With two-thirds of the U.S. carrying a camera around in their pockets and roughly a trillion photos shot every year, it’s a pretty safe assumption that there’s a lot of repeats out there, but the latest version of PicsArt is using artificial intelligence to show users just how unique — or boring — their shot is.
Released on the App Store on Tuesday and rolling out to Android phones later this week, the latest version of PicsArt includes a Similar Images feature. After snapping a photo, users can click on the arrow underneath to see similar shots from other users. PicsArt says “similar” could mean a number of different things, from the same subject to a similar color scheme.
Along with helping users to find inspiration for their photos — or perhaps helping photographers find a new angle — the feature is a significant improvement for using the PicsArt community to create graphics. Users looking to merge multiple photos for a double exposure or creative effects can use the similar feature to find an image tagged #FreeToEdit that they can incorporate in their own work.
The latest version uses artificial intelligence to search through the millions of images in the PicsArt database, pulling them together in one place for users to view. With the update, users can also choose to view photos by the most recent or the most relevant.
Of course, the app won’t show users how many people took that same photo with their native camera app, but the ability to instantly see what other photographers shot of a similar place, subject, or scene (or what other graphic artists created) is a useful concept.
PicsArt is a popular photography app, with 75 million monthly active users. It’s a bit different from other free photo apps out there because it allows users to combine graphics and photography, for example, as well as hand drawing on images or the addition of predesigned graphics. And now it’s adding the Similar Image search as another standout factor.
