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Mechanical engineer Anthony Chesneau and web designer Julien Lecherbault now specialise in creating string pictures from photographs sent in to them with their company Needle. They sell them on their website for €170-€250.

Julien said: “It is a little bit of magic. People are surprised with the realism at the end.”

It took 30 hours to make their first picture, so they created software and a machine to help.

The software converts the picture into a drawing and tells the machine which way the string needs to follow. Julien and Anthony now plan to introduce colours. They will create pictures with only one colour or with several colours.

The two friends, both 31 and from Rennes, spent three years working on this project before launching it last November.

They have since exhibited their art in Brittany and Normandy.