Quote - Phantast:
Expressions: I find a common fault is over-exaggeration. Look at people around you and study the range of expressions they actually use. Much of the time the face is in repose. The face sets you see for sale in the RMP are mostly gross caricatures and are best avoided.

Oh I -SOOOOOOOOO- Agree with you on this one... Nearly every 'expression morph set' out there is overdone at a setting of 1.0 I tend to build my own expressions by turning all sorts of different dials up to usually around .3, and rarely over .5. Of course, I will also make my own morphs with Carrara and Poser Tool Box or magnets. On this angle, yestderday I went browsing through the marketplace and the first several 'female characters' I saw all had what looked like 'stretched upper lips (made too thick and as a result a little flattened at the top), pinched noses, and a certain 'starry' look to the eyes. Very unreal. Also something I notice female artists lke to do about as often as male artists overdo the breasts. I want to post an example, but I also don't want to offend anyone particular morph-maker here... > Quote - Phantast:

Photo-realism: Personally I don't want my renders to look like photos. I want them to look like what you see when you look at the world through your eyes, not through a camera lens. Thus I dislike focusing effects, lens flares and other such tricks.

I myself do like lens flare's and other effects. They are particularly good for conveying magic, but have other uses as well. In animation, figures will look stiff and fake if not somewhat overdone, and much like that, renders without photographic like light effects tend to look a little fake, even where they are actually realer to sight. This same issue I believe is why 'technicolor' went out. It is also why in comic book art heads are typically larger than is anatomically correct. The look of realism is often only achieved by creating a little unreality.

Truth has no value without backing by unfounded belief.
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