Brief:

• Perfect's makeup try-on app YouCam debuted its annual lineup of scary augmented reality (AR) face filters for Halloween, according to a company announcement. The collection has 13 looks for YouCam users to share on social media as they test styles and prepare costumes for Halloween.
• The selection includes the "Buttoned Up" look as the winner of the YouCam Halloween Costume Makeup Contest that began last month. The contest challenged makeup influencers to submit original looks for a chance to be featured in the 2019 Halloween look book.
• The filters are available in the YouCam Perfect and YouCam Makeup apps for iOS and Android. YouCam users can win a one-year premium subscription to YouCam Perfect by taking pictures with the AR filters and submitting them to the apps.

Insight:

Perfect aims to bolster its pioneering role in pairing makeup with AR effects that are popular among mobile users by revealing its Halloween looks and urging users to submit their spooky selfies in its apps.

The Halloween lineup comes as YouTube debuts similar AR makeup try-ons and Amazon adds virtual lipstick trials with L'Oréal's Modiface technology. It's not clear how many consumers buy products after experimenting with them in YouCam's Makeup and Perfect apps, or how much brand awareness the apps generate, though Perfect says its apps have been downloaded a total of 750 million times worldwide. People use YouCam Perfect to take 25 million pictures a day, and 58% of them use filters in the pictures, the company said last month, suggesting that the immersive mobile app is sticky and drums up loyalty among users.

Perfect has made online contests more central to promoting its AR content in seeking to inspire and engage fans of its apps that feature makeup looks from multiple brands. The company last month launched a photo editing contest timed with New York Fashion Week, giving users a chance to see their selfies on its Instagram account. In May, Perfect launched its YouCam Beauty Star contest that offered entrants a chance to become a beauty influencer. As with its Halloween contest, Perfect urges people to upload their pictures of real makeup looks to a microsite for a chance to have it recreated as an AR filter.

The mobile app company has expanded its virtual beauty platform to include hair and nail colors. In July, it launched YouCam for Web that lets businesses add its AR capabilities to their respective websites via a plug-in. Perfect's clientele includes brands Estée Lauder, MAC and YSL. Direct-to-consumer hair color brand Madison Reed and Jerome Russell brand Punky Colour last year partnered with the app to show off their products to mobile users. Aside from beauty brands, Perfect also partnered with more retailers and brands including Target and QVC, and introduced mobile features like livestreaming for deeper interactivity.