Google Art Selfie app matches your face to a piece of art

Google Arts and Culture app for iPhone and Android smartphones lets you find out if you look more like a Matisse or a Monet

Anthony Cuthbertson

Tuesday 04 September 2018 15:54 BST

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Google Arts and Culture app: How to find which famous painting you look like

Google's hit Art Selfie tool has launched outside the US, meaning people in the UK can now find out whether they look more like the Laughing Cavalier or the Girl with a Pearl Earring.

The feature comes with Google's Arts and Culture app and has been available in the US since earlier this year, allowing people to find their doppelganger among thousands of famous artworks.

"Travel through artworks and discover which ones look most like you," the app explains. "This new, experimental feature uses computer vision technology to compare your selfie with faces in 1,000s of historical artworks."

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

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1/1111 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Easter Eggs

There are a lot of Easter Eggs hidden in Chrome, and more and more are discovered each year. One of our favourites is the dinosaur game. The next time you fail to connect to the internet on Chrome, tap the spacebar. It’s also worth Googling “barrel roll”, “zerg rush”, “super mario bros” (and clicking the question mark graphic), “festivus”, “recursion”, “askew” and “atari breakout” (and then clicking Images).

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Pin tabs

If you tend to browse with a lot of tabs open at once, you can clear up the clutter by pinning the ones you’re least likely to close. Right-click them and select Pin Tab. They’ll automatically shrink and slide left.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Save battery

You can save some battery life by sacrificing performance. In Settings, scroll down to the System section and uncheck the box reading Continue running background apps when Google Chrome is closed. We wouldn’t recommend having this feature enabled all the time, but it could come in handy if you’re nowhere near a charger.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Browse faster

There are loads of Chrome Extensions available, but one of the most useful is Google’s Data Saver. It compresses the pages you visit to reduce data usage and speed up loading times.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Make multiple profiles

If you use multiple Google accounts, for work and for personal use, for instance, you can keep your bookmarks and browsing history for each account separate by creating individual profiles. Go to Settings, Manage People and Add Person. This is also handy for when you lend your computer to a friend, and you don’t want them to have access to your internet history.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Downloads

Many users would prefer it if Chrome downloaded files straight to the desktop, but by default it sends them to your Downloads folder. You can change this by going to Settings, opening the Show Advanced Settings menu, clicking Downloads and choosing your preferred destination.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Extra info

To see cookies and permissions for every site you visit, click the View Site Information symbol on the left-hand edge of the omnibar. It will also let you quickly control things like Popup and Location settings.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Task manager

You can quickly find out which pages are using up the most memory and slowing down your browsing experience by opening the burger menu, going down to More Tools and opening the Chrome Task Manager.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Calculator

When you’re online and need to do a quick sum, you don’t have to hunt down your computer calculator or whip out your phone. Just type it into the Chrome omnibar and hit Enter.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Startup

If there’s a certain set of pages you always open when you turn your computer on, you can get Chrome to open them automatically when you launch the browser. In Settings, click Set Pages in the On Startup section, and choose the ones you want.

11 hidden Google Chrome features you didn't know existed

Search Gmail from omnibar

You can search your gmail inbox directly from the omnibar by going to Settings, Manage Search Engines, scrolling to the bottom and pasting https://mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/#apps/%s into the box on the right-hand side.

People have been sharing their results on social media, though not all of the likenesses are very flattering.

Testing out the feature involves downloading the Google Arts & Culture app from either Google Play or Apple's App Store, opening it, and scrolling down to the Art Selfie section. Then it's simply a matter of taking a self-portrait on your smartphone and letting Google's technology to find your lookalike.

Google claims that despite requiring selfies to be sent through its computer servers, user privacy is not compromised.

"When you take a photo with this feature, your photo is sent to Google to find artwork that look like you," the company says. "Google won't use data from your photo for any other purpose and will only store your photo for the time it takes to search for matches."

The Google Arts & Culture app lets you find your art twin

(Google)

The Google Arts and Culture app has been downloaded more than 5 million times through the Google Play app store and is one of the most popular downloads in the Education category.

The aim of the app is to democratise art by providing access to thousands of top exhibits around the world through a smartphone.

Google Arts and Culture teamed up with over 1,200 museums, galleries and institutions in 70 countries to make the exhibits available to everyone online.

"Be your own curator by finding your favourites, creating your own collections and sharing them with friends," Google explains on the apps Google Play page.

"Travel anywhere with tours of iconic sites, famous buildings and natural wonders, on your screen or in VR. Learn something everyday."

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