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IBM’s The Cognitive Photobooth from Justin Au on Vimeo.

Back in April 2017, IBM hosted an “Art with Watson” exhibit in New York City, featuring a photobooth powered by the eponymous AI that would create a data visualization of the user’s personality in the form of a portrait. With IBM being a large company, I’m surprised that this is the first time I’m seeing this project, but there’s something charming and admirable about creating a warm, human experience with artificial intelligence.

The photobooth asks questions such as the user’s favorite artist or to tell them about their childhood friend, then using text-to-speech and tone analyzers, figures out the user’s personality traits to then be integrated into their portrait. While the personality analysis is entirely up to the AI, the portraits do bear the mark of their creators – icons representing each traits are premade, it’s the algorithm that determines where to place them, in what quantity, and at what size.

Usually personality tests feel somewhat arbitrary, requiring to choose between bubbles that say “Agree” or “Somewhat Agree,” but IBM’s Cognitive Photobooth seems to encourage its users to speak freely on topics that one wouldn’t expect a computer to understand, and it’s admirable to see that human element being worked into technology for an experience that’s not only wonderful, but welcoming.

Check out the project on Behance.

Shots of IBM’s Cognitive Photobooth