[Marvel]

As I've been trying to model a more complicated 3-D female, the following questions have been nagging my mind; Why can we / how do we tell a female is a female just by looking at her face? I.e. removing hair (and make-up), what are the key characteristics we 'recognise' to tell genders apart just by looking at a person's face; what about trying to exaggerate those features - how to make a face especially feminine (or masculine)?

I have a clue on the basics on making a face feminine -- make jaw narrower, lips fuller, cheeks rounder, cheekbones less visible, nose smaller, chin-mouth-nose -area smaller, eyes more out, eyebrow area rounder, forehead rounder etc. ... yet after several tries, I don't think I'm any closer to a real answer (atleast not by looking at the polygons of my 3-D face).

If anyone cares to give his/her view on this and/or could give visual pointers on the subject, it would all be much appreciated.

[jfrancis]

There is a "mask" that looks a lot like a polygon mesh. It purports to show the ideal dimensions of the "beautiful" face. There might be male as well as female versions. You might want to poke around along those lines.



http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&safe=off&q=marquardt++face&btnG=Search

...

I found the web site of this guy:

http://www.beautyanalysis.com/index2_mba.htm

You can see his mask there.

[Anthony]

There are various things you can do to accentuate the masculinity or femininity of a face. Lips actually tend to be fuller on men than women I notice, but you make the women's more curving. One thing my grandfather pointed out - you can tell who's driving the car in front of you because men have square heads and women have pointy heads. :] You have to flatten the face into facets more with men, like on the brow and cheeks. Men's chins jut more and are generally wider from the front(is that right? I'm tired haha), whereas women's jaw line arcs into the chin more softly. Same with the cheekbone. If someone has a scan of Loomis' Heads and Hands book it might talk about this topic. Women tend to have more visible temple/cheek area visible from the front between the eyes and ears than men do. Also, their hairline is more square than men's. I'm no authority on this stuff, but those are some of my observations.
_________________
-Anthony
Carpe Carpem
http://www.anthonyfransella.com

[aphelionart]

i remember reading somewhere that the difference largely rests in contour... men more angular, women more curvy. for instance if you wanted to blur the difference between man/woman purposely, you could define smooth but masculine muscles (large round biceps, etc.)

(my 2 cents)

-matt

[xray360]

Women are pear shaped and men are V shaped. That's another way to tell women form men. Their hips are bigger.

I just realized you only want to know about the face. Lips and eyes I say are the best way. Also I think a womens face has softer features where as a man has strong features for example big eyebrows. There is a comercial for tobaco that shows women getting their hair buzzed and they still look like women. You might be able to see the key features that make a face feminine.

[jfrancis]

In the skull, the brow ridge area is more pronounced on men.

[jfrancis]

Face variations by sex:

http://www.beautyanalysis.com/mba_facevariationsbysex_page.htm