Beauty retailer Ulta Beauty has integrated Nvidia's StyleGAN2 generative AI model (genAI) to launch GLAMlab Hair Try, a new service that lets customers virtually try on hairstyles and colours.

Available on the Ulta Beauty service and mobile app, GLAMlab Hair Try allows customers who are undecided about new hairstyles to virtually try out new styles before purchasing hairstyling devices or hair colouring products.

To try the experience, users can upload their selfies on the Ulta Beauty AI app or website and view near-instant, highly realistic previews of desired hairstyles. Users can also use photos of models to experiment with different hair colours and styles.

To develop the new tool, the team used StyleGAN2, a style-based neural network architecture for adversarial generative networks, also known as GANs. StyleGAN2, developed by Nvidia Research, uses transfer learning to generate infinite images in a variety of styles.

The source code was available for experimentation and was a perfect fit for the application, explained Juan Cardelino, director of the computer vision and digital innovation department at Ulta Beauty.

“For our hairstyle try-on use case, we had to license the model for commercial use, retrain it and put guardrails around it to ensure the AI was only modifying pixels related to hair, not distorting any feature of the user’s face,” he added.

The hairstyle and colour trial service relies on Nvidia's Tensor Core GPUs in the cloud to perform artificial intelligence inference, which takes about five seconds to calculate the first style and about one second for subsequent styles.

According to data from the company, which has more than 1400 shops across the US, people who use the virtual tool are more likely to purchase a product than those who do not.

“Shoppers need to try out hair and makeup styles before they purchase,” said Cardellino. “As one of the first cosmetics companies to integrate makeup testers in stores, offering try-ons is part of Ulta Beauty’s DNA, whether in physical or digital retail environments.”

The company now plans to incorporate virtual trials for other hair categories, such as wigs, and is exploring how virtual hairstyle trials could be linked to in-store styling services.

“Stylists could use the tool to show our guests how certain hairstyles will look on them, giving them more confidence to try new looks,” he added.

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