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This research (reported by Terry below) shows it is possible to predict acceptable faces. I suspect that any good orthodontist could do the same. It says nothing about art or beauty and nothing about any area of aesthetics where conformance to a norm is not the priority. It also predicts a world in which deviance may become a prized aesthetic characteristic - when the whole world has perfect teeth who then is the attractive one? best wishes from Sheffield Chris ******************** Professor Chris Rust Head of Art and Design Research Centre Sheffield Hallam University Psalter Lane, S11 8UZ, UK +44 114 225 2706 (direct) +44 114 225 2686 (research admin) [log in to unmask] www.chrisrust.net Terence Love wrote: > Hello, > Last year there was a brief debate on whether beauty (as a surrogate for > aesthetics in general) could be defined mathematically instead of requiring > artistic skill. This has strong implications for design practice - > particularly if software can simply 'maximise beauty' automatically in a > similar way to reducing red-eye. This would reduce the need for many > professional artistic or design skills to do with creating better visual > aesthetics in a competitive business environment. > > The ACM (see below) reports that researchers in Israel have developed new > software that can automatically enhance visual beauty of a face in an image > by manipulating 250 numerical characteristics of the shape of the face. > Beauty at the click of an interface icon. > > Importantly, for Design Research, it implies it is straightforward to > identify general technical processes by which the techniques of > automatically improving visual aesthetics can be applied to any designed > objects that are relatively common - and perhaps even to 'new' objects'. It > would be interesting to extend the approach to abstract objects, e.g. > entities in the realm of mathematics assessed in terms of 'elegance'. > > Thoughts? > > Terry > > === > Dr. Terence Love > Tel/Fax: +61 (0)8 9305 7629 > Mobile: 0434975 848 > [log in to unmask] > === > > ACM Technical News 5 Feb 2007-02-06 > > Israeli Researchers Promise a More Beautiful You > Israel21c (02/04/07) Kloosterman, Karen > > Computer scientists at Tel Aviv University (TAU) have developed a computer > program that can make an image of a person's face more attractive. The > program is based upon a survey of 300 men and women who were asked to rank > pictures of other people's faces on an attractiveness scale of one to seven. > These results were correlated with exact measurements and ratios of facial > features to produce an algorithm that can add desired elements of beauty to > the image of a face. The program works in just minutes, and in a test > conducted using large sample of volunteers 79 percent said the program, > Beauty Function, made the face more attractive. TAU co-researcher Daniel > Cohen-Or says, "Beauty is not in the eye of the beholder. Beauty is merely a > function of mathematical distances or ratios. And interestingly, it is > usually the average distances to features which appears to most people to be > the most beautiful." Its creators believe that Beauty Function could become > popular among plastic surgeons, or even become a "must-have" option for > cameras, "just like the red-eye function is today," said co-researcher > Tommer Leyvand. > > For fuller report see > http://www.israel21c.org/bin/en.jsp?enDispWho=Articles%5El1543&enPage=BlankP > age&enDisplay=view&enDispWhat=object&enVersion=0&enZone=Technology > > > -- ******************** Professor Chris Rust Head of Art and Design Research Centre Sheffield Hallam University Psalter Lane, S11 8UZ, UK +44 114 225 2706 (direct) +44 114 225 2686 (research admin) [log in to unmask] www.chrisrust.net