The architectural company balbek bureau uses artificial intelligence to visualize the reconstruction of buildings destroyed during the war. The plans are to create a free application where the user can take a photo and receive several scenarios for restoring the destruction. In general, the company intends to invest up to 2% of its revenue in the development and implementation of AI solutions in 2025.
The architectural company balbek bureau uses artificial intelligence to visualize the reconstruction of buildings destroyed during the war. The plans are to create a free application where the user can take a photo and receive several scenarios for restoring the destruction. In general, the company intends to invest up to 2% of its revenue in the development and implementation of AI solutions in 2025.
Balbek Bureau annually allocates 3-5% of its revenue to R&D. The introduction of technologies reduces the routine of architects and frees up time for creativity, the company told Forbes Ukraine.
Initially, the company used the Midjourney, DALL-E, and Firefly neural networks to generate building images. However, the results were unsatisfactory, so they improved the prompts and switched to using the StableDiffusion model to generate illustrations.
StableDiffusion blurs an image of a destroyed building to near-invisible results, then gradually restores colors and elements at the architect's prompt.
The model was trained on over 3,000 Balbek Bureau visualizations. This gave the architects control over the form, geometry, and style of the building, adapting the AI to the studio's vision.
The building reconstruction application is being developed by three balbek bureau specialists together with the machine learning laboratory of the Ukrainian Catholic University (UCU) and student Marta Sumyk. This is a social project RE:Ukraine Vision, which is financed by balbek bureau. The company will be looking for donors from 2025. According to balbek bureau estimates, at least $1 million is needed for MVP.
