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The little images you can slot into messages bring expression,
personalisation and an element of fun to instant messaging, and with
most platforms having some kind of feature of sort available, Google
have stepped forward to bring innovative technology to the game.
Lesser-known messaging app Google Allo has featured in some articles previously,
and this new feature is definitely worth shouting about. I'll be
honest, before coming across news of this new feature, I hadn't actually
heard of Allo, but with a little research, it looks pretty cool and
makes me question why it's not as high up on the app charts than
counterparts WhatsApp and Messenger.
The new feature brings Allo's take on personalised stickers without the
faff of making it yourself. Take a selfie, and the app does the rest
with their new feature, which they call Neural Network Generated
Illustrations. Google worked alongside artist Lamar Abrams to create a
repertoire of cartoon hairstyles, face shapes, eyes and other features
which respond to your selfie and create your very own mini-me; like
Bitmoji, but automatic.
Once your selfie is turned into an avatar, you're then free to
personalise or alter it to maintain the principle of freedom to users to
represent themselves as they wish; whether that's true to their usual
everyday-self, or an enhanced version with fun features like blue hair
or fairy wings- whatever tickles your fancy.
From an article from Google's Research Blog,
Allo's Expressions Creative Director Jennifer Daniel writes about the
development of the new feature, and how they were careful to avoid the
uncanny valley and keep cartoons still cartoon-like. She also expresses
the production team's efforts to ensure the created features were widely
representative of race, age and gender to be successful and good to use
for everyone:
"Aesthetics are defined by race, culture, and class which can lead to
creating zones of exclusion without consciously trying. As such, we
strove to create a space for a range of race, age, masculinity,
femininity, and/or androgyny. Our teams continue to evaluate the
research results to help prevent against incorporating biases while
training the system" Daniel writes.
The feature is available now for the Android version of Allo, and will be available on iOS soon.
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