ColourAIze: AI-Driven Colourisation of Paper Drawings with Interactive Projection System

Abstract

ColourAIze is an interactive system that analyses black and white drawings on paper, automatically determines realistic colour fills using artificial intelligence (AI) and projects those colours onto the paper within the line art. In addition to selecting between multiple colouring styles, the user can specify local colour preferences to the AI via simple stylus strokes in desired areas of the drawing. This allows users to immediately and directly view potential colour fills for paper sketches or published black and white artwork such as comics. ColourAIze was demonstrated at the Winter 2017 Comic Market in Tokyo, where it was used by more than a thousand visitors. This short paper describes the design of the system and reports on usability observations gathered from demonstrators at the fair.