On February 28, NAVER Webtoon released a demo version of its in-house developed WebtoonMe to the public for the first time. WebtoonMe is a technology that allows users to turn photos and videos into webtoons in real time.

NAVER Webtoon hosted a session and official booth at NAVER’s developer conference, DEVIEW 2023, held at the COEX Grand Ballroom in Samseong-dong, Seoul, on the 27th and 28th to introduce the ‘WebtoonMe’ project, which is being researched by NAVER Webtoon’s AI organization. 

NAVER Webtoon introduced the ‘WebtoonMe’ project, which uses deep learning technology to convert images from real-world images into webtoon characters and backgrounds. Various pre-processing and post-processing technologies based on computer graphics are applied to reflect the characteristics of webtoon characters with various facial features. Last year, a paper on ‘WebtoonMe’ was accepted at the Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR), a leading conference in the field of vision AI and one of the most influential conferences in computer science.

WebtoonMe is a technology that helps users enjoy watching webtoons more. The ability to transform real people’s faces, expressions, and movements into webtoon characters not only makes the webtoon viewing experience more enjoyable for readers, but also enables the development of new content, such as interactive webtoons where users can enter the webtoon and participate in the story. Last year, NAVER Webtoon incorporated WebtoonMe technology into NAVER Shopping Live and transformed the host’s face into a Webtoon character, attracting the attention of viewers.

At the conference, NAVER Webtoon used WebtoonMe to showcase an experience that allows users to take four-cut photos of themselves as characters from NAVER Webtoon’s popular works. 

“We plan to conduct various experiments using WebtoonMe in the future,” said Kim Dae-sik, AI Lead of NAVER Webtoon. “We will strengthen our AI technology by researching innovative and fun technologies that benefit both users and creators.”