Subject: Re: Modelling Heads?
Date: Fri, 06 May 94 10:05:00 PDT
From: Stethem Ted              5721 <TedS@ms70.nuwes.sea06.navy.mil>

    There was a tutorial to do this exact thing with the Forms editor  in
the now defunct AV magazine last year.  I have the issue somewhere.  I tried 

to do it but didn't really get the results I was hoping for and haven't gone 

back to it.  My main problem is that I haven't overcome the learning hurdle
with the Forms editor and I keep promising I am going to learn it but keep
procrastinating. Soon, though, soon...
   Also, I have been playing with the Applique function in V2.9/V3.0 and
this might do the trick, especially for the face.  It is possible to take a
frontal face view, convert it to grey-scale and create a displacement object 

of the face.  This is very close to producing a face object which is
incredibly detailed.  The only problem/difficulty is that the Applique
extrudes (or displaces? not sure about the proper terminology) with respect
to the color, so black displaces the least and white displaces the most.  To 

make the Applique create a properly displaced object with all the right
high's and low's, it would be necessary to take the face image and create a
"contour map" out of it using some kind of paint program.  The parts that
need to stick up from the surface, like the nose, lips, brow need to be
lighter or almost white.  Also, the whites of the eyes need to be darkened
so they won't protrude.  Also, the Applique can be wrapped around an object
so it would be possible to create the basic featureless elliptical head
object and use the Applique on it directly for the facial feature.  I
haven't investigated this thoroughly but it should work.

 ----------
From: imagine-relay
To: imagine
Subject: Re: Modelling Heads?
Date: Thursday, May 05, 1994 7:57PM

>:
>:   Any suggestions? This would be an excellent building block
>: for any CU of human figures.
>:
>
>       What you want to do is use the FORMS editor instead of the Detail
>editor. Forms editor was designed for such a thing.

  Unfortunately, forms editor seems to work best when you have
symmetric objects that you can cross section easily. One person
mentioned getting a foam mannequin head and chopping it up to get
the cross sections, but it doesn't really seem to me like all
this should be necessary for a head shape. It's just basically a
sphere with smooth indentations for eyes, a smooth projection for
a nose, and same for the chin and jaw. Unfortunately, the detail
editor doesn't seem up to this, and I don't have any mannequin heads
handy B^). Maybe I'll try drawing some cross sections from scratch,
but I have my doubts..

  Greg


 --
+----------------------------+--------------------------------------------+
| Greg Pringle               |                                            |
| pringle@holly.cuug.ab.ca   |          "Better dead than smeg"           |
| greg_pringle@mtroyal.ab.ca |                                            |
+----------------------------+--------------------------------------------+


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