Researchers at the University of Washington (UW) are developing a way to create a digital rendering of a person's face capable of speaking and make expressions.

According to Mashable, the researchers plan to detail their technology by presenting a paper titled "What Makes Tom Hanks Look Like Tom Hanks" at the International Conference on Computer Vision in Chile later this month.

The researchers started with Tom Hanks for a simple reason: there are decades' worth of photos of the award-winning actor's face.

"One answer to what makes Tom Hanks look like Tom Hanks can be demonstrated with a computer system that imitates what Tom Hanks will do," Supasorn Suwajanakorn, a UW graduate student in computer science and engineering and the paper's lead author, said in a press release.

The technology could have major implications on virtual - or augmented - reality systems and hardware like headsets and glasses.

"Imagine being able to have a conversation with anyone you can't actually get to meet in person - LeBron James, Barack Obama, Charlie Chaplin - and interact with them," the paper's co-author, Steve Seitz, a UW professor of computer science and engineering, said in the release. "We're trying to get there through a series of research steps. One of the true tests is can you have them say things that they didn't say but it still feels like them? This paper is demonstrating that ability."