Samsung AI lab brings Mona Lisa to life


Scientists have brought the Mona Lisa to life! (well, not literally that is)
Researchers at Samsung’s artificial intelligence arm in Moscow are working on techniques to create life-like, photo-realistic videos and animations of a person’s face as reported by TechCrunch.
In a recently released research paper followed by a rather amazing video demonstration which shows the famous oil-painted portrait made by Italian Renaissance artist, Leonardo da Vinci, actually emoting.
According to the research team, the machine learning algorithm is able to generate and transform even a single still image into a moving animation, which – to a certain degree – accurately “guesses†how a particular sample image would speak, make mundane human facial expressions, and even move.
Though the technology is far from perfect, the potential uses of such techniques are utterly limitless and this fact is raising concerns among the more paranoid members of our society.
Previous renditions of these so called deepfakes – fake AI-generated video or audio clip – have resulted in some comedic gold.
I’ve gone down a black hole of the latest DeepFakes and this mashup of Steve Buscemi and Jennifer Lawrence is a sight to behold pic.twitter.com/sWnU8SmAcz
— Mikael Thalen (@MikaelThalen) January 29, 2019
Though concerns on the misuse of such tech are deeply understandable as appearances of fake celebrity porn videos and even bogus political speeches have surfaced in the recent years.
You yourself probably have seen how the use of similar technology can make life rather… confusing.
This new filter got you females hating on us pic.twitter.com/qgTc0DUlAz
— Boredpersonful (@Boredpersonful) May 10, 2019
But nonetheless, the miracles of the modern age can be mind-blowing for sure.

Typing out trending topics and walking the fine line between deep and dumb.