This AI digital frame turns your photos into paintings – and I didn’t see it coming (aff)

Here's a creative use of AI that I really didn't see coming - a digital frame that turns your images into paintings.

It's another interesting invention by SwitchBot, a company that likes to take tech and come up with ideas you've probably never thought of before.

And it's fair to say, this is probably a gadget you never knew you needed. I certainly haven't hankered after one, but having tested one over several weeks, I'm really quite fond of it.

It uses e-ink to gently create an image which stays in the frame completely static, as if it were painted on.

The benefit of this is it takes up an incredibly small amount of energy, so the battery life is astonishing. Charge it up from a USB port on the back, and it'll trot on for a claimed two years.

There are three sizes available: 7.3-inch, 13.3-inch, and 31.5-inch. The prices, which I should probably get out of the way first, range from fairly affordable to "you're probably better off buying some actual art".

The smallest frame, which looks great on a table top, but a bit lost on a wall, costs £149.99. Then it gets quite scary quite quickly.

The medium-sized frame, which is ideal for a wall but too big for a table top, costs £349.99.

And the full-sized frame, which is arguably the best option, costs £1,499.

There's a 20% discount at the moment if you use the code MKMK20, but these are pretty pricey pictures.

There are other issues, too. for an e-ink display, the images reproduce pretty well, but they're fairly different to how you'd see them on your phone screen, which is where they begin, in the excellent SwitchBot app.

And then there's the brightness. In a well-lit room, it's not too much of a problem, but the display on the frame just isn't as bright as you'd want it to be. It might be good for battery life, but you might want to position the frame near a lamp or put a frame light above it to really enjoy it.

I'm pretty much done with downsides, though, because I actually love everything else about it.

The fact that there are no cables is a huge bonus. You mount it on your wall and nobody would need to know it's a digital frame. In fact, the only clue on the back is the USB socket, a tiny button, and a little charging LED.

In the app, you've got a world of fun at your fingertips. SwitchBot will give you a huge selection of images to thumb through, and they're all pretty arty, but you can easily upload your own. It lets you create a small album, and you can load these up as a slideshow, or just dip in every now and again to change the picture.

It supports landscape and portrait formats, but do bear in mind you'll have to change the frame's orientation to suit, so only one slideshow at a time, and there's a few adjustments you can make to the picture from within the album.

And then there's the AI element. SwitchBot's app will let you create an image from scratch, as every generative system can do, or you can import one from your favourite AI system, or you can upload an image and get SwitchBot to turn it into a wide variety of styles, from oil paintings to weird cartoons.

In reality, you'll probably settle on an image you like and leave it on the display, once you're bored of all the AI trickery. And that's fine, it'll be on there for many months before you need to charge it.

But changing the image regularly, despite taking up a bit more juice from the battery, is very easy. It takes a few seconds to load, and the screen goes quite weird in the process, but it's very simple.

I really wish SwitchBot could make this technology a bit cheaper, because every home should have one or more of these frames. And it would make the resolution and brightness shortcomings feel a bit more palatable.

But that's not a barrier to everyone, and if you can afford one of these fabulous frames, you're going to absolutely love it.