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Cosmic beauty: Chinese AI aims to give astronauts makeover in space
- Researchers say their technology can boost China’s soft power by beautifying the Tiangong crew
- Artificial intelligence also conceals sensitive hardware and other national security secrets in images from the space station
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Stephen Chenin Beijing
China’s astronauts are ready for their close-up, thanks to new technology designed to beautify them as they live-stream from the country’s Tiangong space station.
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Researchers in northwestern China said they had developed an AI that could adorn astronauts with celebrity-inspired “digital make-up”, allowing them to put their best face forward in an environment where putting on cosmetics is impractical.
“[The technology] will enable astronauts from all over the world to present a better image when they engage the public in scientific research, space education and other activities,” said the team led by Yan Chunman of Northwest Normal University in Lanzhou.
The AI is able to replicate the make-up style of any celebrity photo the astronaut chooses, according to a paper published in the peer-reviewed Space Electronic Technology last month.
Achieving a natural look was a major challenge for the scientists. According to the researchers, the astronauts wanted to retain as much of their original appearance as possible, without the filtered faces produced by TikTok and popular beauty apps.
Yan and colleagues at Air Force Medical University in Xian trained the AI to identify the face powder, eyeshadow and lipstick used in the celebrity photo and applied the products to the user’s face. If the AI produced an unnatural look, it was “punished” by an algorithm the researchers designed.
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The team then forced the AI to recreate the user’s original face based on the made-up image. If it failed to create a close match to the original, the AI would again lose points.
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