You think looks ain't nothing but a number? You are absolutely right!

We've all heard the saying, "age ain't nothing but a number"; it's all in the head and how we perceive ourselves! We know there is a direct correlation between age and looks so we can restate this as “looks ain’t nothing but a number” except for one fact, we will be quite right if we put it this way.

The relationship between age and looks is blurry these days thanks to plastic surgeons and silicone/botox, however they are not the sole responsible for this misrepresentation.

Think of any of your favorite social media app with picture editing features; Instagram, Facebook, Flickr, Snapchat and pretty much all apps with picture editing features embedded has the ability to take years off our real age by making us look younger/prettier/more handsome than we actually are thus disrupting this delicate balance between age and looks.

If you have used this “special” feature before or you plan to use it in the future, you owe Artificial Intelligence a debt of gratitude because as it turns out, it is all about algorithm and numbers.

While a lot of people frown at the oversimplification of age (read: looks) as ‘only’ a number, Artificial Intelligence has proven this to be true with proliferation of the use of image filters/editors to look anything but our age!
Seam carving and Gaussian blur are two popular processing used in such image filters.

There are several other calculations done with algorithms that affect sizes and shapes of objects; you want to look slimmer, fatter, stodgier, younger, older, prettier or uglier? There are combinations of various low level processing decided by an algorithm that make this possible. You want to reduce image noise or improve an image severely corrupted by defective pixels? Algorithms to the rescue!

So after all, looks ain’t nothing but a number/a combination of numbers!

To get introduced to the world of algorithm-based look-enhancement, check out this great video (happy viewing!)

Mozart and Beethoven at youtube? Van Gogh and Picasso uploading paint at Pinterest? Just wondering....

There is something to how popular arts such as painting and music were done before, and how nowadays painters and musicians are getting they work appreciated all around the globe currently. TV and Radio are becoming less and less famous as the time passes by, and there is nothing no one can do about it, basically because all the trends are being imposed by the online community, in almost every relevant topic and mainstream interests among the society.

Contemporary artists are understanding this trend, and actually started diverse communities, in order jump aboard the online community; and they actually succeeded amazingly. Nowadays is easy to spot really cool photographs on Tumbler, Pinterest, Flickr, Instagram; you can hear diverse independent artist on Youtube, Musicbaby, Deezer, Spotify; you can even find original paintings at this awesome website called SaatchiArt.com; where you actually buy and sell original and unique paintings from different artists. Probably, we all get the picture of this new era, and how things are gonna work out from now on. Is the artist community ready for this extreme adaptation.

Actually many sophisticated tools have been developed in past few years, trying to actually anticipate what the market actually wants and need; there is a interesting story of a company called Polyphonic, which through a specific algorithm was able to predict if a new song was going to be a popular worldwide hit; which is just fantastic, if you ask us; but is the market and the natural customer of this algorithm willing to use it? You'll find out later.

What about you, Fuego Fans? Are you musicians? Artists? Are you ready to be famous in matter of days or hours? Are you willing to be judge by the whole world? This is whats happening now, if you are famous online, you get all the good and bad attention of the community. Please think about it thoroughly and let us know on the comments section.

Cheers!