Reconstructing images of Vietnamese heroic youth using AI

Recently, the Skyline photo restoration team brought a gift to generations of union members - vivid portraits of typical Youth Heroes - those who devoted their youth to the Fatherland - now "revived" thanks to the power of artificial intelligence (AI).

Image of Hero Vu A Dinh was restored by Skyline group using AI.

AI technology recreates images of young heroes

The faces of heroic young people such as Vo Thi Sau, Kim Dong, Vu A Dinh, Nguyen Van Troi... were restored by the Skyline group with sharp quality, helping today's young generation have a more realistic view of those who have devoted themselves to the country. Thanks to AI, old black and white photos, sometimes only faint, are vividly recreated with higher detail.

Mr. Phung Quang Trung, leader of Skyline group, shared about the passion of the project: “A special thing about Skyline group is that the 10 portraits of heroes that the group has restored have been brought to all parts of the country over the past many years. We have personally delivered these photos to the families of the heroes, relic sites, museums, exhibition units... from the mainland to the islands, from North to South. The journey was not simple, but it was all the passion of the whole group.”

The application of AI in the restoration of historical images not only recreates details that have faded over time but also helps today's young generation "meet" heroic examples of the past, and feel more clearly about the people who sacrificed their youth for the independence and freedom of the nation.

The journey from one old photo to more than 6,000 reconstructed portraits

The person behind this meaningful project is Phung Quang Trung, born in 1996 in Hai Duong . In 2021, while working in marketing, he received a request from a friend to help restore the only photo of a martyr. The original photo was blurred by time, but after many nights of work, Trung successfully restored it and returned it to the family. Witnessing their emotions and tears of happiness, Trung realized the meaning of this work.

From that motivation, Trung and 10 other young people founded the Skyline group, focusing on restoring photos of heroic martyrs, Vietnamese Heroic Mothers and other historical images. In the early days, restoring a photo took from 8 to 12 hours, requiring patience and meticulousness. In particular, when recreating images of heroes of the resistance against the French, the group encountered many difficulties due to lack of documents and had to rely on the memories of relatives.

However, with gratitude and constant efforts, during nearly 4 years of operation, the Skyline group has restored and donated more than 6,000 photos across the country. These photos are not only kept in digital space but also sent directly to families, relic sites, museums and exhibition units.

Mr. Phung Quang Trung - Head of the Skyline photo restoration team - received the Outstanding Young Vietnamese Faces Award 2024. (Photo: NVCC)

With those contributions, on the evening of March 23, the Central Committee of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union and the Vietnam Young Talent Support Fund presented the Outstanding Young Vietnamese Faces Award 2024 to Mr. Phung Quang Trung.

Here are some images of heroic teenagers that the Skyline team has reconstructed using AI: