Dr. Seung Chul Rhee, a board-certified plastic surgeon in South Korea, has developed an online system for facial analysis named BAPA, or Balanced Angular and Proportional Analysis.
By analyzing 41 facial landmarks (28 frontal points and 13 profile points) using 10 proportional and 18 angular measurements taken from photographs, BAPA automatically and objectively calculates an attractiveness score and then classifies each face as "super-attractive," "attractive," or "average" but mercifully no lower.
The analysis is based more on facial relationships than absolute measures and is said to favor "harmony or balance" within different facial sub-units (for instance, the lower face) rather than for each individual feature (for instance, only the nose). Symmetry seems to play a major role.
Much of what is considered "beautiful" is based on previous analysis of contemporary entertainers' faces.
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Dr. Rhee prefaces his explanation of the technique by acknowledging that beauty is hard to objectify since aesthetic issues such as personal perception, changing trends, ethnic differences, and highly subjective preferences have tremendous bearing. However, he emphasizes that harmonious and balanced facial characteristics are very important to most observers and that such anatomical relationships can be measured fairly accurately.
While you can analyze your own pictures to see just how beautiful a computer program thinks you are, be careful to read the Release and Assignment section before uploading your photos that become property of the site.
APSG Comment: The fine print indicates that BAPA is intended solely for the purpose of entertainment, even though other places on the website allude to its clinical usefulness. Have fun with it if you will, but be very sure you understand that all of this quasi-scientific mumbo-jumbo is actually good for little else.
Even though a great deal of effort has gone into BAPA's development and slick implementation, as stated in the introduction, "it is impossible to determine a definitive definition of facial beauty." But then the scores provided by the program are given to the -- get this -- hundredth of a percent!
Try out the BAPA Web Face Analyzer here for free and then decide for yourself.
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