Toronto-based augmented reality platform developer ModiFace Inc. has released E-Commerce 2.0, a browser-based modification that allows users shopping for beauty products to try on lipstick or eyeshadow while browsing their favourite retailer’s website.
To use the feature, all users need do is look into their webcam or mobile phone camera while browsing a compatible website and ModiFace’s facial tracking technology will instantly map their features and render makeup onto their faces in three dimensions, so that as they watch themselves move around on-screen, they appear to be wearing the colours of their choosing.
So far, the program has been integrated into the Virtual Artist website of French cosmetics chain Sephora, and will be added to several partner websites over the next few months, ModiFace said in a statement, though it did not specify which ones.
The original E-Commerce tool, which allows users to modify photographs, was released in November 2014 and now powers more than 150 website and mobile apps for beauty brands such as Allergan, L’Oreal, Unilever, and Yves Rocher, in addition to Sephora. According to ModiFace, the apps have been downloaded nearly 60 million times.
“AR on product pages can boost conversions, but it needs to be done right, it needs to be realistic, and it needs to be extremely simple,” ModiFace founder and CEO Parham Aarabi told ITBusiness.ca.