Tuesday saw a couple of photo presentations come my way.
First came a YouTube video AI Photo Magic That Made My Mom Cry, the latest in a series Ancestors and Algorithms: AI for Genealogy & Family History. The accompanying blurb is ‘When I enhanced a damaged 1920s photo of my great-great-grandmother using AI, my mom started crying. “It’s like meeting her for the first time,” she said. “I can see she has the same nose as me.”‘
The explanation was clear, starting with MyHeritage facilities. Although on YouTube it’s actually a podcast with just one title slide — a strange choice for a photo-oriented presentation.
In the afternoon, Legacy Family Tree Webinars featured Rick Crume with an explainer video on “5 Easy-to-Use Tools to Repair, Enhance, and Animate Your Old Photos on MyHeritage.”
Both presentations were careful to emphasize that the products should not be portrayed as the original. AI does not have any more profound insights into reality than are embedded in the image it’s fed. The modifications/ enhancements may or may not bring you closer to the truth, although they will likely appear more pleasing.