266 replies to this topic

[Baravis]

Can't wait to see it!

[Jymm]

Damn.  Wish I had this post a few days ago, OR that they let us change characters after starting the game.  Unwilling to redo 20+ hours of game time at this point...  Still, I copied this down for next run through.  Thanks mate.

[Aleithian]

Damn.  Wish I had this post a few days ago, OR that they let us change characters after starting the game.  Unwilling to redo 20+ hours of game time at this point...  Still, I copied this down for next run through.  Thanks mate.

 

Yeah, I wish I'd researched this first...Thankfully I based my first character on me so the proportions are pretty good by default.

[Epigram]

Perhaps you should try comparing headshots from ad agencies and modeling firms to the math before trying to tell people they don't know what they are talking about.  

 

Did I say that? We arn't solving P vs. NP here, it's a character creator. People know what looks good and what dosen't, I had no issues.

[Nefla]

These are very basic rules

 

Real faces "bend" them,

 

Sometimes eyes width is a little smaller than the distance between them or the other way around. 

The width of the nose is usually a tiny bit bigger than spacing between eyes ... and so on.

Indeed, when you strictly adhere to the golden ratio you end up with a doll face.

[Arngeld]

Indeed, when you strictly adhere to the golden ratio you end up with a doll face.

That's mostly true, but remember that the golden ratio is only relevant when it comes to attractiveness. Most people's faces don't conform to the golden ratio, but the vast majority do fall very close to the proportion guidelines in the first post. The vertical and horizontal axes aren't strictly bound, which is why you have people with long faces, round faces and wide faces as well as golden ratio faces.

I'd say that unless one had an instinctive feel for creating natural faces, it would probably be better to create a face that fits the proportion guidelines first, and then adjust to taste. Obviously, people that are comfortable with the CC and have made characters they like already should ignore this advice. It's more for people who are frustrated because they can't get the results they want.

And I can't stress enough the value of the advice to use a measuring device of some sort. I already knew about facial proportions, but couldn't get it quite right for a long time because I was eyeballing it(and I'm no artist).

[sumojellybean]

Attractive faces more or so follow the average proportions yes. Mind you following the proportions to the exact rule all in the end makes a really generic face. In reality, no one is flawlessly beautiful, and it is in fact those flaws and quirks in what makes them striking in the end. 

 

This is a nice resource guide for beginners though, especially for eye proportions. It is very easy to make a character look like a 10 year old in DA:I without realizing it because the eyes are way too big and too low.

 

All depends on taste though. The more you get experienced with the CC, the more you priortize realism first, beauty second IMO. xD

[Aleithian]

I discovered something interesting this morning while trying out different facial structures: it is impossible to achieve realistic head proportion in the game. By modifying the ear position, the width of the face varies from 11"-12.5"; by modifying chin size and jaw size, the length of the face varies from 14/14.5"-15.5". In other words, at best it is possible to create a face that is 11"-15.5, or which displays a ratio of 1.4. Realistic facial ratio is 1.618.

 

Also, the eyes can be lowered to at most 7.5" from the top of the head. This means that facial proportion cannot be maintained beyond a facial length of 15".

 

So, the upshot of all this is that it's impossible to achieve realistic proportions relative to the head as a whole. However, realistic proportion can still be achieved relative to the internal proportion of brow-eyes-nose-mouth-chin and ear-eye-bridge-eye-ear. So I'll update the first post a bit later with a guide crafted for Dragon Age, given it's limitations.

[Arngeld]

Well that's really not  that bad.  As I said before, the ratio isn't really a problem, as that isn't a measure of realism, but merely of classic beauty.  Most faces don't have proportions matching the golden ratio, else we'd have to find some other objective common factor held by those historically found to be beautiful.

 

As long as the horizontal proportions and vertical proportions hold up independently(or at least do so approximately), you'll get something that looks realistic.  It might not match up with classic statuary, but that too is in keeping with realism.

[Aleithian]

Well that's really not  that bad.  As I said before, the ratio isn't really a problem, as that isn't a measure of realism, but merely of classic beauty.  Most faces don't have proportions matching the golden ratio, else we'd have to find some other objective common factor held by those historically found to be beautiful.

 

As long as the horizontal proportions and vertical proportions hold up independently(or at least do so approximately), you'll get something that looks realistic.  It might not match up with classic statuary, but that too is in keeping with realism.

 Totally agree. I'm uploading the final set of pictures right now, and the face looks far more balanced in-game that either of the two previous sets. I'm going to update the original post too. 

 

The upshot of my experiments is that, generally, it's possible to use the principles as rough guidelines to offset some of the worst offenses against irrealism, but that everyone's character depends ultimately on their own taste and artistic eye. Which, really, is what we've said all along. 

[Monica21]

Hey everyone. I thought you all might find this helpful. The vast majority of human faces share the same basic proportions, and if you follow these general principles in your character creation you'll end up with far more realistic faces (and likely better facial animations as well).

 

I want to emphasize this right away: this is not a thread attempting to determine "objective" standards of beauty. It does nothing more than open discussion regarding the general statistical proportions evidenced in the global human population, for application in the character creation system. Many aspects of your character will not be determined by these general principles, such as cheek placement and width, lip width, eye vertical width, brow type, forehead width, complexion, and many other aspects of beauty. If you're curious, I invite you to measure your own face. You'll be pleasantly surprised.   

 

There are just nine basic principles of realistic facial proportion:

 

1. The eyes sit at the vertical center of the head, halfway between the top of the skull (not the hairline) and the bottom of the chin.

2. The bottom of the nose (not the bottom of the nose tip, which can be angled however) sits at the vertical center of the bottom half of the head. (In other words, the bottom of the nose is halfway between the eyes and the chin.)

3. The ears stretch from the eyes to the end of the nose.

4. The width of the eyes is roughly 1/5 of the distance from outer ear to outer ear. (So if the ears are set wider apart, the eyes will be wider.)

5. The eyes are one eye-width apart.

6. The width of the nose is the same as the width between the eyes.

7. The center of the lips is located 1/3 of the way down the bottom 1/4 of the face (1/3 of the way between the bottom of the nose and the chin.)

8. The width of the lips (from side to side, not top to bottom) is roughly pupil to pupil.

9. The head should be roughly 1.618 times higher than it is wide. In other words, the ratio of height to width is 1.618:1.

 

Other than that, human faces vary widely. You can use measuring tape to measure these proportions without risking damage to your TV. Here's a graphic that can serve as a rough guide:

 

 

 

This is some really good info and thank you for the time spent putting it together. I thought your later comment about the eyes was interesting, because I've found that every preset and most of the faces in-game have the eyes way too high. Out of curiosity, and for those of us who aren't very good with eyeballing or spatial orientation in general, which preset is the closest to achieving the correct proportions?

[Tensai]

This is some really good info and thank you for the time spent putting it together. I thought your later comment about the eyes was interesting, because I've found that every preset and most of the faces in-game have the eyes way too high. Out of curiosity, and for those of us who aren't very good with eyeballing or spatial orientation in general, which preset is the closest to achieving the correct proportions?

 

For the human female, i can recommend the 4th preset. I used it, only changed some shapes and tweaked the eyes.

[Aleithian]

This is some really good info and thank you for the time spent putting it together. I thought your later comment about the eyes was interesting, because I've found that every preset and most of the faces in-game have the eyes way too high. Out of curiosity, and for those of us who aren't very good with eyeballing or spatial orientation in general, which preset is the closest to achieving the correct proportions?

 

I just updated the first post, so you may want to use the new list of principles, which I've adjusted for the limits of the creation system. You can see my new set of results there as well. 

 

As for the default faces, I just quickly measured them all and they all place the eyes too high. 3 and 4 most accurately represent the brow-nose-chin proportion, and they all get the eye size and horizontal placement pretty much spot on. But since vertical eye placement is so fundamental to character creation, I'd just choose whichever looks best to you and lower the eyes by 25% as a preliminary ballpark (i.e. raise the eye position slider by 25% of the total line). After that, adjust the features as you please, record the sliders, then check for proportion. Adjust, make final adjustments, record the sliders again, then try in-game. Record what looks off ("eyes too high", "cheeks too wide", etc), load up creation again, and adjust. Rinse and repeat. 

 

In my case, I have to restrict how many times I adjust a character. Tiny changes don't justify constantly reloading - what I need for those adjustments is an in-game recreation option.

[LM88]

Very very useful! Just lets keep in mind this guide is based on statistical regularities, which means there is a range of deviation from these measures that will still make your face look real (and actually a little deviation is recommended in order to end up with something unique).

 

Also, these measurments are based on the global human population and not related to beauty. Therefore you can stick to these guidelines and still end up with an ugly character.

[Computer_God91]

The updated face with vertical and horizontal proportions looks great. Your measurements are spot on.

[Tensai]

I was bored so here a face based on a celebrity. A little inaccruate though (i was too lazy). Also i think the Eyes might be a little too high in the relation to the whole head although i lowered them, execpt for that everything is more a less pretty correct. Mouth width is 4,5 length units (forgot to add that)

 

Spoiler

[Aleithian]

The updated face with vertical and horizontal proportions looks great. Your measurements are spot on.

 

Thanks! Here's a pic of my second female character, with correct proportions:

 

[Aleithian]

I was bored so here a face based on a celebrity. A little inaccruate though (i was too lazy). Also i think the Eyes might be a little too high in the relation to the whole head although i lowered them, execpt for that everything is more a less pretty correct. Mouth width is 4,5 length units (forgot to add that)

 

Spoiler

 

Wow, great job! You're right that the eyes are a touch too high. Funny how we can both tell just by eyeballing the picture. A rough measure confirms it: the face is 14.5cm tall, and the eyes are sitting at 6.75cm (from the top, that dark horizontal line about halfway up the hair). So the eyes should be lowered so that the center is at 7.25cm. But even at 6.75cm (a measly 5mm off), this looks way more realistic that the default. 

[Tensai]

Thanks! Here's a pic of my second female character, with correct proportions:

 

 

While the position of the eyes might be correct in this one, it reveals another problem.. The Hairline is too high. This is rather a general problem due to the hair cuts than the result of ur creation

[Hellosanta]

Jumped in to see if there is any other things that I don't know about glad my first quizzi have right proportion

 

Spoiler

 

[Aleithian]

While the position of the eyes might be correct in this one, it reveals another problem.. The Hairline is too high. This is rather a general problem due to the hair cuts than the result of ur creation

 

Yup. They really need to change the hairline. The next build of this character will raise the eyeline and brows just a touch to offset this, but we're all stuck with this at the moment, until we get access to more hairstyles.

[Monica21]

Yup. They really need to change the hairline. The next build of this character will raise the eyeline and brows just a touch to offset this, but we're all stuck with this at the moment, until we get access to more hairstyles.

 

It's especially noticeable on that hairstyle. In profile view, the hairline doesn't even meet the forehead, and that's why I scrapped the very first character I made.

[Aleithian]

It's especially noticeable on that hairstyle. In profile view, the hairline doesn't even meet the forehead, and that's why I scrapped the very first character I made.

 

Agreed. I'll probably restart her file at some point and make the various changes, likely after DLC starts to release. For now, I'm back to actually playing the game. 

[Jymm]

Dangit. Your final corrected version on the original post now looks awesome.  I'm almost tempted to scrap my 20 hours and reroll... but NO.  Must resist!  I will ride my Inquisitor straight through the uncanny valley all the way to the end of this game!  Or until BW releases some means of adjusting characters in-game.  Sigh.

 

Thanks again for the research and for posting the results.

[sumojellybean]

@Hellosanta Your Quizzy’s eyes look a tinge too far apart I think. I think its her fringe, but her frontal view reminds me a bit of a wide eyed pug. Also you can move your lip a little bit up as well. If it went a little lower, it would look similar to a monkey's mouth, height wise. Or maybe change the lip shape/lip width so it doesn't look that squished.

 

Proportion wise, her large brown eyes, eye height, full cheeks make her look like a 15 year old. A cute teenager nonetheless, but it depends on what kind taste you have I guess. xD If you want to make her look older,make those eyes smaller and change the eye color. 

 

Also nice to see another Skyrim modder moving onto DA.

 

@Aleithnan Your inquisitor is starting to remind me of Olivia Wilde. You should tilt her nose tip or nostrils down though. It looks like someone shoved their fingers up her nostrils and it’s a bit distracting, no offence. xD You can also make the nose bridge or nostrils a teeny bit wider. Improved a lot on the eyes and jaw line though. 

 

EDIT:

 

@Tensai, you need to move your eyes farther apart for the nose. Looks too squished in and needs breathing space from nostrils. You can also play around with the nostrils shape a bit more to make them look interesting. Cheek/jowls as well if you want to make her look more thinner.