A new trend on the internet has people turning their self-portraits into historical figures, avatars and hyper-stylized images.

AI-generated apps took social media by the storm. By simply scrolling through Instagram or Facebook, one will find selfies of his friends or people he follows suddenly transformed into works of art – all by downloading an app.

Two AI art generators dominate everyone’s Instagram feeds. The first is called Lensa, a photo-editing app that takes your selfies and turns them into what Lensa calls “magical avatars.” The app was launched in 2018 by Prisma Labs, but gained renewed interest this month following the launch of its avatar tool. Now, Lensa has become the most downloaded app in the photo and video category of the Apple Store, despite high fees.

The second AI app that has become its own TikTok trend is AI Time Machine from genealogy company MyHeritage. This image generator allows users to upload their photos to see how they would look in the style of certain historical periods, such as a 1920s flapper, a viking or a hippie.

AI Time Machine available for free on MyHeritage website and free download from App store. Ever since people started posting their AI Time Machine results on TikTok, the hashtag #aitimemachine now has over 37 million views on the platform, with more than 44 million images generated over the past month.

How do you use AI applications?

To use Lensa, first download the app from the App store Where google play. Although the app is free to download, the photo editing tool requires users to sign up for a subscription, starting at $40 per year. The app will also ask you to pay an additional $3.99 just to use the AI ​​generator tool. However, the app offers a seven-day free trial, so be sure to cancel your subscription before you’re charged an annual fee.

Next, Lensa asks users to upload 10-20 photos of themselves with a variety of backgrounds, angles, and facial expressions to get the best results. Once the selfies are uploaded, Lensa creates 50 avatars (or more, for an additional fee) in 10 categories, each containing five different images. The categories are iridescent, light, elegant, animated, cosmic, fantastic, kawaii, pop, concentrated and fairy.

Meanwhile, MyHeritage’s AI Time Machine asks users to upload between ten and 25 different photos of themselves, ranging from full body to close-ups. Start by clicking “Try Now” and once the photos are uploaded, users will be prompted to enter a name and select a gender. Image processing typically takes between 30 minutes and two hours, but users who register or log in will receive an email when they are ready.

How does the AI ​​app work?

Lensa and AI Time Machine both use text-to-image conversion artificial intelligence model released in 2022 known as Stable Diffusion – which has been accused of stealing artwork from real artists, according to The edge.

What are the risks ?

With any AI software, there are always concerns about how companies collect data. While Lensa privacy policy indicates that the application “do[es] not to use the photos you provide… for any reason other than to apply different filters or stylized effects to them”, that is Terms of use declares that those who use Lensa grant the company “a perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, fully paid-for, transferable, sublicensable license to use, reproduce, modify, distribute, create derivative works of your content user, without any additional compensation.