The developers behind Retro, a photo-sharing application designed for close social circles, are exploring innovative applications for generative AI. As part of this exploration, they launched Splat, a new app that leverages advanced AI to transform any photograph into a customizable coloring page for children.
Parents universally acknowledge children’s fondness for coloring. The internet, in particular, offers an enormous, seemingly endless collection of coloring pages readily available for home printing.
Nevertheless, numerous websites providing these resources are often cluttered with advertisements and extraneous content, hindering ease of use. Additionally, some printable pages come with a small charge, which many parents are reluctant to incur for artwork that is frequently ephemeral.
This observation prompted the Retro team to create an application that enables home printing of coloring book pages, utilizing either personal photos or a curated selection provided by the app, covering engaging and educational themes like animals, space, flowers, fairy tales, robots, cars, and similar subjects.
To begin using Splat, simply capture a new image or select one from your device’s Camera Roll. Users then have the option to pick a desired coloring style—including anime, 3D movie, manga, cartoon, or comic. The app subsequently employs AI to convert your chosen picture into either a digital or printable coloring page for children.
Esquiring a cumbersome sign-up, the app guides you through initial customization preferences upon your first use. During this setup, you can select your preferred app icon and indicate categories that appeal to your child. Furthermore, you can decide whether children will color the photo on-screen or as a printable sheet (an excellent alternative for mitigating boredom without resorting to television or video games).
Users are permitted one complimentary generative AI project to experience the app’s functionality. Subsequent projects require a subscription, priced at $4.99 weekly or $49.99 annually. The weekly plan includes 25 pages, while the annual plan offers 500 pages per year. To prevent accidental purchases or setting changes by young children, access to these features is protected by a pop-up requiring the parent’s birth year for verification.
During short trials, the application performed as advertised, with rapid generation times enabling a swift transition from concept to a printable artwork, ready for coloring, cutting, or other creative activities your child might enjoy.
Splat is among various initiatives harnessing generative AI to foster children’s creativity and imagination in novel ways. Other examples include Stickerbox, which provides AI-generated stickers for coloring, and Casio’s fluffy AI-powered robotic pet, Moflin, whose personality evolves through interaction.