Pix2pix

Pros

• Makes some of the most sophisticated technology available today accessible to amateurs
• Very easy to use and produces results in little time

Cons

• Quality of the neural network can be incredibly inconsistent
• Requires heavy tampering to produce more advanced results

Pix2Pix makes use of conditional adversarial networks to transform simple doodles into more complex images that resemble photographs. But while the technology behind this software sounds complicated, the basic premise of it isn't too difficult to understand. Pix2Pix uses predictive artificial intelligence to basically guess what a doodle is supposed to look like and draw from its collective knowledge to produce the best estimate of high art. If you've seen the cat images or human photos transformed through Google's Tensorflow software, you understand what Pix2Pix can do.

Pix2Pix promises that it can use machine learning to turn basic images into oil paintings, but the actual results are somewhat dubious. Machine learning still hasn't reached the level where it can replicate the human creative process, and line drawings filtered through Pix2Pix's neural network often come across falling somewhere in the spectrum between amateurish and horrifying. But as the software and technology has started to develop, it's becoming increasingly more sophisticated, and people are using it to create increasingly advanced results. All you have to do is compare Pix2Pix's current results to the popular edges2cats site which used machine learning to turn line drawings into sometimes funny and sometimes horrifying results. There are countless applications here. Users have made use of Pix2Pix to populate cars on basic drawings of a street, transforming a real satellite view of a neighborhood into a neat and orderly line map, converting a day scene into one taking place at night, and making photo realistic handbags out of very basic sketches. At the advanced end of the spectrum, creators are even using this technology to essentially morph figures into well known celebrities.

The catch here is that most of these users are digging deep into the components that Pix2Pix uses. Without a deep technical knowledge of this software, you're unlikely to achieve anything approaching the results that these cutting edge developers are producing. Fortunately, it can be just as important a tool for casual users curious about what machine learning can offer. The strange oil paintings that the early versions of this app have created have become a popular meme on social media, and it requires neither a sophisticated knowledge of how the software works nor a particularly high level of artistic aptitude. The interface is incredibly easy to use. It consists simply of an input box and an output box. Simply create a line drawing in the latter, and Pix2Pix's neural network will generate results in the output box. Both can be saved as a png image with the click of a button, and the results are returned to you with surprising speed. Just keep in mind that the work you produce is dependent both on what you're willing to put in and on the unique particularities of machine learning.

Pros

• Makes some of the most sophisticated technology available today accessible to amateurs
• Very easy to use and produces results in little time

Cons

• Quality of the neural network can be incredibly inconsistent
• Requires heavy tampering to produce more advanced results