Manu McFrench, from zero to hero: impact of using a generic handwriting model for smaller datasets

Alix Chagué, Thibault Clérice, Jade Norindr, Maxime Humeau, Baudouin Davoury, Elsa Van Kote, Anaïs Mazoue, Margaux Faure, Soline Doat

Abstract: Manu McFrench is a handwritten text recognition (HTR) model dedicated to French texts from the modern and contemporary periods. It was trained using data generated through the CREMMA infrastructure and/or shared via the HTR-United catalog. We demonstrate its usefulness to reduce the costs of training such models for specific handwritings.