Ink Restorer: Virtual Restoration of Ancient Chinese Paintings Inheriting Traditional Restoration Processes

The restoration of ancient Chinese paintings plays an essential role in protection and inheritance of Asian culture. A traditional restoration process consists of four stages: Xi (washing), Jie (separating), Bu (mending), and Quan (completing). However, it is difficult for the public to experience this process due to high professional requirement and time consumption. We conduct a questionnaire survey and interview experts in our formative study. The questionnaire result shows the public express strong interest in virtual restoration. Experts believe virtual restoration is an experience valuable for the public. We introduce Ink-Restorer, a tool designed for experiencing virtual restoration for ancient paintings. Its design follows the traditional restoration process, and it adopts image segmentation and generation techniques to simplify detailed restoration for users. We recruit 60 users to evaluate Ink-Restorer and invite experts to evaluate restoration results. Ink-Restorer significantly improves user experience, cultural understanding, and restoration quality.