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Updated July 24th, 2019 at 16:43 IST

This new AI tool can create classic portraits from your selfies: What you need to know

Turning your selfies into classical portraits has just become easier, thanks to this artificial intelligence (AI) tool that lets users do just that.

Reported by: Tech Desk
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Turning your selfies into classical portraits has just become easy and realistic, thanks to this artificial intelligence (AI) tool that lets users do just that. Here is everything you need to know:

The AI powers a lot of things these days, and it is also the brain behind deepfakes and many other modern-day techniques. This new tool lets users upload a photo or selfie. A few seconds later, it would transform into a classical-style faux oil portrait. 

The tool, however, it seems down at the moment. Right now, a message on the website reads:

"Back Soon. Due to the overwhelming popularity of the site, we are currently down for maintenance. Check back soon."

Once the website goes up again, we shall try it out ourselves. For now, let's see what goes behind the tool:

What goes behind it

Researchers at MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab used a popular AI technique called generative adversarial network (GAN). The whole idea behind this technique is to get two neural networks to duel each other and produce a desirable outcome. It also involves two key ingredients: Generator and discriminator.

While the generator looks at existing data sets and tries to mimic them, the discriminator would compare the subject and outcome with the same training examples and judges accordingly.

Researchers used 45,000 portrait images to train the AI and produce desired results, including paintings by Titian, van Gogh, and Rembrandt.

However, the tool doesn't seem to create that include smiles. According to MIT, that is because it was uncommon for such overt facial expressions to be painted in the era the training examples cover.

READ | FaceApp founder clears air on every single privacy policy concern about the app, but is that enough?

Is it safe?

Users might worry about its privacy implications of uploading photos on such services. Recently, FaceApp became a global sensation on social media that also uses AI. The app was embroiled in a controversy involving its users and privacy concerns.

As far as Airportrait is concerned, researchers promise pictures are immediately deleted after processing by their servers and those photos be used for any other purpose.

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Published July 24th, 2019 at 16:39 IST

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