NICHOLAS MOLTON
Date of Birth:12 March, 1973Nationality:British
Address:1 Dunstable Road, Telephone:01865 280950
Stanford-le-Hope, Mobile:07773 198565
EssexSS17 8QL, UKEmail:
EDUCATION
October 1995-UNIVERSITYOFOXFORD, ROBOTICS RESEARCH GROUP
January 1999D. Phil. ‘Computer Vision as an Aid for the Visually-Impaired.’
The application of robust stereo vision to a device carried by a
partially sighted person, which warns of nearby obstacles.
October 1991-Brunel University, UK
June 1995BEng.(Hons.) ‘The Special Engineering Programme’.
(First Class) A degree combining mechanical, and electrical
engineering with management. Accredited by IEE and IMechE.
Final year subjects: Control theory, intelligent systems, real-time
systems design, solid mechanics, internal combustion engines,
Final Year Project: ‘Stereo Vision for Automated Inspection’
September 1985-TheCampionSchool, Hornchurch, Essex, UK
June 19911991A Level: Physics (A), Further Mathematics (A),
Chemistry (A), General Studies (B).
1990A Level: Mathematics (A).
1989GCSE: 10 subjects (A-C), including English (B)
Career History
January 2003-April 2004 – Postdoctoral Researcher
Robotics Research Group, OxfordUniversity.
Real-time camera tracking in natural scenes. The work included looking at live initialisation and recovering motion by treating the world as a set of locally planar image patches.
March 2000-November 2002 - Research and development Scientist
2d3 Ltd, 14 Minns Business Park, West Way, Oxford, OX2 0JB.
While at 2d3 I worked on the boujou software project from early development, through to the release of version 2. The software is sold into the visual effects industry and won an Emmy award for technical achievement in early 2002. I was involved in the design of all parts of the product, and did major implementation work on feature tracking, lens distortion, 3D scene set-up, and exporting 3D data to many different animation packages.
March 1999- March 2000 - Postdoctoral Researcher
Robotics Research Group, OxfordUniversity.
The enhancement of inscribed Roman writing tablets using shadow movement and photometric stereo.
April-October 1992,1993 & 1994 - Undergraduate Sponsorship
GEC Alsthom Paxman Diesels, Paxman Works, Hythe Hill, Colchester, Essex, CO1 2HW
During my eighteen months here, I worked in most of the company’s departments and facilities, and on two significant projects.
While a student at OxfordUniversity I also worked part-time as a student demonstrator in the engineering department and as the graduate computing officer of my college, both for a year.
DOCTORAL THESIS
My doctoral project required integration of video cameras with C40 based video equipment and a PC, and the design of camera mountings. Methods for tracking the motion components of a walking person were investigated, along with methods for robust structure and motion recovery and filtering from computer vision. The work was part of a larger project involving partners from academia and industry.
COMPUTING SKILLS
I have 4 years experience of programming in c++, most of which was as a commercial software engineer. Before that I programmed in c for about another five years. I have also used MATLAB for a number of years. I have worked under Windows and Linux, using packages such as Microsoft Visual Studio, SourceSafe, Installshield, cvs, the QT and gtk gui toolkits, and the vxl and vw computer vision libraries. I have experience of exporting data to many animation and compositing products, and have written a simple plug-in for Adobe After Effects. As graduate computing officer while at university I was responsible for the maintenance and upgrade of a small network of 12 PCs and Macs, and also created the college’s web page.
PERSONAL SKILLS
The research work I have done at OxfordUniversity has always been part of practical projects involving other academics, and sometimes partner companies. As well as writing academic papers, I have also been involved in project reviews and grant applications. The project I worked on at 2d3 was driven largely by group discussion and peer review, and I and also regularly worked in collaboration with customers and with academics in Oxford. As an industry sponsored student I was involved in a number of activities aiming to teach team working skills, including a 3 month student project to build a CNC lathe, and helping to run a technology summer school for young children.
ACTIVITIES, INTERESTS AND GENERAL SKILLS
I have been learning tai-chi for about a year and regularly play ultimate Frisbee with work colleagues. Past interests have included jiu-jitsu and playing football. I enjoy reading and travel. I am a member of the IEE, IEEE, and BMVA, and a former member of the IMechE. I have a full driving licence, and a basic knowledge of French.
REFEREES
Dr Andrew Davison or Dr Ian Reid,Dr Andrew Stoddart,
Department of Engineering Science,2d3 Ltd
University of Oxford,14 Minns Business Park,
Parks Road,West Way,
Oxford, OX1 3PJOxford OX2 0JB
Nicholas Molton – PUBLICATIONS
N D Molton, S Se, M Brady, D Lee, P Probert, ‘Robotic Sensing for the Visually Impaired’, First International Conference on Field and Service Robotics FSR’97, Canberra, Australia, December 1997 (Nominated for best student paper)
N D Molton, S Se, M Brady, D Lee, P Probert, ‘A Stereo Vision-Based Aid for the Visually Impaired’, Image and Vision Computing, 16(4), pp 251-263, April 1998
N D Molton, S Se, M Brady, D Lee, P Probert, ‘Robotic Sensing for the Partially Sighted’, Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 26(2-3), 28 February 1999
N D Molton, J M Brady, 'Practical Structure and Motion from Stereo When Motion is Unconstrained', International Journal of Computer Vision, 39(1), pp 5-23, August 2000
N D Molton, J M Brady, 'Modelling the Motion of a Sensor Attached to a Walking Person', Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 34(4), pp 203-221, 31 March 2001
N D Molton, X Pan, J M Brady, A Bowman, C Crowther, R Tomlin, ‘Visual Enhancement of Incised Text’, Pattern Recognition, 36(4), pp 1031-1043, April 2003
N D Molton, A Davison, I Reid, ‘Parameterisation and Probability in Image Alignment’, Asian Conference of Computer Vision 2004, Vol 1, pp 192-197, Jeju, South Korea, January 2004