Snapchat is offering experimental augmented reality and generative AI tools through its new Lens Studio iOS app and web tool. According to the company, “you can generate your own AI effects, add your dancing Bitmoji to the fun, and express yourself with Lenses that reflect your mood or an inside joke.” The app responds to text prompts, producing filters that can be published to Snapchat. Snap previously offered generative AI capabilities only to professional creators as part of its Lens Studio. The company has also launched an app that lets users read and reply to messages using their Apple Watch. For professional developers, Snap’s Lens Studio has added tools to build Bitmoji games.

“These are experimental new tools that make it easier than ever to create, publish, and play with Snapchat Lenses made by you,” Snap explains in a blog post about the commercially available app.

“While the new iOS app and web version aren’t nearly as powerful” as the professional developer tool, they offer “a wide range of face-altering and body-morphing effects thanks to generative AI,” Engadget writes, noting that Snap was an early mover in the space, having “been experimenting with generative AI-powered augmented reality lenses in its app for the last couple years.”

Snap says its Lens Studio desktop application “remains the primary tool for professional developers and teams across Snapchat, partner mobile apps and websites, and Spectacles.”

The new public-facing app, which interoperates with some simple editing tools, is designed for “all skill levels,” according to Snap. Users can download the iOS app at the Apple App Store or interact online at lensstudio.snapchat.com.

An early look at the Lens Studio iOS app left Engadget “pleasantly surprised,” reporting the AI-powered tools transform “face, body and background via detailed text prompts.” Snapchat-supplied prompt suggestions help people get started and there are also customizable templates.

Some of the generative AI effects “can take up to 20 minutes to render,” notes Engadget. Users “can also make simpler face-altering filters that don’t rely as heavily on AI but take advantage of popular Snapchat effects like face cutouts or Bitmoji animations.”

The Apple Watch app allows users to “preview incoming messages on your wrist (functionality that already existed if you chose to mirror notifications from your iPhone) and reply using the wearable’s tiny keyboard” or by dictating the response, reports The Verge.

TechCrunch provides details on the new game Lenses development options built into Lens Studio 5.10, including “a turn-based system to enable back-and-forth gameplay” and a “customizable Character Controller that supports different gameplay styles, including third-person, first-person, side-scroller, and top-down perspectives.”