KloneWorld, a Singapore based company, allows children to insert their faces into cartoons and movies and even allows them to create 3D printed toys of themselves as superheroes.
Kloneworld is an app that allows viewers of the popular children’s cartoon Chhota Bheem to insert a 3D avatar of themselves into a new character, by both superimposing a picture of their face onto the new character and by 3D printing customized toys. The character is named Klinja and was envisioned as a gender neutral character so both boys and girls can insert their faces.
In order to insert your 3D avatar into the popular cartoon you simply need to upload a picture to the Kloneworld website and pay about $8 for a copy of the movie with your face inserted. You can purchase multiple cartoon adventures and stories and even create custom 3D printed products with your 3D avatar starring as Klinja.
Here is an animated video about Kloneworld’s 3D printing service:
The 3D avatar generation service is very easy to use. It only took me seconds to upload a picture and have my face superimposed onto the body of a child superhero. The effect was a little creepy, to be honest, but this is most likely because my face seemed frozen with a rictus grin that made me look like some sort of madman. Although I do give Kloneworld props for making my eyes blink while I was out for a jog with my little buddy Chhota.
The 3D printed figures are nice enough, especially since the head is generated by a single photograph, and they are certainly detailed enough for a child. But this isn’t the service for you if you want a realistic 3D printed selfie of yourself. But at this point it looks like you can only get the 3D printed figures when you visit local attractions in Singapore anyway, so unless you are visiting the island it is unlikely to be an issue.
Still, it is nice to see 3D modelling and 3D printing used in products aimed at children and the 3D avatar is certainly a cute idea. I don’t know if it is going to have much crossover success in the West because the cartoon doesn’t really seem like something that would be embraced by kids in America. And Kloneworld is clearly aimed at very small children, thus I doubt older children would find much joy in seeing their face emotionlessly beat up bad guys. Although I certainly enjoyed my brief stint as a young bearded Indian superhero, so, you never quite know for sure.
