Scare Your Friends With This ‘Smile’ Inspired Snap Lens

Smile is a new Paramount Pictures film that has critics raving, calling it “terrifying” and “scary as hell.” In order to prepare for this horrifying film, a new face mapping SMILE lens is available on Snapchat and a branded effect is available on TikTok. There’s also a SMILE pop up lens on Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram that you can use in your videos to scare your family and friends. Here are a few ideas on how to use these spooky lenses to play pranks–or simply give your loved ones a good laugh!

Scare your friends with a pop up lens.

If you want to scare your friends over Snapchat, then use the pop-up lens. It’ll make a character pop up behind you and say, “It’s smiling at me.” You can either do a creepy smile along with the character or mouth the words, “It’s smiling at me,” like you’re scared for your life. Either way, your friends will never look at smiling the same way again.

Jump-scare everyone with a seemingly normal video. 

Smile is a psychological horror movie filled with deep, mind-bending scares, but there are also some good old-fashioned jump-scares thrown into the mix. Copy this trendy horror movie trope by making a perfectly normal video showing off your hairstyle or outfit–then use the lens without warning! Smile with the face mapping smile lens, or use the popup lens and pan over until the character is in frame.

Send a text ahead of time to increase the tension.

Send your friends a few messages over social media first to prep them for the prank. Act like you’re scared because you feel like someone is watching you. Then send them a video of yourself with the woman staring over your shoulder. Once they realize it’s a joke and you were only messing with them, you can tell them that you’ll make it up to them by inviting them to see the film with you soon!

Scare your friends and family with footage of themselves. 

If you want to scare your family and friends in person, all you have to do is walk up to them with a lens ready on your phone. Ask them to close their eyes and place the camera in front of them (in selfie mode so they can get a good look at themselves). Then ask them to smile wide. When they open their eyes and come face-to-face with a lens distorting their face (or a creepy woman standing behind them), they’re going to be terrified!

List out all the different things that make you smile.

In the film, the smiling characters wear bright, pastel colors. Meanwhile, the main character who is struggling to stay alive wears darker shades. This creates a stark contrast between the protagonist and everyone around her. Draw inspiration from this cinematic technique by using the right color palette to make your videos even more intense. All you have to do is wear bright colors while you’re recording in order to make it seem like this is a fun, cheery video. In the end, it will make it that much scarier.

Instead of playing a prank, poke fun at yourself.

If you aren’t a big prankster, you can still use the face mapping lens to poke fun at yourself. Start the video off with a phrase that sounds super serious like, “I swear I’m done chasing after him” or “I would never binge-watch that series without you.” Then smile in order to show that what you’re saying clearly isn’t true. This is a fun way to use the filter to get a laugh and a scare at the same time.