New Art Matches Your Changing Moods

An example of an "empathic painting" reflecting the perceived emotional state of the viewer, in this case, despair. Credit: University of Bath, UK.

The world may not smile when you smile or frown when you're down, but some new digital artwork will adapt itself to match your mood.

The electronic art can alter itself by changing color and brush strokes. Software recognizes eight facial features, such as the shape of the mouth and the eyebrows, through a web cam and figures out the emotional state of the viewer.

When the viewer is happy, the colors of the artwork change to bright and vibrant and the brush strokes look soft. But if the viewer is angry, the art turns dismal with aggressively applied leaden colors [Examples].

"It does all of this in real time, meaning that as the viewer’s emotions change the artwork responds accordingly," said John Collomosse from the Department of Computer Science at the University of Bath, UK.

Collomosse and colleagues created the images using rendering techniques, which gave the appearance that they were painted on canvas.

"This kind of empathic painting only needs a desk top computer and a web cam to work, so once you have the program and have calibrated it for the individual viewer, you are ready to start creating personalized art based on your mood."

The research was recently detailed at the fourth International Symposium on Non-Photorealistic Animation and Rendering (NPAR) conference, Annecy, France.

More information about the project is available here.

• DNA Art: Origami Goes Nano
• Image: Electrifying Field of Art 
• Ancient Cave Art Full of Teenage Graffiti
• Gallery: Microscopic Images As Art
• Gallery: Earth As Art