[crazygringo]

This is super, super cool.

However, I also observe that it's not very good at creating emoji that are legible at, well, emoji (body text) size.

Emoji and icon creation generally isn't as straightforward as you'd think -- you need to essentially create a series of clear shapes that are intelligible at body text size (32x32 pixels at retina, or even smaller), and then add texture and smaller details in a way that pops at higher resolutions, but "disappears" when downscaled.

I wonder if there's a pipeline that could implement that today. E.g. training on emoji at 32x32 resolution to generate those, and then some kind of intelligent upscaling algorithm also trained on low- and high-res emoji that is able to insert appropriate texture and details according to the emoji description.

I love the idea that in the not-too-distant future people will just be dictating their desired emoji, they'll save and reuse the ones they love from their friends, and we'll get yearly most-popular-new-emoji lists that reveal the national/worldly mood/zeitgeists...