A major earthquake hit the Slovenian capital Ljubljana on Easter Sunday 130 years ago. Many images chronicling the aftermath have survived, and some have now come alive thanks to the latest advances in technology.

The National and University Library has deployed artificial intelligence to add colour and animate photographs taken after the tremor that rocked the Ljubljana capital on 14 April 1895 killing 21 people and damaging a tenth of the buildings in the city so badly they had to be torn down.

The Ljubljana city authorities commissioned photographer Wilhelm Helfer to record the destruction in the streets and the people cleaning up the rubble.

The National and University Library has now digitally processed a series of almost 100 of Helfer's black-and-white photographs to turn them into colour images.

"Helfer took photographs mainly of buildings that were destined for demolition," according to Urša Kocjan, curator of the library's image collection.

The library also keeps photographs by Josip Armič, who took pictures of the earthquake-hit Ljubljana "out of his own curiosity", and those whose authors are not known, as well as other material such as postcards and painted images.

They have combined those and newspaper articles to create a video that brings this slice of history back to life.

The photos have been animated with an open source tool called DeOldify, which is used by heritage institutions.

The photos and the video are available in the national digital library dLib, along with a digital assistant that has been trained on the library's material to answer visitors' questions about the Ljubljana earthquake.

National and University Library director Jana Kolar said they wish the animated photographs to mark the library's new life in the digital space.