Photo Booth Videos

About

Photo Booth Videos are homemade movies recorded with a built-in webcam and Photo Booth, an image-capturing software application for Mac OS that offers a selection of visual effects and filters which can be applied in post-production. Since its release in 2005, Photo Booth users have recorded and shared video clips of themselves in which their facial features appear comically distorted as a result of the special effects.

Origin

Photo Booth was first introduced by Apple in October 2005 as a standard webcam application for all Macintosh computers with a built-in iSight camera.^[1] Although it remains unclear when or where Mac users began sharing their Photo Booth recordings online, one of the first notable instances was uploaded by YouTuber DucksWithHooves on July 10th, 2009. Titled "Pretty Girls Make Faces", the video shows a woman laughing hysterically at herself while playing around with the "warp" effect from the software (shown below, left). On November 4th, 2010, YouTuber Yazzy O’Brien uploaded an edited version of DucksWithHooves' recording without any special effects (shown below, right). Within five years, the original video gathered more than 3.9 million views and 8,200 comments.

Spread

On March 13th, 2010, YouTuber DesandNate uploaded a video titled "Why You Shouldn't Play With Photo Booth," in which he performs several different characters using different effects to warp the shape of his face (shown below). In the next four years, the video gained over 3.4 million views and 15,100 comments. On February 17th, 2011, YouTuber Thane Covert uploaded a video montage of grandparents recording themselves using Photo Booth (shown below, right).

On August 21st, 2011, YouTuber Mindy uploaded a video of an elderly couple accidentally recording themselves with web cam software (shown below). On September 22nd, YouTuber Justin Kuritzkes uploaded a video titled "Potion Seller," in which he uses warping effects to change his face while performing a dialogue between a knight and a man who sells potions (shown below, left). In the first three years, the videos gained over 11.4 million and 1.2 million views respectively.

On April 11th, 2012, YouTuber megannicolesite uploaded a Photo Booth video in which she lip syncs the 2011 pop song "What Makes You Beautiful" by One Direction, accumulating more than 11.6 million views and 31,600 comments in two years. On December 2nd, YouTuber DesandNate uploaded another Photo Booth montage featuring a variety of different characters with warped faces (shown below, right).

Photo Booth Challenge

On November 7th, 2013, YouTuber Jenna Marbles uploaded a video titled "Photo Booth Tag," in which she urged other YouTubers to themselves trying to make a friend laugh using different Photo Booth effects (shown below). In less than a year, the video gathered upwards of 4.3 million views and 18,000 comments.

On November 10th, YouTuber danisnotonfire uploaded a video in which he attempts Marbles' Photo Booth challenge with his friend Phil (shown below, left). On November 15th, YouTuber PewDiePie uploaded a Photo Booth challenge video with YouTuber CutiePieMarzie (shown below, right). In less than a year, the videos garnered over 4.7 million and 6.08 million views respectively.

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References