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Have a damaged painting? Restore it in just hours with an AI-generated “mask”
- contravariant 1y agoThe restoration method is more interesting than the AI, but claiming it uses AI is probably necessary to get funding for it.
- dmurray 1y agoYes, it seems like the same method (a thin polymer mask of which a computer record exists) could be used in a completely human-driven process. Just allowing restorers to try a few different things to see what works would probably speed up their process immensely. There's probably some other grant money they can get down the line for a completely AI-less process, but obviously there's a lot more funding for AI than for art restoration.
- crooked-v 1y agoIt's conceptually similar to current restoration techniques, but, the real innovation is in doing the whole thing as one piece ahead of time rather than requiring somebody to get in there with tiny brushes after a transparent base layer is completed. It's also worth noting that this doesn't help with the first half of most restorations, which is removing crud and wear and often painstakingly undoing previous alterations or low-quality restorations. There's actually a pretty long history of paintings being altered to fit current fashions or otherwise mucked with in ways that make modern art historians cringe.
- masklinn 1y agoAs far as I understand this only replaces the retouching phase. A human needs to do that in place in order to color and pattern match (and it's already hard enough that way). And I do not know but would assume the retouching paints can be removed without affecting the isolation layer if the conservator realises they went in the wrong direction earlier and can’t easily recover.
- ryandrake 1y agoThey could probably just tell people they're "using AI" and then just use whatever methods work best. It's not like investors are doing much more DD than listening for that phrase.
- kulahan 1y agoI would’ve argued against this so hard if it weren’t for that NIKOLA company advertising their trucks running on an “HTML supercomputer” and still getting millions in funding.
- glimshe 1y agoA few years ago, they would just call it an "algorithm" or simply "software"
- absurdo 1y agoNo links to Baumgartner from HN yet? Strange.
- aspenmayer 1y agoFor those who are unaware, as I was, this is an art restoration business and YouTube channel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumgartner_Restoration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumgartner_Restoration
- amelius 1y agoI hope the AI will not generate hands with seven fingers ...
- userbinator 1y agoThat was a problem a year or two ago. New AI models have gotten past that point now.
- kachapopopow 1y agoopenai native 4o image generation generates 4 fingers instead.
- doubled112 1y agoAnd a thumb? Or like The Simpsons?
- vunderba 1y agoIs that a joke? Because 4o image generation (assuming you click "Image Generate" which uses gpt-image-1) EASILY handles rendering hands with the proper number of fingers even without specifying something like that. If anything, it's actually MORE difficult to generate hands with an improper number of fingers. Apologies to Count Rugen. https://imgur.com/a/hIp5DQO https://imgur.com/a/hIp5DQO
- washadjeffmad 1y agoIf you consider finger count to be the lowest bar, then it's still a problem. People just aren't generally creative enough to find the cracks. Think in terms of hands, their components, and their function, and test again. Be specific.
- vunderba 1y agoSo? My point wasn't that they were capable of EVERYTHING - it was addressing what looked like to me (and likely to any casual observer) factually incorrect information. You're also really talking to the wrong person about potential deficiencies in GenAI for images. I run an entire site where I compare a multitude of prompts I CREATED to explicitly test state of the art major generative image providers (Imagen4, gpt-image-1, Flux Kontext, etc.) - I'm all too aware of their shortcomings. https://genai-showdown.specr.net https://genai-showdown.specr.net
- omoikane 1y ago> "Because there's a digital record of what mask was used, in 100 years, the next time someone is working with this, they'll have an extremely clear understanding of what was done to the painting" Reminds me of https://xkcd.com/1683/ https://xkcd.com/1683/ Whatever digital record format they use, they will probably need to rewrite it once every few years to ensure that it's still readable.
- bee_rider 1y agoFunny aside, they have an odd ligature to for “fi” on that site. It shows up in iOS Safari at least. > Kachkine acknowledges that, as with any restoration project, there are ethical issues to consider, in terms of whether a restored version is an appropriate representation of an artist’s original style and intent. Any application of his new method, he says, should be done in consultation with conservators with knowledge of a painting’s history and origins. A sort of interesting thought, “what was the artist’s intent, should be recover the painting,” is a well known question nowadays. It would be sort of funny if current artists would just write down what sort of restoration plans they are ok with. I wonder how many would say “just do what you will do people can enjoy it.” Although, one could argue maybe that the damage which occurs to artwork as it ages also tells a historical story. Perhaps that story doesn’t just belong to the artist, and so restoring the work could be questionable even with their permission. I’m sure this is well-trod ground.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Daub 1y agoI will reserve judgement on this for the simple fact is that att conservation has been responsible for a huge amount of Art vandalism. The 'restoration' of the cistine chapel ceiling was funded by a Japanese tv company. The cheapest approach was chosen which assumed that michelangelo made absolutely no corrections to his fresco using applied paint. It is perfectly obvious that this was a mistaken assumption, in the process removing many of the artists original work. I can upload some slides later if anyone is interested. In victorian times many classic sculptures were scrubbed of their original paint and their stonework bleached, just in order to serve the tastes of the time. And let us not forget that modern conservators will add or remove elements according to the clients taste. Eg change the flag of a ship from British to American.
- xeonmc 1y agoAnd don’t forget the restoration attempt on the Ecce Homo portrait[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecce_Homo_(Garc%C3%ADa_Mart%C3%ADnez_and_Giménez) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecce_Homo_(Garc%C3%ADa_Mart%C3...
- solardev 1y agoHonestly, that's a lot better than the original. We should restore more art that way.
- PetitPrince 1y agoIn that case they explicitly says that the process is non destructive and reversible. Essentially a wrap over the original artwork > The restoration is printed on a very thin polymer film, in the form of a mask that can be aligned and adhered to an original painting. It can also be easily removed. Kachkine says that a digital file of the mask can be stored and referred to by future conservators, to see exactly what changes were made to restore the original painting. I wonder whether it's still worthwhile to replaced a yellowed varnish varnish on old painting, just to be sure that it doesn't degrade further (with the assumption that historical varnish are somewhat lesser than modern one, which I really don't know if it's the case).
- b0a04gl 1y ago[dead]
- matt3210 1y agoWhy not just generate a new painting with AI? How much of the painting has to be covered with a mask before it’s not a painting anymore?
- masklinn 1y agoThat’s not exactly a gotcha. Art conservators have been grappling with variants of that question for hundreds of years.
- zelphirkalt 1y agoThe answer might just be: What's done is done. Conserving what's left is the best you can hope for.
- masklinn 1y agoThat is a bit of a truism, as conservators don't have access to time magic and can only conserve what's left. The question is how far conservation extends. To my layman's understanding, the current logic of conservation is: 1. clean. dust, grime, soot, tar, and other environmental deposits don't belong on the painting and have little value 2. stabilise, this is mostly for paintings which are actively degrading (e.g. paint is lifting), this can also include repairs to the substrate e.g. patch up tears in the canvas 3. fill-in losses The last one is the one that has some contention, and what TFA is about (and only a portion of it to boot), and the idea behind it is (again to my understanding) that at the end of the day art is for the living to appreciate, and while damage can be of some historical interest it generally detracts from enjoyment of the piece and is (usually) not part of the original vision. However it is of course subject to (0). do not damage what remains, so the retouching should be well separated from the original material in order to be identifiable and removable without risk of further damage in case re-conservation is needed, or better conservation methods can be used. And then if you allow for (3) arises the question of limit, is there and if so what is the point at which it doesn't make artistic sense to try and replace losses even if somebody's paying for it, and it is better to accept the piece's new state of being as its normal?
- t43562 1y agoUnless the result is a form of protection to the painting then why not "just" reprint the whole painting and not touch the original at all?
- teruakohatu 1y agoLooking at a oil painting in real life is a vastly different experience than a looking at a print. Oil paintings are for a start 3D (textured). Colour reproduction is also difficult.
- zelphirkalt 1y agoNo thank you, that would destroy the value and art of the painting.
- ecocentrik 1y agoIt changes the medium. Even if it works perfectly, doesn't alter luminosity and perfectly preserves the art under the wrap, it's still shrink wrapped art and alters the experience of viewing the work.
- jbverschoor 1y agoPerhaps.. have you seen the 3d replica's in the van Gogh museum? The film could also have a 3d printed version.
- ecocentrik 1y agoI doubt this technique could be used with heavy impasto paintings. Wouldn't the film have to sit on a mostly flat image to work correctly? Otherwise it would cast shadows between the painting and the film. 3d printing impasto does sound cool as a tool for restoration of topographically scanned originals.
- not_your_mentat 1y agoInfill the damaged parts of this painting with exactly no elephants.
- t0bia_s 1y agoWould be interesting to use it on old photographs restoration.