Samsung unveils upgraded digital ideograms with 'AR Emoji'

By Park Sae-jin Posted : February 28, 2018, 15:49 Updated : February 28, 2018, 15:49

Samsung AR Emoji demonstration [Aju News YouTube channel]
 


SEOUL, Feb. 28 (Aju News) -- Samsung Electronics, the world's top smartphone maker, challenged its arch rival, Apple, in digital ideograms used in PC and smartphone messenger software by introducing its own emoji software which digitalizes the face of users into 3D characters.

The history of emojis goes way back to the 1990s. The term originated from Japanese mobile phone users who used cute ideograms such as a smiling face and a heart to express emotions in text messages. Now, emojis are used widely in smartphone messenger apps and evolved into character animations.

This week Samsung introduced AR Emoji, an ideographic feature using the augmented reality (AR) feature of its new flagship smartphone Galaxy S9 at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Spain. The AR Emoji feature in S9 scans the face of users and creates a 3D animated clone.

The South Korean tech giant highlighted S9's visual communicating ability as one of its key features. Samsung said that with AR Emoji, people can communicate with each other on video calls using their own 3D characters or they can use personalized emojis on smartphone instant messaging apps.

"AR Emoji is very easy to use and fun," Lee Jong-won, a 36-year-old financial analyst in Seoul, told Aju News after having his hands on S9 at a Samsung store in Seoul to test the emoji feature. "It was fun to send voice messages using my personalized character."
 

Apple's Animoji demonstration [Apple YouTube channel]


Samsung is not the first to bring animated 3D character emojis to the market where most of the ideograms were drawn in simple illustrations. Apple introduced Animoji in September 2017, but users' characters were recreated as animals such as a puppy or a unicorn. Unlike AR Emoji, Apple's digital ideograms are only sharable between iPhone users.

AR Emoji provides detailed 3D clones and can customize avatars by changing skin colors, putting on different clothes and adding glasses and other accessories. Animoji provides a limited selection of avatars but its animalized emojis can mimic facial expressions very accurately in real time.

Consumers may think that both emoji features can be very boring after a few laughs. "It was very fun at the beginning but I don't think it will last for a long time," Lee said, adding it is too much a hassle.

Kim Hong-min, a 37-year-old iPhone X user, agreed, "The (Animoji) feature gave my family something to laugh our heads off for few days, but I don't use it anymore."
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