Inverse rendering of an object under entirely unknown capture conditions is a fundamental challenge in computer vision and graphics. Neural approaches such as NeRF have achieved photorealistic results on novel view synthesis, but they require known camera poses. Solving this problem with unknown camera poses is highly challenging as it requires joint optimization over shape, radiance, and pose. This problem is exacerbated when the input images are captured in the wild with varying backgrounds and illuminations. Standard pose estimation techniques fail in such image collections in the wild due to very few estimated correspondences across images. Furthermore, NeRF cannot relight a scene under any illumination, as it operates on radiance (the product of reflectance and illumination). We propose a joint optimization framework to estimate the shape, BRDF, and per-image camera pose and illumination. Our method works on in-the-wild online image collections of an object and produces relightable 3D assets for several use-cases such as AR/VR. To our knowledge, our method is the first to tackle this severely unconstrained task with minimal user interaction.

The newly discovered P. mikazuki is a tribute the famous warrior Date Masamune. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. A team of university students in Japan identified an entirely new species of the mighty Portuguese Man O'War . Described in a study recently published in the journal, the creature's distinct features and fearsome venom have earned it a name that honors a famous 16th century samurai warrior. It's easy to mistake the Portuguese Man O'War () for a jellyfish .

Activity and behaviour correlate with dairy cow health and welfare, making continual and accurate monitoring crucial for disease identification and farm productivity. Manual observation and frequent assessments are laborious and inconsistent for activity monitoring. In this study, we developed a unique multi-camera, real-time tracking system for indoor-housed Holstein Friesian dairy cows. This technology uses cutting-edge computer vision techniques, including instance segmentation and tracking algorithms to monitor cow activity seamlessly and accurately. An integrated top-down barn panorama was created by geometrically aligning six camera feeds using homographic transformations. The detection phase used a refined YOLO11-m model trained on an overhead cow dataset, obtaining high accuracy (mAP\@0.50 = 0.97, F1 = 0.95). SAMURAI, an upgraded Segment Anything Model 2.1, generated pixel-precise cow masks for instance segmentation utilizing zero-shot learning and motion-aware memory. Even with occlusion and fluctuating posture, a motion-aware Linear Kalman filter and IoU-based data association reliably identified cows over time for object tracking. The proposed system significantly outperformed Deep SORT Realtime. Multi-Object Tracking Accuracy (MOTA) was 98.7% and 99.3% in two benchmark video sequences, with IDF1 scores above 99% and near-zero identity switches. This unified multi-camera system can track dairy cows in complex interior surroundings in real time, according to our data. The system reduces redundant detections across overlapping cameras, maintains continuity as cows move between viewpoints, with the aim of improving early sickness prediction through activity quantification and behavioural classification.

It's unlikely that the fate of a company as large as Ubisoft will hinge on the success of one tentpole single-player game. But the company cannot afford another major error anytime soon after the likes of Star Wars: Outlaws and XDefiant failed to set the world alight. Ubisoft desperately needs a big hit (and for the Rainbow Six Siege X overhaul to go well). The good news for the company is that Assassin's Creed Shadows is poised to deliver on that. On the surface, it's exactly what you'd expect: a massive Assassin's Creed game that takes dozens of hours to beat. There's so much to do beyond the core story, given all the missions and sidequests that the game constantly points you towards.

Japan, 1581: Iga province is burning down around you. You watch on, injured and helpless as the Oda Nobunaga - the warlord responsible for numerous civil wars and the eventual unification of the country - smirks from a nearby hill. You draw your katana, the blade shining in the flickering light of the flames. This is Assassin's Creed: Shadows – part exciting ninja game, part history lesson. It's an odd combination but it comes together in a sprawling historical-fiction adventure full of discovery and deception.

More than four years after its announcement and after two last-minute delays, the latest title in Ubisoft's historical fiction series Assassin's Creed will finally be released on Thursday. Set in Japan in 1579, a time of intense civil war dominated by the feudal lord Oda Nobunaga, it follows two characters navigating their way through the bloody chaos: a female shinobi named Fujibayashi Naoe, and Yasuke, an African slave turned samurai. Japan has been the series' most-requested setting for years, Ubisoft says. "I've been on [this] franchise for 16 years and I think every time we start a new game, Japan comes up and we ask, is this the time?" says executive producer Marc-Alexis Coté. "We've never pushed beyond the conception phase with Japan until this one." The game comes at a crucial time for Ubisoft after the disappointing performance of last year's titles Star Wars Outlaws, Skull and Bones and Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, and the expensive closure of live service shooter XDefiant.