Synthetic Data: How AI Uses Fake Data for Genuine Gains

The most remarkable thing about shopping in a smart store is how unremarkable it feels -- once you get over the whole no-checkout thing, of course. At the same time, there's a whole mess of complex computer vision modeling going on all around you to facilitate the experience. Those models have to be sophisticated enough to handle all manner of image challenges: object recognition, activity recognition, pose estimation. Asking a system to differentiate between two similar bags of chips, grabbed by people in similar coats and gloves, with no margin for error, is a big ask. Getting it right requires data.