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FotoNation, a small company based in Galway, Ireland, has developed technology that allows amateur photographers to avoid common problems. Software from the company is found in two-thirds of the world's digital cameras. It corrects for red eye, and detects when everyone in the picture is smiling, or when someone has his eyes closed. The technology can be found in cameras from Nikon Corp., Eastman Kodak Co., and Pentax Corp. Eran Steinberg, the Israeli born CEO of FotoNation, looked for ways to use software, rather than lenses, to improve photographs. Compared with competitors such as ArcSoft Inc. and Omron Corp., FotoNation has the largest share of its market, and some 70 employees work in offices in Ireland and Romania. Tessera Technologies Inc. recently acquired FotoNation for $39 million. Nikon was the first to introduce a FotoNation feature, the red eye scrubber, in its 2003 CoolPix line. Other companies soon followed suit. The company is still working to remove the green eye problem that occurs in photos of pets. At the heart of FotoNation's technology is a face-detecting algorithm, though problems remain such as detecting faces in profile. Solutions to correct for blurry pictures due to shaky hands, and to prevent people standing in front of windows from becoming dark silhouettes are in the works.
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