Red packets or Ang Pows are given out by the Chinese as tokens of good wishes during auspicious occasions like the Lunar New Year.
Unfortunately, many Singaporeans have forgotten the true significance of the red packet, and have been taking things at face value – giving out packets of varying valuations based on how much they like someone.
We decided to parody this notion – by creating an app that helped people calculate ‘face value’, on the most superficial level, using facial-recognition techniques paired with a sorting algorithm inspired by ancient Chinese physiognomy.
In a nutshell, Huat the Face measures facial characteristics and gives you a numerical value of how much your face is worth – the better looking you are, the less cash you are worth. (Thought being: Good looking people already have it easier in life haha)
We launched the mobile site two days before the Lunar New Year without a budget, and relied on our friends to circulate the app.
It was picked up by a few influencers, and took off from there. The app was used over 24,000 times in the first 3 days of the Lunar New Year, and by the end of the festivities, it was used over 79,000 times.
Description taken from Aik Tiao’s portfolio
Microsoft Face API