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Show HN: AI Generated (Not-Real) User Avatar Images for Development Needs

by timz on 2/17/24, 10:20 AM with 43 comments

Hello,

There are many services that return fake avatar images, but it can be hard to get consistent names and faces.

In this service ChatGPT was used to generate a list of users with various characteristics and Dall-E to generate their avatars, based on those.

You can get a random avatar image like so: https://avatars.tzador.com/face

Or request a specific size, like so: https://avatars.tzador.com/face?size=250

You can ask for specific gender, like so: https://avatars.tzador.com/face?gender=female

Also you can pin point with id param to get back always the same image: https://avatars.tzador.com/face?gender=female&id=0987654321

If you need a list of fake users with their names, usernames and avatars, you can get it in JSON here. https://avatars.tzador.com/faces

Hope it helps someone, runs on CloudFlare, so should be fast, built using SvelteKit.

  • by romanhn on 2/17/24, 1:57 PM

    This is neat, but it bugs me that it generates email addresses with real providers (Gmail, Outlook, etc). This can lead to accidental emails to real people during testing. I would recommend using @example.com for all emails.

  • by tylerrobinson on 2/17/24, 12:51 PM

    It would be refreshing to see a version of this where the avatars actually look like plausible users and not models/dolls/uncanny robots. Backgrounds, less attractive faces, and different poses would help. Most of the time avatars come from candid snapshots.

  • by pimlottc on 2/17/24, 7:14 PM

    When are real user-generated avatars ever consistent? What kind of artificial visual goal are you chasing with this? Or is it just to make your pitch deck look pretty?

    This feels like another small step toward making the tech world a more visually bland and uniform space [0].

    0: https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-...

  • by Brajeshwar on 2/17/24, 12:57 PM

    Once upon a time there was a service for avatars and people used to contribute their real avatars (pictures of faces). I contributed mine and it used to pop up at random apps, websites, and such.

  • by snet0 on 2/17/24, 12:09 PM

    Minor spelling issue:

    > You can mix and match the above paramers as needed.

    Should be "parameters", of course.

    I'm literally building a tiny webapp for myself and a few others, this'll come in handy!

    Just out of interest, would you consider describing the prompt(s) you used for this? I've barely dabbled in ChatGPT for anything like this. Did you use one of those wrapper-like services to ensure the data-out was of the appropriate format?

  • by hasbot on 2/17/24, 1:55 PM

    The age parameter should accept more granularity for 50+. There is a huge difference between 50-59, 60-69, 70-79, and 80+.

  • by Gare on 2/17/24, 12:26 PM

    I cannot quite put it into words, but something looks eerily uncanny about them.

  • by sailorganymede on 2/17/24, 12:53 PM

    Honestly, when it comes Avatars for my development needs, I just use Emojis. It’s just really easy to set up compared to getting anything more complicated.

  • by xdennis on 2/17/24, 7:53 PM

    If you use this and refresh they all look the same. https://avatars.tzador.com/face?gender=male&ethnicity=white&...

  • by WesolyKubeczek on 2/17/24, 7:53 PM

    The images are all overly handsome faces. Can it be dialed to more ugly and less symmetric mugs, like those you are actually likely to see in real life?

  • by wouldbecouldbe on 2/17/24, 1:32 PM

    Would default to a bit warmer styles. Looks very much like a modern art portrait style where no one is allowed to smile

  • by mberning on 2/17/24, 7:45 PM

    Where are all the fat and ugly people.