Imitation of style: Russian scientists have created a robot artist capable of applying strokes in the manner of great masters

Researchers from St. Petersburg State Electrotechnical University “LETI” using a new algorithm taught a robot artist to more accurately convey the technique of applying strokes when copying paintings by famous painters. The first prototype painted only with black paint, after improvement it was able to mix paints and use different shades, and now it has learned to apply strokes of various widths, lengths and shapes. This expansion of functionality improves the quality of the drawn copy.

Specialists from St. Petersburg Electrotechnical University “LETI” taught a robot artist to imitate unique styles of brushstrokes when creating paintings. Thanks to a new computer algorithm, the machine can reproduce the style of famous masters, paint pictures in different styles, and also make calligraphic inscriptions. The press service of LETI reported this to RT. The study was carried out with financial support from the Russian Science Foundation. The results were published in the journal Robotics.

As the authors of the work said, the idea to create a robot artist came to them in 2016, and a few years later they assembled the first prototype of such a machine. Scientists have written special software for the robot: the algorithm breaks the downloaded image into separate strokes and converts this data into machine code.

The device is a robotic arm moving in three-dimensional space – a manipulator that can hold a regular brush for drawing. The robotic arm is rigidly attached to the table on which the canvas is located.

Center for Scientific Communications LETI

At first, the machine could only paint black and white pictures. The robot artist has successfully copied several paintings using the grisaille technique, that is, monochrome painting. At the next stage, the scientists created a special mixer of acrylic paints, thanks to which the robot learned to produce almost any color and shade of paint for painting.

Now scientists have developed a mathematical model, thanks to which a robot artist can apply strokes of various lengths, widths and shapes to the canvas. In addition, he was taught to make strokes of different thicknesses – this parameter depends on the force of pressing the brush on the canvas.

All this significantly expands the functionality of a mechanical painter; now he is able to even more accurately repeat the style of a particular artist. The robot's abilities have already been tested to imitate the style of the Impressionists.

“Thus, we have completed an important stage in improving our robotic painter. In the future, we will work on integrating the latest version of the robotic arm and the previously created paint mixer in order to “add color” to its new abilities,” project manager, senior researcher at the Youth Research Institute of St. Petersburg Electrotechnical University “LETI” Artur Karimov explained to RT.