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Watch the Mona Lisa come to life: Interactive version of masterpiece sees her frown, turn her head, and even breathe

The digital version of the Mona Lisa allows da Vinci's painting to move
It uses motion sensors to tell if someone in the room is looking at her
Artificial intelligence then allows the painting to react to what is going on
The team behind the project have given the painting her own 'personality'

Published: 08:54 EST, 13 July 2015 | Updated: 11:49 EST, 13 July 2015

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Her eyes are said to follow art lovers around the room and the Mona Lisa's enigmatic smile gives her a strangely life like quality that captivates those who gaze upon her.

But now computer technology has been used to bring the Mona Lisa to life like never before.

An interactive version of the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci allows her to turn her head, pucker her lips, frown and even breathe.

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Eerie: The new 'living' Mona Lisa uses artificial intelligence to make a digital version of Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting react to people in the room around it. The portrait can turn its head, turn her enigmatic smile into a frown and blink. Her chest can even rise and fall as if she is breathing

The Living Mona Lisa project, or Living Joconde as it is known in France, uses artificial intelligence to transform the oil painting into a living, moving work of art.

While it does not perhaps tell us anything new about the woman in the painting – thought to be Lisa Gherardini – it perhaps lets viewers see her as da Vinci did while she posed for him.

The living painting uses motion sensing devices to pick up movements in the room, triggering reactions and 'mood' changes in the digital Mona Lisa.

WHO WAS THE MONA LISA?

Florentine noblewoman, Lisa Gherardini, is widely believed to be the model for Leonardo da Vinci's painting.

Lisa Gherardini is thought to have posed for the painting between 1503 and 1506.

Not much is knownown about Gherardini's life. Born in Florence and married in her teens to a cloth and silk merchant who later became a local official, she was mother to five children.

It is believed Francesco Del Giocondo commissioned the portrait to celebrate either his wife's pregnancy or the purchase of a house around 1502 and 1503.

After his death, Gherardini became a nun. She died in 1542 at the age of 63 and was said to be buried near the Sant'Orsola convent's altar.

In 2014 scientists conducted a DNA test on bones fond at the convent which they believe belonged to Gherardini but the results are still to be released.

Unlike the original painting, which hangs in the Louvre museum in Paris, art lovers will also be able to take home their own digital living Mona Lisa for themselves.

The team behind the project, which consisted of 40 technicians and artists, plan to produce digital Mona Lisas in a variety of sizes and formats, including miniature versions that can be placed on pendants.

Florent Aziosmanoff, who came up with the original concept, told the Telegraph: 'Now she can sense changes in her surroundings.

'Leonardo da Vinci tried to make her come alive, so it's appropriate that we've taken his intentions a few steps further.

'This is primarily an artistic project, not a commercial one, but we want to make paintings cheap enough for tourists to buy and take home as a souvenir.'

The team also plan to release a smartphone app that will allow people to carry around a living version of the Mona Lisa with them in their pockets.

To create their digital version of the painting, the team first used specialised computer software to capture a three dimensional wire frame image of the portrait.

The Mona Lisa now turns her head from looking off into the distance (left) to face those who come to stare at her (right) with the help of the new computer technology. It is intended to reflect changes in her 'mood'

The Mona Lisa comes to life thanks to digital technology

They used computer technology that aims to mimic real-life movement so that when the figure moves, it appears to do so in three dimensions.

They have combined this with the kind of motion sensing and facial recognition devices used on video game consoles.

This allows the digital painting to tell when a viewer is looking directly at it. When no one is looking, the painting poses in profile as if lost in thought.

However, when the view looks directly at the digital Mona Lisa, it offers a slightly questioning smile.

If the algorithms feels the viewer is behaving in a way it does not like, however, the painting will darken and turn away.

Mr Aziosmanoff and his colleagues said this gives the painting emotions, moods and a personality thanks to the artificial intelligence technology used to drive it.

Writing on their website, they said: 'Emotions are what causes the immediate reactions of the character.

'They are manifestations of medium and intensive affects, usually caused by something that arises in the immediate environment.

'The mood is the general mood of the character, for a specified period - from a few tens of minutes to a few days.

Public react to interactive Mona Lisa at French exhibition

The team used computer software to create a three dimensional wire frame of the Mona Lisa (shown on the left), which then allowed them to manipulate the image so that she appears to turn her head and change her facial expressions. The original Mona Lisa (shown right) hangs in the Louvre Museum in Paris

The digital Mona Lisa, or Joconde as it is called in France, uses motion sensors from video game consoles, as can be seen at the top of the image above, to detect when a viewer is looking at it, allowing it to react

'This mood will colour operation emotions, and therefore its reactions to events that arise.

'The personality of the Living Mona Lisa is itself defined by parameters determined on the classic structure of the "Big 5".

'These five aspects of personality are openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism.'

The team claim that as the 'life' of the painting evolves, these aspects of the personality will change and so the painting will react differently to different situations.