The two Cate Blanchett pics that Vestmann posted have very good even lighting, and the front view is marvelous, and the 3/4 view would probably also suffice as a side view in FaceShop.

Still open to other suggestions too, but I'm pretty gung ho on Cate Blanchett. 8-)

Blanchett is in a league of her own and her look is very unique. I you decide on her I could probably dig up more images of her. Won't be until tomorrow though.

Quote - The two Cate Blanchett pics that Vestmann posted have very good even lighting, and the front view is marvelous, and the 3/4 view would probably also suffice as a side view in FaceShop.

Still open to other suggestions too, but I'm pretty gung ho on Cate Blanchett. 8-)

She's not the most recognizable actress and seldom looks the same twice. If I didn't have the name before looking at the pics posted, I'm not sure I would have known who she was.

Attached Link: Blanchett as Elizabeth I

> Quote - Blanchett is in a league of her own and her look is very unique. I you decide on her I could probably dig up more images of her. Won't be until tomorrow though.

Yeah, but the only problem I will have in doing her is I won't be able to stop with the morph. I'll add the long wavy hair and the DAZ Historical Armour for V4, and then put her on a white horse with a flowing cape to reproduce the scene from Elizabeth part II. LOL
'
Either that or the Galadriel woods scene from Lord of the Rings when she's at the cauldron.

Or this one ...

http://www.moviewallpapers.net/images/wallpapers/2007/the-golden-age/the-golden-age-2-1024.jpg

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, somebody stop me!

Found a decent sideview...

Blanchett Side

"Yeah, but the only problem I will have in doing her is I won't be able to stop with the morph. I'll add the long wavy hair and the DAZ Historical Armour for V4, and then put her on a white horse with a flowing cape to reproduce the scene from Elizabeth part II. LOL"

Yeah I know what you mean hehe...  I´m gonna call it a day. Looking forward to what you decide. May vote is still for Cate...       ...or Wiesz ;)      ...or Eva Green.

Well if she doesn't get picked I will do her anyway. I've been wanting to do a pic with her for a long time. The armour and all. 8-)  And I JUST got exactly the right hair for it, with that image in mind.

Deecey, here are some more of Cate.  These should be good for texture detail.

Blanchett 1
Blanchett 2
Blanchett 3
Blanchett 4
Blanchett 5

I´m thinking about having a go at her myself.  I'll probably use FaceShop & Argile.

But we need more suggestions for the little challenge. Are people okay with Cate or is someone else more suitable?

Vestmann your links don't work for me.
CHECK OUT  this site  it is the best  source for celeb model references:

http://usemycomputer.com/indeximages/women/

Quote - Vestmann your links don't work for me.
CHECK OUT  this site  it is the best  source for celeb model references:

http://usemycomputer.com/indeximages/women/

My first link doesn´t seem to work but the others are fine.

Thanks for the link. I´m not if it's the best source though but it is good.

I´m registered to this site:
http://celebutopia.net/forum/
It has tons of images added every day

This one is also okay:
http://www.vettri.net/index.html

Quote - Deecey, here are some more of Cate.  These should be good for texture detail.

Blanchett 1
Blanchett 2
Blanchett 3
Blanchett 4
Blanchett 5

I´m thinking about having a go at her myself.  I'll probably use FaceShop & Argile.

But we need more suggestions for the little challenge. Are people okay with Cate or is someone else more suitable?

Unable to get any of these either.

OK I do have my authorization key as of this morning and took a first stab at the front photo and the good left profile photo from the previous links.

After a couple of minutes in FaceGen I have a pretty decent likeness ... I'd be glad to post it once we decide whether or not we are doing Cate.

However ... while it's recognizeable as Cate, I'd still probably do more. As Carodan and I were discussing earlier, these automatic face programs are great for a start, but they don't allow for the VERY fine detailed shapes around mouth, eyes, nose, etc that you would need to get a perfectly exact likeness. Comparing the "automatic" morph to the photos side by side, I see areas in shape of the nostrils, lips, and cheeks that I'd like to refine further, even though the original state of the morph is recognizeable as Cate I'd like to take it even further, either by using V4's built-in morphs or by taking it into Mudbox. These are types of detailed tweaks that neither FaceGen or FaceShop address and they would have to be done if either program was being used at the start.

So what I may do is show the results in stages.

Quote - hmmm... That's odd.

Does this one work?

(link removed)

Oops, not liking that link. Got uber pop ups to sites that I don't want to go anywhere near. Might want to remove the link 8-)

Attached Link: http://abalonellc.com/faceshop-pro.html

> Quote - "OK I do have my authorization key as of this morning and took a first stab at the front photo and the good left profile photo from the previous links. > > After a couple of minutes in FaceGen I have a pretty decent likeness ... I'd be glad to post it once we decide whether or not we are doing Cate. > > However ... while it's recognizeable as Cate, I'd still probably do more. As Carodan and I were discussing earlier, these automatic face programs are great for a start, but they don't allow for the VERY fine detailed shapes around mouth, eyes, nose, etc that you would need to get a perfectly exact likeness. Comparing the "automatic" morph to the photos side by side, I see areas in shape of the nostrils, lips, and cheeks that I'd like to refine further, even though the original state of the morph is recognizeable as Cate I'd like to take it even further, either by using V4's built-in morphs or by taking it into Mudbox. These are types of detailed tweaks that neither FaceGen or FaceShop address and they would have to be done if either program was being used at the start". > > So what I may do is show the results in stages.

**
I disagree with that last statement. FaceShop 4.0 has a morphBrush and a TextureBrush.
MorphBrush allows you to tweak any shape, TextureBrush allows you to tweak any texture.
Laslo** 

 

OK that's cool to know. I don't think I have a version of FaceShop with a morph tool in it.

Okay, I´m giving up on the links :) People can find hires images right?

I´m thinking about skipping the aggravation of using FaceShop and doing the morph using V4's ++Morphs and the Ultra Head morphs from RDNA then refining it in Argile.  It will be interesting to see how close I can get that way.

Attached Link: http://abalonellc.com/faceshop-pro.html

> Quote - Okay, I´m giving up on the links :) People can find hires images right? > > I´m thinking about skipping the aggravation of using FaceShop and doing the morph using V4's ++Morphs and the Ultra Head morphs from RDNA then refining it in Argile.  It will be interesting to see how close I can get that way.

Not to argue your point but:

1. Many people don't have the enhanced V4.2 ( I know I don't)
2. FaceShop can work with any head (Aiko, Jessi, David, etc), not just V4.2.
   This is why we developed it in the first place.
   As for frustrations; like with everything else, there's a learning curve. Over the past years (FS3.1, FS3.5, FS 3.7, FS 4.0) we tried everything to make FaceShop more user-friendly and we will continue to do so.
   Laslo
    

Don´t get we wrong Laslo. I bought FaceShop Pro and haven't upgraded since and personally I find the upgrade charges too high. I really like the potential FaceShop Pro has and I have got some results with it but I´m not ready to pay more for some extra features at the moment.

I have a lot of morphs for V4 and I thought it would be interesting to see how far I could go without FaceShop compared to those who are using FS or FaceGen. That's all.

Laslo ... I think FaceShop has a LOT of potential, which is one of the reasons I tried to like it. I like that it can use any figure, but my main area of disappointment is the resulting morph.

After you said that FaceShop 4 had a morph brush, I went to look at the videos. I see a lot of changes have been added since I stopped using FaceShop, which is good!  It's heading in the right direction.

Now ... the application goes a long way in TRYING to achieve the proper face shape. And with the addition of the morph brush that's a good thing too. BUT ... and this is a really big BUT ... in the end, once the morph is in DAZ Studio or Poser, the user is advised to dial the morphs back down to somewhere between .5 and .7.

Yes, dialing it back does improve the appearance of the MORPH, but it also defeats the purpose of using the morph brush to add all that fine detail. What happens as a result is that  you are dialing OUT all of the character detail that you wanted to add IN, and the result becomes a blend of the figure you wanted, and the default character.

FaceShop is getting CLOSER, but it would be so much better if the morph was useable at a setting of 1. Otherwise, the morphing feature in FaceShop doesn't accomplish what I'd like to see it accomplish.

I say this with a great amount of respect for the product in hopes that it might one day become something that I would consider upgrading again. 8-)

Quote - Laslo ... I think FaceShop has a LOT of potential, which is one of the reasons I tried to like it. I like that it can use any figure, but my main area of disappointment is the resulting morph.

After you said that FaceShop 4 had a morph brush, I went to look at the videos. I see a lot of changes have been added since I stopped using FaceShop, which is good!  It's heading in the right direction.

Now ... the application goes a long way in TRYING to achieve the proper face shape. And with the addition of the morph brush that's a good thing too. BUT ... and this is a really big BUT ... in the end, once the morph is in DAZ Studio or Poser, the user is advised to dial the morphs back down to somewhere between .5 and .7.

Yes, dialing it back does improve the appearance of the MORPH, but it also defeats the purpose of using the morph brush to add all that fine detail. What happens as a result is that  you are dialing OUT all of the character detail that you wanted to add IN, and the result becomes a blend of the figure you wanted, and the default character.

FaceShop is getting CLOSER, but it would be so much better if the morph was useable at a setting of 1. Otherwise, the morphing feature in FaceShop doesn't accomplish what I'd like to see it accomplish.

I say this with a great amount of respect for the product in hopes that it might one day become something that I would consider upgrading again. 8-)

Deecey,

As you know, I like and respect your work a lot. There are some technical reasons for recommending a dial back (of course you can use 100% of the morph if you wish).

With our new, upcoming FaceAge (http://abalonellc.com/faceage-10.html) that debuts next week here at Rendo, we recommend a "mix and match" of several morphs to achive optimal results.  

OK ... since there hasn't been any more input on the challenge I just thought I'd post my initial results in FaceGen that I did earlier.

Here's the results that I got after about five minutes in FaceGen (half of that being the photo fit calculations, the other half setting the points and adjusting a couple of dials for the shape of the nose).

Now ... these are as they appear in FaceGen. What I normally do after this is bring the morph into Poser and then use Victoria's face morphs to fine-tune the facial features. And I would definitely work on the shape of the nose/nostrils, chin, and mouth with the dials. And maybe the cheekc a tad. Either that, or I'd take it into a morphing program.

But that is largely because I'm really picky. LOL  Even the default morph is quite recognizable as Cate Blanchett (to me, anyway).

My gallery shows a lot of images where I use the word "UnVicky." Now you know what I use to "unVicky Vicky."   If you didn't know this was V4 when looking at the textured versions, would you suspect that it was?

This is looking good.  Just a few adjustments, like you say, to the nose/nostrils.  Looking forward to seeing her fully textured from Poser.

Deecey that blows  away  1 hour of work that  I did in W3D  and ,mostly Poser face room and Poser morph brush -

to  top it all off, morph brush  as usual, crashed Poser on me  and I didn't even  get so  much  as a screen shot of my hour's work.

Face gen  sure appears to  be an awesome tool.

I am starting over

frequent savefile  this time .....

Yeah  she has a very  unique  nose  the nostril openings are like a complete donut, the nostril  wall doesn't terminate perpendicular to  her face surface.

Deecey - thanks for posting the untextured version from FaceGen. It's not such a bad starting morph - as you say, with some tweaking it'd be rather good. So what is the workflow inside FaceGen (assuming we already have the model inside)?

Quote -
There are some technical reasons for recommending a dial back (of course you can use 100% of the morph if you wish).

Laslo - it'd be useful if you could actually state some of these 'technical reasons' rather than being so vague all the time. I suggest these reasons are really to do with some of the things that are 'technically' wrong with FaceShop, but then I suppose this is open to debate.

Quote - OK ... since there hasn't been any more input on the challenge I just thought I'd post my initial results in FaceGen that I did earlier.

Here's the results that I got after about five minutes in FaceGen (half of that being the photo fit calculations, the other half setting the points and adjusting a couple of dials for the shape of the nose).

Now ... these are as they appear in FaceGen. What I normally do after this is bring the morph into Poser and then use Victoria's face morphs to fine-tune the facial features. And I would definitely work on the shape of the nose/nostrils, chin, and mouth with the dials. And maybe the cheekc a tad. Either that, or I'd take it into a morphing program.

But that is largely because I'm really picky. LOL  Even the default morph is quite recognizable as Cate Blanchett (to me, anyway).

My gallery shows a lot of images where I use the word "UnVicky." Now you know what I use to "unVicky Vicky."   If you didn't know this was V4 when looking at the textured versions, would you suspect that it was?

Facegen is terrific, no question. The only thing that really needs a fix is the jaw width and that's usually a native morph in most heads anyway. I'll take a shot at Cate in Face Shop just for the hell of it. I'd say a patient effort takes about 20 minutes rather than 5.

I am trying to understand -

Face gen   modeler  vs  face gen  customizer -

are they  2 different aps?

must you  have customizer to  be able to use any figure's head that  you wish?

Quote - Deecey - thanks for posting the untextured version from FaceGen. It's not such a bad starting morph - as you say, with some tweaking it'd be rather good. So what is the workflow inside FaceGen (assuming we already have the model inside)?

Quote -
There are some technical reasons for recommending a dial back (of course you can use 100% of the morph if you wish).

Laslo - it'd be useful if you could actually state some of these 'technical reasons' rather than being so vague all the time. I suggest these reasons are really to do with some of the things that are 'technically' wrong with FaceShop, but then I suppose this is open to debate.

An honest answer to an honest question:
While there's nothing "technically wrong" with FaceShop, it uses a very different workflow from FaceGen. In Facegen, the system finds a likely match for a picture from 200 or so meshes. This works well on average heads, not so well with older or very different ones (think Winston Churchill).
FaceShop relais on tracing outlines of features. Depending on how many points you put down or how carefuly, your result my be great or may be rough.
Not going full 100% on the dial eliminates some roughness.
If you go the long route (zoom in, folow outlines, put down plenty of points), the dial back may not be necessary at all.
I hope this answers your question.
Laslo  

Does FaceGen import/export standard V4 mesh? Is the result a morph for V4 or a prop mesh?

The FaceGen Customizer is used to make a set of data that you can use to make a model compatible with FaceGen Modeler.

As I said earlier, the whole process took me about a month to figure out, and I even posted a tutorial that is on FaceGen's site. However, it's not for the squeamish, it's quite a tedious process. You have to morph the facial features of your model (say, V4) to fit the shape of their "mean face", and if it's off the morph and texture don't work quite right.

Just the calculations to transfer the model into a FaceGen compatible format take 10-20 hours, depending on the speed of your processor. What I usually did was set it up and let it run overnight. It takes about 8-10 hours on a Dual or quad core. If you don't get the face shape quite right, you only do PART of the setup process over again to tweak it. You don't have to go through the 8-10 hours of calculations again, it's more like 1 or 2.

Anyway, when you bring this "magic data stuff" into FaceGen Modeler, there are actually two underlying sets of data to work with, largely because of V4's overlapping UVs. There is one set of model data to use when you create the texture (because of all the different material uvs and how some of them overlap, so the geometry has to be broken apart accordingly to compensate for the overlapping UVs), and another set of model data to export the morph (which basically will be an UNTEXTURED head, neck, eyebrows, eyes, and teeth all welded together). 

After generating the texture and OBJ in FaceGen, I export the texture and the morph. I then take the welded OBJ (face, head, eyes, etc) into Poser and open the Group Editor. Then from that, I  spawn the individual morph targets, export each one out individually, and reimport onto V4 as morph targets. The result is a morph that CAN WORK with Mimic and the existing morph targets.

Now ... like I said earlier, making the models compatible with FaceGen isn't an easy process. I DO already have Michael 4 and Victoria 4 working in FaceGen. I COULD ask DAZ about distributing it, but I wouldn't be able to do that WITHOUT their blessing because the head geometry is copyrighted by them. A lot of people have contacted me after attempting to do the conversions themselves, and I wish there was an easier way to help right now! LOL

As for the workflow INSIDE FaceGen?  I should do a video one of these days. LOL But time has been precious lately. I'll see what I can do.

-- place 11 markers on the front view
-- refine 11 markers on closeup of front view
-- and for each side photo you pick (can have two) ... place and refine 9 markers

-- click a button and watch FaceGen calculate and morph the face while superimposing the texture. It's hypnotizing. LOL

Laslo - Ok, your explanation goes part way I think. I accept the thing about accuracy and quantity of placed points.
One of the things I pointed out earlier was to do with the system of plotting those points in both a front and a profile view. FaceShop4 has this option, but there seem to me to be issues with how this method is technically applied.
Firstly, after the initial points are placed in the front view and applied, FaceShop appears to slightly rotate the head model. I've tried this workflow dozens of times, zooming in very closely, but the rotation always takes place. The rotation makes the second round of placing points very difficult because it becomes less feasible to judge accurately where the points need to be placed.
Second, although you do have the option to load a profile image and plot points, you have to manually rotate and scale the head model in a non-orthographic space. This is very important as it effectively means (if the rotation is off by merely a fraction) that the translations can easily become skewed, resulting in a 'twisting' motion when the morph is applied in Poser. This has nothing to do with the accuracy of the points placed, but is IMO a funtional deficiency of the app itself.
You also need to be able to move from profile to front views to tweak the positioning of points, and in my experience FaceShop just doesn't permit this, either corrupting the morph or crashing entirely. This is what I refer to as the bugginess of FaceShop. Even if the core concept worked, the software doesn't permit you to sucessfully complete the process.
I suggested earlier that in my view FaceShop was probably concieved to work based on the idea of using a single, semi-profile reference photo, and that the option to use a second profile reference has been somewhat unsuccessfully added to this in later versions.
Is this the case?

I will concur with some of what Laslo says ... part of that 10-20 hours of calculations that the Customizer does is converting the morph data from the model's head (ie: V4) to match those built-in face shapes that he's talking about. That's what the whole Customizer process is about.

(And see, this is turning out to be a good discussion!!!)

Carodan,
Very insightful.
Indeed, the step where you combine front and profile makes it more difficult in many instances.
Fortunately, there's a workaround:
Do two separate morphs (on front and one profile) and blend the in either Studio or Poser.
This is what we recommend with the new FaceAge program.
(Obviously there are still texture issues to smooth, etc. but that is not that hard for an average Photoshop user).
Laslo

 

 

> Quote - > Carodan, > Very insightful. > Indeed, the step where you combine front and profile makes it more difficult in many instances. > Fortunately, there's a workaround: > Do two separate morphs (on front and one profile) and blend the in either Studio or Poser. > This is what we recommend with the new FaceAge program. > (Obviously there are still texture issues to smooth, etc. but that is not that hard for an average Photoshop user). > Laslo

Actually a separate pass for texture and morph, not necessarily using the same ref picture is a good approach as well.

As a suggestion Laslo, I think you need to build a bit of an online community of the silent majority of satisfied customers with samples of work, perhaps with a blog somewhere. People who are unhappy always make the most noise.

This is a quick and dirty job, one pass same pic for morph and texture:

But how do you suggest dealing with the rotation issue and non-orthographic camera views?

I was just looking at the FaceAge page. I suspect there will be similar issues with accurately positioning points because you are not dealing with fixed views.

Here she is after being brought into Poser as a morph target. I used the facegen texture on her face, but also made an attempt to add a bump map from another texture rather than making one. The bump map doesn't quite match with the lips and eyebrows, so don't count that as part of the overall result.

Hair is Mon Chevalier hair from DAZ, which suits her well. Eyes are from one of the many textures I have for V4 ... I forget which one! LOL

Now ... I'll probably keep working with this and evolving it over time, as I am still not happy with the nose and eye shapes. Haven't started with custom morphs yet, that is usually my next step.

Deecey, I went to your gallery. Lassie was the closest likeness...
Just kidding. Actually, I was impressed, especially with Scarlett.

LOL Lassie!!! That's a Laddie! He will be crushed. (And he sure is a little sweetie pie!)

Deecy, can't afford FaceGen and Costomizer but why can't you just share your V4 head set-up just as a morph to the V4 head?

As you can see from the Cate morph above (the one of the FaceGen views and untextured version), there are some issues under the jaw that don't have a smooth transition. That's not FaceGen's fault, that is some additional touchup that I'd have to do on the morph. So it's not quite ready for "prime time." I don't mind smoothing it out as needed for the pics I do, but if I do release it in one form or another I'd want it to be perfect.

So that would mean back to the drawing board one more time, and I'll have to add it to the list of projects. 8-)

I have tried faceshop but I must say I have never found it a worthwhile tool . It is buggy and it does not work half as well as they make it seem .  I quickly ditched and began learning custom morphing in zbrush which is a blast and Ihave to say I prefer it now !

Hey Laslo. Do you have an update of tips&tricks for FaceShop. Best practice etc. More reference points, less points, circle the eyes, etc. To be honest I was getting good results at the start but my accuracy has gone down not up... I am getting crumpled deformed mesh now but I can not ascertain what bad habits I have fallen into to cause it. For those of us struggling with the app it would be great if you could induce who ever it is doing best with it to share their experience and knowledge.

Quote - Hey Laslo. Do you have an update of tips&tricks for FaceShop. Best practice etc. More reference points, less points, circle the eyes, etc. To be honest I was getting good results at the start but my accuracy has gone down not up... I am getting crumpled deformed mesh now but I can not ascertain what bad habits I have fallen into to cause it. For those of us struggling with the app it would be great if you could induce who ever it is doing best with it to share their experience and knowledge.

We should be able to update "tricks and Tips" for the upcoming FaceShop 5.0 (late November).
My take is that the more detailed line you draw, the better the results.
I have also learned that if I have two photos (front and profile), I will try to make two separate morphs and then "mix and match" in either Studio or Poser.
Laslo  

Here are a few quick tips:

1. Head shaped like potato happens when lines are abruptly terminated: it sometimes helps to draw the outlines of the head ALL THE WAY to the top of the head (the two outlines meet on top).
   I also started with a M4 already squinting.
2. 3/4 photos. They should work fine. Please make sure that after you place the dots, the head's orientation is the same as the photo. This is important.
3. I noticed that when drawing the nose, the less you draw is the better. What is meant is that the best is to draw just under the nose but not up the sides. (see illustration).
    

 

 

Here's the result  

and in DS,  

Thanks. I have been ending the lines abruptly. I have found in general I am suffering worse results the more points I use... that is why I asked.

BTW.

Not that I can afford it these days --inexpensive upgrade planned? I would sure love to Beta test for a free copy!-- but if Face Shop Pro 5  is still in development... maybe to build in X and Y axis scaling? I notice that as an issue in my work with FSP. Also could it be possible take morphs internally too? It would be nice to use the built-in default V4 head and add the smile or open mouth in FSP rather than setting up an exported V4 morphed head from Poser. I like the shorter work flow of using the default V4 head to an imported head... or else an option to template up imported heads like "Smiling V4" that are to be used over and over so they don't need the extended work flow.

It's well to say that, but why so late !

Since i buy it, it sleep in a dark place of my hd ...

Quote - It's well to say that, but why so late !

Since i buy it, it sleep in a dark place of my hd ...

Maybe wake him up?
Could be fun.....
Laslo  

I'd love to see it work in Vista or Windows 7 without graphical corruption, and maybe a tool to rotate the head after the program has done it's initial positioning.

Sometimes the reference photo can make it hard to get a good match on head angle and such (usually women more than men due to longer hair covering up more of the head itself) and the ability to refine the position before you add more points to create the morph would be VERY helpful.

That is true... I have always wondered if it wouldn't go better if I could set up the head angle directly... a simple mater in terms of where the nose tip and ears are relative the cheeks. etc or maybe as an outline display you orient right over the reference picture.