This document compares two models for facial expression recognition (FER): a dedicated Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) developed from scratch and a VGG16 pre-trained model fine-tuned with the FER dataset. The study found that the dedicated CNN significantly outperformed the pre-trained model in terms of accuracy (87.133% vs. 71.685%) and performance in both public and private tests. The results highlight the effectiveness of deep learning techniques in recognizing human emotions through facial expressions.