AI Portrait Reveals What Kurt Cobain Would Look Like If He Was Alive Today

Photographer and lawyer Alper Yesiltas has used AI technology to create portraits of famous dead musicians that show what they would look like if they were still alive today. 

Yesiltas has created a photo-realistic portrait of late rockstar Kurt Cobain, as part of the collection, revealing what the Nirvana frontman would look like if he was still alive today. 

The project also features updated portraits of iconic musicians Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson, John Lennon, Janis Joplin, Tupac, and Elvis Presley. The artist also provided updated portraits of late Aussie actor Heath Ledger and legendary martial artist Bruce Lee. 

Each of the stunning AI-generated portraits showcases the impact that ageing may have had on the appearance of these icons of stage and screen, had they lived to see old age. 

Writing about the project, Yesiltas offers "With the development of AI technology, I’ve been excited for a while, thinking that ‘anything imaginable can be shown in reality, when I started tinkering with technology, I saw what I could do and thought about what would make me the happiest. I wanted to see some of the people I missed again in front of me and that’s how this project emerged. The hardest part of the creative process for me is making the image feel ‘real’ to me. The moment I like the most is when I think the image in front of me looks very realistic as if it was taken by a photographer.”  

Yesiltas used AI software Remini as well as a selection of image editing programs to create the portraits.  

The full collection of Yesiltas creations can be viewed here.

The Cobain image makes for an interesting combination when paired with the AI-generated Nirvana song from the Canadian non-profit Over The Bridge, Drowned in the Sun which was crafted using the open-source Python library powered by TensorFlow, last year.