Today I played around with Ghost Selfie, an ARKit AR app that you can use to spawn live action ghosts. The app comes with 4 unique ghosts. The ghosts look like people from the 20s. I have to admit that they look a bit scary, especially when they look at you straight into their eyes.
I have quite a few problems this app. First of all, I need to download each ghost individually in order to deploy it in my room. Second, the app crashed several times. I think the ghosts are an image sequence made using semi-transparent PNG image files and they might be heavy, file size wise. The developer probably made it like that so you won’t have to download a heavy app right from the start. I have no idea why the crashes, but it was annoying.
Leaving those issues aside. The ghost looks realistic, these are not 3D models, more like a video and those are real people in there. The whole idea behind this app is that you can take a selfie with a ghost and share it with friends.
You can use either the rear or front camera to take a picture. There is a dedicated camera button so you can take a shot without the UI in the picture. When using the front selfie camera, you have a lock button which you can use to lock the ghost image in place and then compose the photo to your liking.
I took some pictures of the ghosts with my cat. Usually, cats feel the presence of ghosts in the area, but not my cat. It just goes do his own things, but the pictures turned out nice.
There is really anything out of the ordinary to report here. You don’t really need a surface to spawn the ghost, you can just put them in the air or wherever you want. Ghost Selfie app won’t even ask you to scan a surface.
It would be nice to have the ghosts make creepy sounds and record a video as well. The ghosts are animated, so it’s waste just having the option to take a picture.
It’s cute app to have some selfie fun for a few minutes, but nothing more. Who knows, maybe one of your friends will fall for it 🙂