DODA: A Database of Datasets for Aesthetics Research

2026-07-30

AI Summary

This work addresses the lack of a unified, open platform for retrieving aesthetic image datasets—a gap that hinders efficient discovery, comparison, and reuse in empirical and computational aesthetics research. To bridge this gap, we present DODA, a web application that integrates standardized metadata and precomputed quantitative image attributes from major aesthetic image datasets. DODA enables visual exploration and multidimensional filtering, offering unified cross-dataset management and streamlined querying. By significantly reducing the costs of data acquisition and evaluation, and embracing open science principles, the platform fosters interdisciplinary collaboration, enhances data reusability, and advances reproducibility and transparency in aesthetic research.

Abstract

With rapid growth in the fields of empirical and computational aesthetics we have seen a vast increase in large image datasets annotated for aesthetics. As the image databases differ widely in many respects (e.g., different standards for annotation), it can be tedious to find the dataset that fits one's research needs best. The absence of a centralized open-science search system causes additional problems. Currently, researchers typically share dataset links in papers or on diverse platforms like OSF, GitHub or Dropbox. Manually searching for details like image quality and content often requires downloading all datasets. Therefore, we present the Database Of Datasets for Aesthetics (DODA), an intuitive Web application in which researchers can browse all important datasets for aesthetics research. DODA provides general information about these datasets (size, resolution, type of annotation, number of annotators, etc.) and for many of them also precomputed quantitative image properties. We discuss relevant criteria for selecting a suitable dataset with DODA and illustrate the benefits of reusing datasets. Our approach facilitates collaboration across the fields of empirical and computational aesthetics. Keywords: empirical aesthetics, computational aesthetics, machine learning, image annotation, quantitative image properties, Open Science

Problem

• empirical aesthetics
• computational aesthetics
• image annotation
• Open Science
• dataset discovery

Innovation

• empirical aesthetics
• computational aesthetics
• image annotation
• quantitative image properties
• Open Science