John G. Breslin

John Breslin (born 1973 in Dublin, Ireland) is an Irish engineer and full professor at the National University of Ireland Galway. He is co-founder of the Irish websites boards.ie and adverts.ie. He co-authored the Irish bestselling book Old Ireland in Colour in 2020 and Old Ireland in Colour 2 in 2021. He is from Fanore, County Clare (in the Burren) and lives near Oughterard, County Galway (in Connemara).

In 2019, Breslin set up the Old Ireland in Colour project, which uses a combination of artificial intelligence techniques (such as DeOldify) and human artistry to colourise and restore historical photographs of Ireland and Irish people from the 19th and 20th centuries. An Old Ireland in Colour book with some of these photographs, featuring captions written by historian Sarah-Anne Buckley, was published by Merrion Press in October 2020. Breslin spoke to Ryan Tubridy about the book on The Late Late Show on 20 November 2020. Old Ireland in Colour was the number one bestselling book in Ireland from 16-29 November 2020 and from 7-20 December 2020 according to Nielsen BookScan. It was also the official Christmas number one for 2020 according to Nielsen BookScan. It also won Best Irish-Published Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards 2020.