We know what it’s like to hover over a magnifying makeup mirror, looking at the entirety of our face on display with our pores and beauty marks magnified and fine lines more pronounced. We’re not objective creatures, so our eyes will fixate on these little details, potentially giving more weight to the things we perceive as a problem. Not only is this frustrating, but it’s virtually solutionless. It simply shows you the areas without adding ideas or providing long-term solutions on how to improve the status of your skin. We’d typically seek counsel from a dermatologist for assistance targeting things like elasticity, dull skin, or dark spots, but this can be expensive and could entail a lengthy wait for an opening at their office. Enter the AI Facial Scan. These user-friendly scans are designed to measure skin health using cameras in-store or on your cell phone, and they could just be the next big wave in the beauty industry.
Tech developers in beauty have designed artificially intelligent scanners to analyse your unique skin condition in a matter of seconds using the data fed to it with deep learning algorithms. The “AI algorithms are trained on 70,000 medical grade images to ensure precise and highly accurate skin analysis results,” Vice President of Perfect Corp, Lisa Lee, shared with Grazia. Perfect Corp is one of the companies developing this technology, which will revolutionise the beauty industry. Lee notes that the AI scan’s fast and accurate results depend on “14 unique metrics, including spots, fine lines, wrinkles, moisture,” followed by “ultra-personalised product recommendations to treat the issues identified.” It functions similarly to a dermatologist but reduces the time and costs incurred in just one visit.
Like anything else that is new, these AI Facial Scans have been met with pushback, and beauty critics are quick to mistrust the product recommendation model embedded into the skin diagnostic tool. Issues with the, sometimes, insensitive verbiage built into the rating systems and the conflict of interest between companies that adopt this technology (designed to point out flaws) while selling their products to users. Despite the dodgy dynamics, having a personalised skincare routine created for people looking for an easy way to improve the status of their skin is beneficial. Features that track progress using in-app photo diaries show how your skin rates higher over time can be invaluable to the skincare journey. And while we don’t suggest ditching the dermatologist altogether, these programs can be a useful alternative as long as users are satisfied with their progress. As time goes on, the widespread use of this technology will improve its efficacy and likely guide most of our decisions on what beauty products we’ll purchase in the future.
