and very dark portions of a given color scheme within a selected area.
Emboss Effect
Emboss – An effect that provides a “stamping” effect, while also using Gray Scale to enhance fine line detail in the selected area.
Edge Effect
Edge – An effect that uses Black Scale to distort imagery. This is a tool routinely used in redaction operations.
Canny Effect
Canny – An effect that identifies all edges within a selected area. This effect has an X and Y axis tool that populates to the right of the Effect column, that can be used to eliminate edge noise in the selected area so that you can focus on the specific items you need to highlight with enhancement work.
Adaptive Equalizer Effect
Enhance Details Effect
Automatic Detection
The method provides the type of Automatic Detection you would like to employ. They are:
Exact Matching
Exact Matching – Follows the pattern of the imagery you have selected within the given area, and follows that imagery throughout the frame to apply the selected effect.
Image Analysis
Image Analysis – Follows the exact imagery, frame for frame. This is best used in the video where movement is static.
Zoom Analysis
Zoom Analysis – Searches for matching points within the selected area, and uses those points to confirm the presence of the object or person being highlighted.
The last prompt in this column is Memory and is a numerical value-based prompt, that relates to using previous frames to search for objects or persons in future frames.
This prompt can hold up to ten frames in memory, and compare those to each frame moving forward in the video, as you enhance and redact people and objects. Keep in mind that the frames held in memory will remove themselves at a ratio of one to one, as you move forward in the video.
To the right of the Effect column, customization tools for each effect will populate as you select them. The set of customization tools for each effect differ from one another.