Instagram’s Guess the Gibberish creator on ‘Hey are field hers’

Christopher Gu, the creator behind the viral ‘Guess the Gibberish’ on Instagram tells us how the filter came to be.

Over a billion people have used AR filters on Instagram, Facebook, Messenger and Portal. (HT Photo/Screenshots)

You've probably used or seen the 'Guess the Gibberish' filter on Instagram lately. This filter which is available on Instagram Stories has taken social media by storm, and has everyone trying to decode the gibberish text. So what's this filter about and how did it come to be? The gibberish filter creator tells us.

But before that some quick stats on Instagram's AR filters. Instagram is home to many AR filters developed by creators using Facebook's Spark AR. In total, over 1 billion people have used these AR filters on not just Instagram but Facebook, Messenger and Portal as well. In India, the most popular AR filters on Instagram are 'Glitter', 'Moodytones', 'Golden Glitter' and 'Chromatic Pulse'.

Coming back to the gibberish filter, its creator Christopher Gu who's already made over 20 AR filters, shares about his most popular one yet.

How did the idea for this filter came up? And would it be possible in the future to create a similar filter where the user's response will also be taken?

During my quarantine, I've been watching a bunch of videos and TV shows. One of the videos I watched was a bunch of YouTubers (Jenn McAllister, Elle Mills, Luke Korns, etc.) playing a game called Incohearent. I really enjoyed the reactions from everyone in the video and I kind of wanted to play myself, so on a whim, I decided to make it an Instagram filter! I would love to create a filter that records and shows people's responses, but I'm not sure if that kind of functionality exists yet.

 

How did you come to know your gibberish filter went viral?

So, cool story! I dm'd Jenn McAllister and Elle Mills about the filter I made and how I got inspired by the video they were in, and to my surprise, they actually saw my messages and posted stories of themselves using my "guess the gibberish" filter! Soon after, other influencers and celebrities started using it, the hashtags "#guessthegibberish" and "#gibberish" racked up hundreds of thousands of views, and I started gaining followers like crazy! All in the span of one day, this was when I knew my filter had gone viral!

Are there other filters that you've created on Instagram?

There are! Since starting to learn how to make filters a couple months ago, I've made over 20, ranging from "bubble wrap", "roast me", "never have i ever", to "karaoke roulette"! I actually just recently published a "twist the tongue" filter, which prompts users to say a tongue twister 3x fast!

How easy is it for people to create AR filters for Instagram Stories?

Creating AR filters for Instagram Stories is surprisingly not too hard! Facebook provides a software called Spark AR Studio that allows anyone to create filters for Facebook and/or Instagram! Not only is Spark AR very intuitive to work with, there are also a ton of resources available, such as a facebook group of over 60k+ members, hundreds of tutorials on YouTube, and really thorough documentation!

How quick was the review process?

Currently, the review process can take anywhere from an hour to a max of 10 days! On average, my filters get reviewed in ~ 2 days. If you're lucky, it might get approved in minutes!