“Every human is different and has different desires and looks,” Wood says.“Just because some people have enjoyed this and found it to be a positive experience doesn’t mean everyone will.” If you already like your brows, she cautions against changing them just because Choi’s filter recommends a different shape. “Some people may use this filter and believe this is the ‘right way to look’ but don’t actually want to change,” Wood says. For those people, “I would recommend steering towards what they feel is right for them and what they enjoy. Changing or enhancing our appearance is about expression of personality and if it doesn’t feel like you, don’t feel the need to conform.”
Plus, not everyone is sold on the filter’s ability to turn you into a brow-shaping pro. Suman Jalaf, a London-based “International BROW Magician” who has clients like Deepika Padukone and Sonam Kapoor feels strongly that we should leave it up to the experts to do any real-life shaping. “Brow experts create a custom brow, that’s as bespoke as you are,” Jalaf explains. “You’re in their hands with your actual face, features, skin tones, skin texture, brow hair texture — all of this matters.”
Michele Holmes, a hair and brow artist dubbed “The Eyebrow Whisperer” by the San Francisco Chronicle, feels that experts and AI filters can work together. “Filters are a really fun way to temporarily enhance your eyebrows or try a different shape and size to see if it feels like a match,” Holmes says. Once you’ve virtually found a shape you like, “I would highly recommend seeking a professional who can look at you IRL in 3D to determine the best shape for what nature gave you in the brow department.” The filters, she says, often don’t take the “muscles, hair growth, and [other] subtle differences” on each side of our faces into account. “Nobody is an exact mirror image blueprint of themselves,” Holmes says. “If you were to print one side of your face that is your favorite and copy the reverse image of that side to study, it would not be a match.”
In more extreme cases, people have run with Choi’s filter, and rather than just drawing a new brow shape, they’ve turned the trend into something more permanent, often using a dermaplaning razor to shave off part of their eyebrows where the filter indicates they should end. I was one of these misguided people, swept up in the fun and chaos. Jalaf warns against doing this: “The shaving part is a hell no for me, as you have no control over how much you remove or get carried away.” But don’t panic if you’ve already done this, the damage isn’t permanent. What does Jalaf suggest if it all goes wrong? “If too much is taken off, you throw that plastic blade thingy in the bin! And don’t touch your brows for at least 6 to 8 weeks,” she says, noting that massaging cold-pressed castor oil into your brows every night can help nourish them.