Working Out What The Average Face In A Movie Looks Like

Working out what the average face in a movie looks like seems like an impossible task, but not when you involve the processing power of modern computers. In a new project called Portrait from Shinseungback Kimyonghun, a Seoul-based art collective who previously went face-spotting in the clouds, they use facial recognition software to look for faces and then generate average portraits from popular movies.

The software detects a face every 24 frames and then at the end of the film it generates an average from all the faces it finds. "The composite image reflects the centric figure(s) and the visual mood of a movie." they say.

The faces they create have a painterly quality to them along with an uncanny creepiness, as a haunting, ghostly amalgamation of the star of the movie is filtered through a blurry haze of all the other actors that appear on screen.

The video above shows the process of generating an average portrait from the film Avatar and below are some other portraits generated from different films. 

Black Swan

Kill BIll: Vol 1


Taxi Driver

The Bourne Identity

The Matrix


Images courtesy of Shinseungback Kimyonghun