Looks can be deceiving.

The folks at Analogia Star Estimator run a service that claims to "find the analogy between your portrait and the top celebrities." After a quick trip to their site, it turns out I am in some pretty good company. Whether you think so or not, and I am not so sure I agree, the fine folks at Analogia seem to think I look like George Clooney, Ewan McGergor, and David Duchovny which they happen to misspell.

In case you are confused by the similarities, I am the one in the upper-left.

I am not sure how they determine similarities, but as much as I don't want to admit it, I really don't think I look like any of those stars. Possibly I have the ears of George Clooney, the face-shape of Ewan McGregor, and maybe the forehead of David Duchovny, but one possible similar point from each star is not much of a match. Surely there is at least one celebrity out there that shares a few more things in common with me. After all, I consider myself pretty average looking.

I suppose any similarity, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, but this matching process uses technology from a company called Optical Recognition Objectives LLC. This company makes software "... for person identification in criminal investigations ..." (I love their tag line, "The unique software for criminal needs.") I assume their actual software for helping to catch criminals is better than the one used to match me to the stars, or at least I hope so. Hmm, I certainly hope George Clooney doesn't decide to change careers and go on a crime spree. I wouldn't want to be mistaken for him and be arrested by mistake.

Here in Korea I have been told several times that I look like someone famous. Early on when I first arrived in Korea, and had longer hair, students used to tell me I looked like Macgyver, not Richard Dean Anderson but Macgyver, which is what he will always be known as in Korea. Personally I don't think I have the eyebrows to pull off a Macgyver, but it's not bad being compared to him. And I did always carry around my Swiss Army knife.

Later on, I was occasionally told I look like Harrison Ford. I actually still get that one sometimes. I really like this comparison, not so much because I think I look like him (I don't), but because I really like him as an actor. There is no way I am as suave as Harrison Ford, but maybe I am pretty good with that non-smile smile.






And just recently I was told I look like David Caruso, currently Horatio Caine of "CSI: Miami" fame. This is not a bad comparison either, but I think there are some fundamental problems with this one. First of all, my eyes are brown, not blue. Additionally the most obvious difference is the hair. He has less, I have more. His is red, mine is a bland gray and brown. Maybe there is something in the face, but I am not so sure.

Perhaps if I had a few of those traits that David Caruso has, I too might have been a star of the small screen. What do you think?

"People are pretty much alike. It's only that our differences are more susceptible to definition than our similarities."
~ Unknown

"Our Similarities bring us to a common ground; Our Differences allow us to be fascinated by each other."
~ Tom Robbins