Opera Software will include Face Gestures in Opera 10. Opera Face Gestures enable anyone with a Webcam to control their browser moving only their face. Based on the same architecture as Opera’s Mouse Gestures, Face Gestures makes surfing the web as easy as smiling, batting an eye lash or flaring a nostril.
Opera Face Gestures grew out of a collaborative project between Opera and the Norwegian Intelligence Service (NIS) to create the world’s most advanced facial-recognition technology using only JavaScript, HTML and CSS. After more than seven years in development, Opera Face Gestures were born.
“In 2001, we introduced Mouse Gestures in Opera 5.1. At that point we knew we were on to something,” said Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera. “We already had keyboard shortcuts in the very first version of Opera, but once we introduced voice control in Opera 8 we had only one input mechanism left—the face. Opera Face Gestures represent the next frontier in browser control.”
Opera Face Gestures include more than 45 controls, from opening new tabs to restoring sessions to navigating through a Web page. Opera Face Gestures are so advanced you can compose and send an entire e-mail message through Opera’s built-in e-mail client. Even Mouse Gestures can be triggered with Opera Face Gestures. To activate Opera Face Gestures simply press the single-key shortcut F8.
Some gestures are eyebrows/heads up for scrolling up and eyebrows head down for scrolling down. Puffing up and blowing the face out zooms in, sucking-in, zooms out. Wagging of a tongue opens speed dial.
Let’s face it, this tech may also come to the opera mini browser, “Are you really smiling at me or are you just browsing on your phone?” friends may ask one day soon in the future. It definitely may raise a few eyebrows.
There are some issues however with facial and pron sites. Face Gestures is compatible with most types of facial hair and haircuts. But if your face is covered with more than 25% of facial hair, recognition errors may occur. Please note that handlebars and goatees are compatible independently but if combined recognition will decrease. At the moment soul-patches crashes the browser and it refuses to relaunch, we are looking into this problem. Bushmen beards and emo haircuts are not supported.
Users visiting Web sites that contain adult content sometimes make unconscious facial expressions. If Opera keeps opening Speed Dial and Zooming In and Out, please be aware that this not a bug. It may be useful to disable Face Gestures for a better experience. Also remember that wiping your cache is recommend after visiting untrusted websites.
For compatibility reasons Face Gestures auto-detects financial news services and disables itself. The current version of the recognition software is unable to adapt fast enough to the sudden change in the users expression map. As soon as the new version is available you will be prompted to install stimulus_package.patch.