New AI Can Retouch Your Photos Before Capture

MIT researchers and search engine giant Google have created a new system that can automatically retouch images, in real time, so the photographer can see the final version of the image while still framing the shot.

The new tech is so energy-efficient, it can run on a smartphone and it has learned to perform specific tasks by analysing data which, in the case of the photo editing AI, meant the system had to look at thousands of pairs of raw and retouched images to learn what adjustments had been applied to photos. 

The system is able to retouch images in real time as it doesn't apply its image editing algorithm to the high-res image until it's done some maths on a lower-resolution version first. What this means is you can get your smartphone out and while you're framing your shot with live view, the AI can apply the retouching adjustment it thinks the image needs. 

"This technology has the potential to be very useful for real-time image enhancement on mobile platforms," says Google Researcher, Jon Barron. “Using machine learning for computational photography is an exciting prospect but is limited by the severe computational and power constraints of mobile phones. This paper may provide us with a way to sidestep these issues and produce new, compelling, real-time photographic experiences without draining your battery or giving you a laggy viewfinder experience.”

The researchers do go into a lot more detail over on the MIT website about the project so do go take a look and they've also created a short video, shown below, detailing more of the technology. 

(Via The Verge)