How to animate photos with MyHeritage Deep Nostalgia app
A new internet sensation, the MyHeritage Deep Nostalgia app lets you bring your old family photographs to life, into moving, life-like pictures.
There are times when we would like to capture within a photo a moment in motion, and not just a static pose. Using smartphones with cameras we can cut a video to do just that to create a GIF, a type of ‘moving photo’ that is basically an animated image of a specific moment captured and repeated in a loop. But digital still photos remain static in time.
Wouldn't it be great to animate those photos like the ones from the world of Harry Potter - the ones in the Daily Prophet newspaper? Well, you can with the latest AI photo app to go viral: Deep Nostalgia from genealogy site MyHeritage.
Animate photos with Deep Nostalgia app
Created by MyHeritage, an online genealogy service, Deep Nostalgia is a deep learning tool that is part of a mobile app capable of adding facial animations to old photos, bringing old portrait photos to life by adding animations such as:
- Smiles
- Nods
- Blinks
- Head tilts
The application is available on both Google Play store and Apple App store.
How to use Deep Nostalgia to animate your old photos
You can download the app on your smartphone or go to the MyHeritage official website first. If it doesn't open it's probably crashed, due to the huge increase of visitors it's having these days.
- Register with some required details, including name, email, password, among others.
- Next, upload your old photos or those of your friends that you want to turn into an animation. Click on the "Go" option.
- A little patience as it takes some time for the portal/app to convert the still photos into animated ones.
- Once the animated photo is created you can share it directly on WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Don't use Deep Nostalgia to create deepfakes: It’s illegal
While people on social media are busy creating animated photos using Deep Nostalgia, MyHeritage has warned against "using the technology to create deepfake videos of public figures or anyone else without their permission," as it constitutes a crime.
Obviously we also ran our Darwin statue through #DeepNostalgia and had immediate regrets pic.twitter.com/0h6R3fSERN
— Natural History Museum (@NHM_London) March 2, 2021
Currently, the platform can only animate one face in a photo at a time and not various in a group photo. Users have the option to crop a face from a group photo and animate it using Deep Nostalgia.
You have the option to sign up for a free account or a subscription to use Deep Nostalgia. The free account option is limited to a small number of animations. If you choose to sign up for a subscription plan, there are other animation options available.
As promised, we have one more #DeepNostalgia treat to share with you. We present ... Miss Charlotte Brontë pic.twitter.com/9QxeVR7nFN
— Brontë Parsonage Museum (@BronteParsonage) March 5, 2021