Have you ever wanted to know what you’d look like as a cartoon character? Well consider your wish granted with this new app called Toonstar. The app allows users to create and customize their own toon character and animate it using their facial expressions. The user created toons are then available to be shared on different places such as Facebook Live, YouTube Live, and even Musical.ly. It’s not a one sided thing, since viewers can also interact by dropping objects into the streamer’s live feed.
Source: Facebook, Toonstar
The company who created the app was founded by John Attanasio and Luisa Huang. They were executives at Warner Bros, an affiliate of Cartoon Network. Their aim was to create a “Cartoon Network” that was ultimately different from the old one. Attanasio’s concept was a “network” that’s mobile and interactive. Now, people are wondering how different it is from Apple’s new animojis that were released last month. Toonstar is focused more on “entertainment” rather than “communication”.
Animojis. Source: TheVerge
The technology that uses facial recognition is also not new at all. This concept however gain massive popularity due to the ever-famous “selfie culture” that’s been going on.
Toonstar has just let go of its training-wheels and has finally gotten out of beta. During that phase though, the app has garnered itself around 20,000 users. The videos created by these users have taken the internet by storm and have been viewed around 50 million times. The company has also partnered itself with Skybound Entertainment, giving way to Skybound comics being translated into Toonstar shows. Skybound North CEO Catherine Winder said in the announcement, “We’re excited to partner with Toonstar because we believe cartoon livestreaming has many unique advantages from both a consumer and production perspective.”
Source: Hulu
Attanasio’s hopes for Toonstar are not that of just being another channel for all things animated. He hopes that it might, one day, be a source of intellectual property, that of the likes of Rick and Morty and Bojack Horseman. While that may be leagues away from happening, or sooner, for now we’re able to enjoy the face tracking, toon creating app called Toonstar.
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