Mail.Ru Group Launches World's First Neural Network-Powered App to Process Videos

MOSCOW, August 2, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Mail.Ru Group has released Artisto, the world's first app that uses neural networks for editing short videos, processing them in the style of famous artworks or any other source image. The app is available on App Store and Google Play globally.

Artisto now processes 5-second videos and offers 14 filters to choose from. New filters are now being tested that will be added later on.

"Neural networks are booming right now, and we were also eager to test out stylization capabilities they provide. Considering that there are a few very neat solutions for redrawing photos, it was only logical to try our hand at video," says Anna Artamonova, Vice-President of Mail.Ru Group, Head of Email and Portal business unit.  "We got the first result quite fast: the beta version was ready within a couple of weeks, and today the app is available for both the leading platforms on stores all over the world. We can already see that our experiment is successful: a number of big name brands and celebrities have shared the videos redrawn by Artisto on social networks. The most popular filters right now are BlueDream based on a Pablo Picasso painting, and In the Fire."

Sample video repainted by Artisto can be viewed here.

The app development team consists of machine learning experts from various departments of Mail.Ru Group. Almost all of Mail.Ru Group's products, including advertising, anti-spam system and search engine, use neural networks and machine learning technologies.

Neural networks are one of the hottest areas of artificial intelligence development. An artificial neural network is a mathematical model that tries to simulate a human neural network. Neural networks are used extensively in image recognition, data science, forecasting, and many more.

Artisto is available for both Google Play and App Store all around the world.

Mail.Ru Group (LSE:MAIL, listed since November 5, 2010) is a leading Internet company in Europe and is the 1st largest Internet business globally, based on the average minutes per visitor (comScore, top 100 properties, April 2016, worldwide).

In line with the communitainment (communication plus entertainment) strategy, the Company is developing an integrated communications and entertainment platform. The Company owns Russia's leading email service and one of Russia's largest internet portals, Mail.Ru. The Company operates two of the major Russian language social networks, VKontakte (VK), Odnoklassniki (OK), and Russia's largest online games (including Warface, Armored Warfare, Skyforge and Perfect World). The Company's portfolio also includes Agent Mail.Ru and ICQ - two instant messaging services popular in Russia and CIS. In November 2013, The Company launched My.com in the US and later worldwide to provide communication and entertainment products and services for the global audience.