[Review] Can Kakao Brain B^ DISCOVER Replace the Commercial Illustration Market?

[Asia Economy Reporter Kang Nahum] By entering just three prompts?'sunset, beach, couple'?an image of a couple strolling along a sunset beach is generated within seconds. Adding details about the texture of objects or the painting style can even create a 'work' that looks as if painted by a famous artist.

Kakao Brain has unveiled ‘B^ DISCOVER (B^Discover)’, an AI-based image generation and sharing platform. It was created using the AI artist ‘Karlo’, which is an advancement of Kakao Brain’s previously released large-scale image generation AI models such as 'minDALL-E' and 'RQ-Transformer'. Having trained on a dataset of 120 million text-image pairs, Karlo can generate images in various painting styles and aesthetics based on the understood context.

Optimized for Mobile Environment... Easy Editing of Other Users’ Images

The biggest advantage of B^Discover is its intuitive interface and ease of use. Without any separate registration process, users can log in immediately using their Google account and start using the application. It is optimized for mobile environments, presenting images neatly within square frames.

When you first enter a prompt, the AI shows six generated images. If none are satisfactory, clicking 'generate more' allows you to obtain up to 14 images.

If you can’t think of what to draw, the guide feature helps ease this dilemma. It shows multiple example prompts such as subject, painting style, location, and color, which you can select or input yourself.

The 'Explore' feature is another highlight of B^Discover. It functions as a kind of 'gallery', displaying images created by other users, evoking the feeling of visiting an online exhibition.

You can view the prompts corresponding to each image, which can serve as references for generating new images. You can also check the prompts used by other users and edit them to create new images. For example, if you add the prompt 'with child' to another user’s 'sunset, beach, couple' prompt, the image is reprocessed to show a couple walking on the beach holding a child’s hand.

These images can be saved to your phone or shared via various social apps such as KakaoTalk.

Professional Version to Launch Early Next Year... Expected to Impact Creative Industries

Interest in the commercial use of B^Discover is also growing. Currently, it is a free version, but Kakao Brain plans to launch an official global version within the year. However, specific business models (BM) have not been disclosed.

There are various fields of application. Closely, images generated by B^Discover can be used as a means of self-expression on the internet. Users can create characters or illustrations representing themselves and use them as profile pictures on social networking services (SNS). Internet broadcasters such as YouTubers who prefer not to reveal their faces can use these images without concerns about portrait rights infringement.

It is also expected to be useful in creative fields such as web novels and webtoons. Web novel authors often need illustrations for main characters, backgrounds, and covers; using B^Discover eliminates the need for expensive outsourcing. Webtoon artists can also receive help in early concept setting and drawing stages.

In this regard, Kakao Brain plans to add features to the official version such as 'Image Inpainting', which naturally removes or edits unnecessary parts of an image, and 'Image Outpainting', which expands an image by imagining light, shadows, and surrounding objects based on the existing image. A professional version supporting artists’ creative activities will also be released early next year.

A Kakao Brain official stated, "B^Discover aims to maximize human creativity by using AI technology as a creative tool to enhance individual artistic expression," adding, "We will continue to introduce various features to provide users with new and valuable experiences."