New Delhi: Snapchat is preparing to further expand into generative AI features after previously unveiling its AI-powered chatbot My AI, which can now respond with a Snap back instead of simply text. The firm will once again experiment with AI images with its next generative AI feature called “Dreams,” but soon, those images may contain you and your friends in imaginative backgrounds.
According to findings from app researcher and developer Steve Moser, the company has been working on capabilities that allow Snapchat users to take or upload selfies that will enable the program to generate fresh pictures of you in situations you might envision. This sounds similar to what is already available in other AI photo apps on the App Store.
As TikTok users realised they could upload their selfies in order to receive professional-looking headshots for LinkedIn without having to pay for a pro photo shoot, one in particular — an app called Remini — went viral last month.
Snapchat is not likely interested in boring headshots, though.
Instead, it envisions Dreams as a means to use AI-generated selfies to put pictures of you in “fantastical places and scenarios,” according to Moser’s research. Like other AI selfie apps, Snapchat would require clear selfies to work with — not ones with other people in them or ones where your features are obscured. The software will advise users that having a variety of angles, expressions, and lighting conditions will also produce better AI photographs.
Along with letting you enter these AI “Dreams,” the firm is also working on a feature called Dreams with Friends, where users can authorise their friends to create these AI “dream” images involving them, as Moser discovered.
References to purchasing Dream Packs found in Snapchat’s app also suggest this may be a monetisable feature at some point.
Alessandro Paluzzi, a reverse engineer, initially discovered Dreams earlier this spring. He said the feature would let users place their likeness into realms powered by generative AI. He found that the new feature was given a prominent placement in Snapchat’s app, right between the Camera Roll and Stories.
The recent developments around Dreams with Friends and the Dream Packs indicate Snapchat is currently moving forward with the feature.
Snapchat refused to comment on its plans for Dreams.