Mémoire en recherche-création. / À partir d’archives diffusées sur YouTube, ce mémoire s’intéresse à la catastrophe naturelle du Verglas de 1998. Les vidéos sont l’occasion d’une réflexion sur l’esthétique des images d’information journalistique de catastrophes naturelles, sur le support VHS qui a permis leur premier enregistrement (la création d’une mémoire), et sur la télévision, médium qui les a d’abord diffusées. Conjointement à l’analyse de ces images est exposée la démarche de leur réemploi qui a mené à la réalisation d’un essai filmique. Le réemploi s’est notamment effectué en altérant des archives avec des magnétoscopes, fruits de la technologie de l’époque, qui avaient permis d’enregistrer les images télévisées. Avec ce geste de réemploi sont apparues des perspectives esthétiques qui permettent de voir la catastrophe autrement. D’autre part, ce projet a conduit l’auteur, muni d’une caméra VHS, à aller sur les lieux de l’événement, filmer les pylônes reconstruits, mais aussi au-delà, à la Baie James. Ce travail de recherche-création procède d’une méthode non systématique mais qui suit des chemins ouverts par les archives, par les technologies rencontrées ou par les images créées. Il envisage la question fondamentale que posent les catastrophes naturelles : celle du rapport qu’entretient l’homme avec la nature. / From archives released on YouTube, this thesis aims to explore the natural disaster of Ice Storm of 1998. The videos offer an opportunity to reflect on the aesthetic images of journalistic information on natural disasters, but also on the VHS medium that allowed their first recording (the creation of a memory), as well as on television, the medium that first distributed them. Alongside the analysis of these images, this thesis presents the process for reusing them, which led to the production of a film essay. Archives were altered thanks to video recorders, the technological advancement of the time, which allowed the recording of televised images. With reuse, came aesthetic perspectives that allow us to see the disaster differently. On the other hand, this project led the author, equipped with a VHS camera, to go to the scene of the event, to film the reconstructed pylons, but also to go beyond, to James Bay. This research-creation work was developed through a non-systematic method, rather following the paths opened up by the archives, technologies encountered or images created. It considers the fundamental question posed by natural disasters : that of the relationship between man and nature.

This thesis presents the novel use of Coherent Point Drift in improving the robustness of a number of computer vision applications. CPD approach includes two methods for registering two images - rigid and non-rigid point set approaches which are based on the transformation model used. The key characteristic of a rigid transformation is that the distance between points is preserved, which means it can be used in the presence of translation, rotation, and scaling. Non-rigid transformations - or affine transforms - provide the opportunity of registering under non-uniform scaling and skew. The idea is to move one point set coherently to align with the second point set. The CPD method finds both the non-rigid transformation and the correspondence distance between two point sets at the same time without having to use a-priori declaration of the transformation model used. The first part of this thesis is focused on speaker identification in video conferencing. A real-time, audio-coupled video based approach is presented, which focuses more on the video analysis side, rather than the audio analysis that is known to be prone to errors. CPD is effectively utilised for lip movement detection and a temporal face detection approach is used to minimise false positives if face detection algorithm fails to perform. The second part of the thesis is focused on multi-exposure and multi-focus image fusion with compensation for camera shake. Scale Invariant Feature Transforms (SIFT) are first used to detect keypoints in images being fused. Subsequently this point set is reduced to remove outliers, using RANSAC (RANdom Sample Consensus) and finally the point sets are registered using CPD with non-rigid transformations. The registered images are then fused with a Contourlet based image fusion algorithm that makes use of a novel alpha blending and filtering technique to minimise artefacts. The thesis evaluates the performance of the algorithm in comparison to a number of state-of-the-art approaches, including the key commercial products available in the market at present, showing significantly improved subjective quality in the fused images. The final part of the thesis presents a novel approach to Vehicle Make & Model Recognition in CCTV video footage. CPD is used to effectively remove skew of vehicles detected as CCTV cameras are not specifically configured for the VMMR task and may capture vehicles at different approaching angles. A LESH (Local Energy Shape Histogram) feature based approach is used for vehicle make and model recognition with the novelty that temporal processing is used to improve reliability. A number of further algorithms are used to maximise the reliability of the final outcome. Experimental results are provided to prove that the proposed system demonstrates an accuracy in excess of 95% when tested on real CCTV footage with no prior camera calibration.

Thèse numérisée par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal

No description available.

Mémoire en recherche-création / Le présent mémoire s’intéresse aux films réalisés par les religieuses au Québec. Depuis les années 1930, celles-ci ont produit de nombreux films amateurs, qui n’ont toutefois suscité que très peu d’intérêt culturel ou académique. Un état de la recherche est d’abord effectué, s’appuyant principalement sur les travaux de l’historienne Jocelyne Denault, la première (et la seule) à avoir écrit sur ce corpus jusqu’à ce jour. Une incursion est proposée dans la production cinématographique de trois communautés localisées à Montréal. Ce faisant, nous associons les différents objets à trois catégories mieux établies : le cinéma utilitaire, le film de famille et le film de réemploi. L’étude de cas du film Le Livre d’or (Sœurs Missionnaires de l’Immaculée-Conception 1964) nous permet de s’intéresser à des films hybrides, mêlant ces trois catégories. Nous nous intéressons ensuite à la valeur documentaire des réalisations des religieuses, s’appuyant principalement sur l’exemple de Chez nous (Barrette s.g.m. 1961) et les documents corollaires à sa production. Ayant démontré la valeur historique et patrimoniale des films faits par les sœurs, nous procédons à une présentation de l’état actuel de leur archivage. Partant du constat que ces films sont plus menacés que jamais, autant par l’oubli que par la destruction, nous considérons deux procédés de mise en valeur possibles et imaginons les différentes possibilités quant à leur concrétisation : la mise en exposition et le film de réemploi. Nous concluons par un pressant appel à l’action afin de sauvegarder et de mettre au jour ces éléments précieux de la mémoire collective. / This thesis focuses on films made by religious sisters in Quebec. Since the 1930s, women religious communities have produced numerous amateur films, which have received practically no critical or academic attention. This essay begins with a survey of past and ongoing research, based mainly on the work of historian Jocelyne Denault, the first (and only) person to have written on this subject to date. An incursion is then proposed into the cinematographic productions of three communities located in Montreal. In doing so, we link the various objects under study to three more established categories: utilitarian cinema, the home movie, and the compilation or found footage film.The case study of the film Le Livre d'or (Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Conception 1964) allows us to look at hybrid films, mixing these three categories. We then turn our attention to the documentary value of the nuns' productions, relying mainly on the example of Chez nous (Barrette s.g.m. 1961) and the documents corollary to its production. Having demonstrated the historical and patrimonial value of the films made by the sisters, we proceed to a presentation of the current status of their preservation. Starting with the observation that these films are more threatened than ever, as much by oversight as by destruction, we consider two possible processes of enhancement and envision the different ways in which they could be put into practice: exhibitions and audiovisual reuse. We conclude with an urgent call for action to safeguard and bring to light these precious elements of collective memory.