ffa1mf Posted April 21, 2011 Share Posted April 21, 2011 A few months ago the face of the "average" person in the world was a news article that some may have seen. The article piqued my interest as I have pretty sophisticated software for facial recognition and measurement that I use as part of my job. As a point of interest, a friend and I downloaded as many faces as we could find off the game and then from image share at Nexus to find the "average" face in Oblivion. The only faces excluded were creature faces (khajiit, argonian, orc).I was not overly surprised to find that there are only two faces in oblivion with a sort of third type that mixes minor components of the two other faces that are used. Out of the generally accepted 7 face types, there are only two that overwhemingly appear in Oblivion. I believe I have discovered why the AI in Oblivion is as it is. Everyone in Oblivion must be related because they all look pretty much the same, regardless if male or female. Obviously, interbreeding has occurred and this is why characters walk into walls, wander aimlessly and generally do weird things. The biggest surprise of the experiment? How many females in Oblvion have "man faces". The faces on female characters were often selected or recognized as male. If you are falling in love with a female character in Oblivion, be warned, it may be a male in female accoutrements.So, if you don't particularly find any characters in Oblivion attractive/unattractive or specifically unique based upon their face, its because they are all pretty much the same face. Tried the same experiment with body measurements, and about the only significant change is breast size. An interesting and somewhat sad comment on what is found attractive and what isn't. I will say though that the unique things about the characters in oblivion are the many inspired and very well done armor and clothing mods that have been made available by the modders. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zapata935 Posted April 21, 2011 Author Share Posted April 21, 2011 In real life you may have to pay a tariff for that, but in front of your own computer you can be whoever you want to be! That... sounds sorta depressing. No wonder I have no real life. Real life is an illusion brought on by lack of computer access. Books are an alternative to computers if you get desperate - I recommend anything apart from Robert Jordan (which is the literary equivalent of an endless pointless dungeon crawl). On your wise words, here endeth the lesson! Best Wishes Zapata935 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CasperTheLich Posted April 22, 2011 Share Posted April 22, 2011 A few months ago the face of the "average" person in the world was a news article that some may have seen. The article piqued my interest as I have pretty sophisticated software for facial recognition and measurement that I use as part of my job. As a point of interest, a friend and I downloaded as many faces as we could find off the game and then from image share at Nexus to find the "average" face in Oblivion. The only faces excluded were creature faces (khajiit, argonian, orc).I was not overly surprised to find that there are only two faces in oblivion with a sort of third type that mixes minor components of the two other faces that are used. Out of the generally accepted 7 face types, there are only two that overwhemingly appear in Oblivion. I believe I have discovered why the AI in Oblivion is as it is. Everyone in Oblivion must be related because they all look pretty much the same, regardless if male or female. Obviously, interbreeding has occurred and this is why characters walk into walls, wander aimlessly and generally do weird things. The biggest surprise of the experiment? How many females in Oblvion have "man faces". The faces on female characters were often selected or recognized as male. If you are falling in love with a female character in Oblivion, be warned, it may be a male in female accoutrements.So, if you don't particularly find any characters in Oblivion attractive/unattractive or specifically unique based upon their face, its because they are all pretty much the same face. Tried the same experiment with body measurements, and about the only significant change is breast size. An interesting and somewhat sad comment on what is found attractive and what isn't. I will say though that the unique things about the characters in oblivion are the many inspired and very well done armor and clothing mods that have been made available by the modders. i found cobl dealt with this issue quite well. when i actually started using it that is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Telyn Posted April 22, 2011 Share Posted April 22, 2011 It's because of how FaceGen works. Very male and very female are ends of a single slider. When you randomize, most faces would end up somewhere in the middle. I wouldn't read too much into it. They used FaceGen, and I am sure they randomized a lot, given the really weird faces on some of the less important npcs. That's the caricature end of another slider. http://www.facegen.com/modeller.htm I don't think Bethesda intended all the faces to be attractive. Even the default faces in character generation, they don't seem to have put much effort into attractiveness. They also some basic faces repeatedly. Bethesda's faces are always one of the first things modded in their games. As for image share, that does surprise me because I would have expected the average face there to be child/anime type face. Maybe the childlike faces are throwing off your study? Adults are notoriously bad at being able to tell a short haired girlchild from a shorthaired boychild in the absence of other cues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ffa1mf Posted April 23, 2011 Share Posted April 23, 2011 The software doesn't see age, nor "pretty" or "ugly", doesn't see makeup, tattoos, hair or even ears. The software isn't impressed by male or female face patterns either. What it does is measure and catagorize faces to a range of facial types and features. While I can't exactly determine how many of the faces used in the experiment were altered by COBL, there were at least some - but none stood out as having a significant difference in shape or features. Actually, the biggest problem was getting the software to stop identifying faces as not real and rejecting them. The problem? - the faces are too symmetrical, they are only a facsimile of a human face, not a real human face - more like a cartoon or doll - which isn't a big surprise. Simply, the software in Oblivion doesn't seem to be capable of creating any significant range of human facial shapes or features and while COBL may add some color or makeup or nice hair or whatever, these cosmetics don't change facial shape or features, except to the human eye. We think we see a human face, because we place a human measurement to it, and decide its male or female or its attractive or unattractive. The software isn't fooled.The other possibility is the vast majority of people who are making characters and posting a picture to Nexus have pretty identical ideas of what face shape and features make an attractive face. I don't think many are creating faces they think are unattractive. Either way, the result seems to be a whole bunch of faces that are pretty much identical, with the vast majority being more male than female in characteristic. I just find it really strange, and its sort of weirded me out, cause now all the characters faces in pictures posted to image share all look like men, with the "females" looking like transvestites because every one has a "man face" with some makeup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Telyn Posted April 23, 2011 Share Posted April 23, 2011 You can make your own faces and import them. The facegen demo is free but you could also use MakeHuman http://code.google.com/p/makehuman/. Someone ported head06 for Oblivion. Maybe with the sliders you might be able to do better with that head. In the construction set you can make asymetrical faces. I went in there and made the left and right eyes less symetrical on some npcs as a test. To me, they do look more real, and that is just a very basic change. The faces are still limited by the range of the sliders. The game generation for characters is a modified version of FaceGen. I'm into art, so I probably have a broader range of what I consider beautiful than a lot of people. Age is not inherently ugly to me. Transvestites don't weird me out, so I am probably less bothered by the game using a face that leans to male. The symetry sometimes makes it harder for me to identify specific npcs who have similar faces. There is a character in my game that has a cute crooked smile, but I am not sure what mod she came from. I'll have to try to find her again. She isn't a major npc. The majority of people in image share are using a limited number of custom races which have faces that can't be changed very much without rather strange results. The popular chocolate elves are based on Corean Race for example. If you try that one, you will probably find it is pretty hard to change the basic nature of it much. One of the reasons games do not generally strive for realism is designers are very aware of the uncanny valley effect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SandsOfTime404 Posted April 23, 2011 Share Posted April 23, 2011 (edited) For me, at least, when it comes to characters I find myself typically playing a female role. It's all a matter of preference. I used to stick mainly with males, but I like being imaginative with my characters. For me, it seems easier to do that with a female character. When I'm role playing a male, the hacking and slashing doesn't feel like anything more than that. The Thieves Guild quests felt like petty burglaries, etc. With a female character, the role changes. It's not just hacking, slashing, and stealing cheap virtual junk. There's an actual person there; a role I'm cast in. I've always enjoyed games and television shows that have a strong, independent female protagonist, or antagonist for that matter. I think that's why I'm more drawn to a female character in these types of games. The male characters are stereotypically expected to be strong and independent, and that bores me. As far as faces and looks go, I try to limit how picky I am. I enjoy 3rd-person over 1st-person. While it's difficult to cast spells or volley arrows into enemies, I don't wonder why looking down at my feet gives me a view of nothing. The 3rd-person view is nice and cinematic. It gives that nice combination of being in control of the story but at the same time allowing you to watch it unfold. Because of the camera controls, the clothing is something more important to me than a face I'll rarely see. I aim for visually attractive, but also practical. When I use "visually attractive" I don't mean that the PC has her buttocks bared for the world to see. I mean, simply, that the armor or clothing currently being worn looks "nice". Not so fancy that it's gaudy, but not so plain that it takes away from my character as an individual. I've especially liked the awesome work the modding community has done it that respect. There's plenty out there that gives your character more individuality, but doesn't involve becoming a sideshow attraction. Overall, the choices I make in character development, from the beginning even, depend entirely on my vision of where I want them to go. What's their story? How would they react to this situation? How would they improve on a weakness? a strength? It may seem kinda strange, but the only thing that gets me through hundreds of hours on these games is treating it like a story. Generating a genuine interest in your character makes for a much better experience, in my opinion, than viewing it as another grinding session. So yes, I suppose Oblivion does encourage transvestism. Edited April 23, 2011 by SandsOfTime404 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CasperTheLich Posted April 23, 2011 Share Posted April 23, 2011 doesn't one of the stock cobl plugins alter something like 1400 npc faces, not just the textures, hair & eyes, but the actual faces? or am i wrong? well, all i can say is the npc faces for the most part look very different from the vanilla faces/heads. (IMHO) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Telyn Posted April 24, 2011 Share Posted April 24, 2011 Cobl does do that if you enable those features. It does attempt to make each racial face type significantly different from the others. I think it is generally better with the male faces than the female ones, but they mostly look better than the vanilla NPCs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lazilot Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 (edited) I always use Male characters, cause i'm Male. I don't really care what i'm looking at (For the record i'm Straight) My Characters usually wear the Darkest clothes, Hide in the shadows, and Kill people without ever being noticed. Other times i just walk down the street on a bloody rampage but...Thats not the point. I think if your a male that has a female character who's "Physically Appealing" that he wants to view, it's fine. Same with Females and Male Characters, I just RP because it's more realistic. Though i will go Third Person to watch the Guards chase me down the streets screaming "Help! Murder!!!" Good Times c: Edited April 27, 2011 by Lazilot Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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