Video chat expands possibilities

You once had to leave home to see a psychiatrist for therapy, a music teacher for guitar lessons or a makeup artist for face-to-face consultations.

Now they can come to you, virtually, through video chat.

Long the darling of science fiction aficionados, video chat has never much caught on for personal calls. But this year, with the technology being incorporated into a widening array of digital gadgets, professionals specializing in one-to-one services are experimenting with video chat as a way to vastly extend their reach.

"My clients aren't looking for a makeover - those they can get at the local department store," said Chris Scott, a San Francisco makeup artist. "They're looking for makeup expertise."

Scott charges $US50 an hour for video chat sessions during which he evaluates faces, suggests makeup and teaches application techniques. He has clients from as far away as Australia.

"It's the first time that they hear the right way to apply something from a real makeup expert," Scott said.

Online video chat technology, once the province of geeks and corporate users with IT departments, has become far more user friendly and available.

Last month, Apple's iPhone 4 and HTC's Evo 4G phone debuted, both with video chat capability. Selected televisions from LG, Panasonic and Samsung now come with built-in cameras for video chat.

On computers, Skype, Yahoo Messenger, iChat and other messaging services have offered video chat for several years. But image quality, reliability and user-friendliness have greatly improved over time.

"Previously, people had to be kind of tech-savvy to use video chat," said Alfred Poor, an analyst with research group GigaOm Pro. "Now, with new products coming on the market with video chat already installed, that kind of barrier is no longer there."

GigaOm is so bullish on the technology that it estimates the annual number of video chats will increase from 600 million worldwide in 2008 to 30 billion by 2015.

Susan Fussell, associate professor of communications at Cornell University, doubts that personal calls will be a huge part of that boom if it comes. Crowds famously lined up to see AT&T's Picturephone at the 1964 New York World's Fair, but the technology didn't catch on in homes.

"Back when the Picturephone came out, housewives thought they had to put on makeup and dress up," Fussell said. "No one wants to do that on a day-to-day basis."

But Scott, who has made up the faces of celebrities such as skater Kristi Yamaguchi, author Maya Angelou and symphony conductor Michael Tilson Thomas, is counting on makeup becoming a reason to video chat.

"I get two kinds of (video chat) clients - the socially awkward women who feel uncomfortable getting lessons in public, or the ones who live in small towns where even a Sephora doesn't exist," he said.