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Deep Nostalgia™ Goes Viral! 

  • By Esther
February 28, 2021
Deep Nostalgia™ Goes Viral! 

Just three days ago, we announced the release of Deep Nostalgia™: a groundbreaking new feature that allows you to animate the faces of your loved ones in still photos. This feature truly takes “bring your old family photos to life” to a whole new level — and it’s gone a new level of viral in turn!

Over 1 million photos were animated in the first 48 hours alone. Today we expect to pass the 3 million milestone. Users have responded with wonder and emotion: some were awed to see ancestors they’d never met — some from over 100 years ago — move, blink, and smile, while others were moved to tears witnessing their lost loved ones in motion after so many years with only still photos to remember them by.

“It makes me so happy to see him smile again,” one user said after animating a photo of her husband, who died 4 years earlier. “It’s as if they are looking at you and your surroundings and seeing how much things have changed,” said another user. Reporter Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez commented that the feature gave him a chance to see his late father’s face move again after he lost the only videotape he had of him years ago.

“Forget iPhones and self-driving cars,” one commenter said in response to a Deep Nostalgia™ animation. “This is the moment we officially started living in the future!”

Deep Nostalgia™ even made a splash in the international media: it was featured in Financial Times, USA Today, and the BBC among others.

Read on to see what everyone is saying about Deep Nostalgia™!

Facebook

Twitter

https://twitter.com/sosonkyrie/status/1365127850001588231


Translation: The new animate feature #DeepNostalgia of @MyHeritage is amazing: here is the result with an old passport photo of my paternal grandmother … I have goosebumps!

https://twitter.com/Pv/status/1365047460926615553

https://twitter.com/pedigreetales/status/1365042664664662018

https://twitter.com/megsgeni/status/1365154296543784965

Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzaWE1JL0v/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL0mXlsh7RY/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL0xgy6pc8V/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL1BhXTK29p/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL0ZjoEA-b8/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL0Hlnfl91r/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLz8ZC3DhPo/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLz8WMHsoa9/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzc22FjbmX/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzhUacHKC9/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzt_bsFpxH/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL1RUFCLmp_/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL1Ofx0JhUj/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL1OPdjINSl/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CL1NWTMIZet/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzDnMgAaxG/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzP5x6BeV9/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLzSjbWJMmr/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLy7_quFVVf/

Users get creative with historical portraits

Some users got creative with Deep Nostalgia™ and used it on portraits and statues of historical figures.

Van Gogh’s self-portrait:

Egyptian queen Nefertiti:

King Tut:

Julius Caesar:

https://twitter.com/marcomeneghello/status/1365418891753701376

King George III of England and family:

Albert Einstein:

Queen Elizabeth, William Shakespeare, Jesus, the Girl with the Pearl Earring, and other subjects of historical photos:

Abraham Lincoln:

The Beatles:

Rosalind Franklin, English chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA, RNA, viruses, coal, and graphite:

Seán Mac Diarmada, 1916. A  portrait of one of the leaders of The Easter Rising who was executed in Kilmainham Gaol on the 12th of May 1916 aged 33.

Edgar Allen Poe:

Media

Brittany Vincent writes for PC Mag: “The results are startlingly lifelike, as we see people moving their heads around, blinking, and even slightly changing expressions. The AI-powered results can be arresting. Seeing a loved one’s face speaking looking at you once more, smiling and emoting, is an emotional experience. So is seeing a long-lost ancestor you didn’t even know you were related to.”

GIZMODO claims it’s another fascinating application of AI and deep learning that feels straight out of science fiction.

Tony Tran writes for The Byte: “While it’s easy to poke fun at this tool, it is undeniably a fascinating and compelling application of AI — not to mention, it can allow many people to reconnect to their long-passed loved ones through technology, which is always fantastic.”

Natasha Lomas writes for TechCrunch: “The Black Mirror-style pull of seeing long-lost relatives — or famous people from another era — brought to a synthetic approximation of life, eyes swivelling, faces tilting as if they’re wondering why they’re stuck inside this useless digital photo frame, has led to an inexorable stream of social shares since it was unveiled yesterday at a family history conference…”

Yahoo News, The Next Web, The Economic Times, Financial Times, USA Today, and Gadgets 360 also reported on the release of the feature.

Genealogy Bloggers & Podcasters

Chris Paton from Scottish GENES put it in blunt terms, as only a Scottish genealogist could: ”Clears throat: Ho-ly sh** balls with little animated bells on…!!!!” he wrote. “MyHeritage evolved its toolkit from the realms of genealogy into digital sorcery! I genuinely don’t know whether to fetch a priest to yell ‘The power of Christ compels you’ at it, or to just drop everything immediately and play with this new toy for the rest of the month…! It really takes a lot to impress me, but I’m properly impressed with this.”

Roberta Estes of DNA Explained writes: “For one of my friends who only has photos of their parents and grandparents, and never knew them, this technology has been a gift of the highest magnitude… This technology is the only way I’ll ever “see” my mother move as a child. I want to hug her. She looks so much like my daughter about the same age. The enhancement technology itself is amazing, even without animation… Their technology has improved dramatically from the first versions, just a few months ago. This picture of my mother during her show business years is stunning.”

Amy Johnson Crow, host of the Generations Cafe podcast, pointed out how this tool can engage the younger generations: “If you’ve been trying to get younger people or non-genealogists interested in your genealogy or family history, it’s things like this that can spark an interest,” she wrote. “Thanks, MyHeritage, for giving us another tool to help break the ice!”

Deep Nostalgia™ also got a shout-out on Who Do You Think You Are Magazine, Family History Hound, and The Legal Genealogist.

Many, many thanks to all of you for sharing your videos and telling your friends about this incredible new feature. Keep ‘em coming!

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Comments

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  • Dawn corner

    March 4, 2021

    Yes I would love to do this for a pic of my late mum

  • Tammy

    March 5, 2021

    Can’t wait to try it

  • Mobin

    March 5, 2021

    Good