Apple's FaceLit: A breakthrough in photorealistic 3D face generation and lighting consistency

Apple has recently released a paper entitled "FaceLit: Neural 3D Relightable Faces," which outlines a new method for multi-perspective illumination of both real and generated faces.

The paper introduces a generative framework called FaceLit, which is capable of generating a 3D face that can be rendered at various user-defined lighting conditions and views. The model learns to generate shape and material properties of a face that, when rendered according to the natural statistics of pose and illumination, produce photorealistic face images with multiview 3D and illumination consistency.

What's more interesting is the speculation and discussion that has ensued on Twitter about what the development of FaceLit could potentially mean for Apple. Some users are suggesting that this development could be related to a new photo feature for the iPhone, while others are speculating that this could be a warm-up for Apple's entry into the world of augmented and virtual reality.