I am modelling my first human face. And now after some days i don’t see what to do anymore on the model. It was supposed to be a female head, but how more i was tweeking the mesh how more the head seems male.
Anyway, ill post the wire from the model in front, side and back in perspective and an screenshot in orthographic view.
I will also add the .blend file in the attachments for those who want to take a closer look to the model.
The major issue I see is the global proportion, even if you’re heading for a cartoon head, the proportions are off and that’s usually under estimated by the beginners.
I see you already got the edgeloop concept which is really good. Since your model seems low poly, you should start working on the proportion right now before it gets to hard to modify.
Considering it’s your first head, I give you 4* since most “first head” I saw were more like subdivided cubes. Keep up the good work, promising!
First i want to thank Robo3Dguy and Djordhan for there nice comments.
And now for the critique.
The strange vertex behind the ear:
I did pull that in before and then out again, and i was just not sure what was best, because it looks a bit like the skullbone to the right of the ear. Anyway ive tried to modify the mesh. It should look a bit better now.
The strange edge loop configuration to the lowerleft of the ear:
This problem started when i was nearly done with connecting the ear mesh to the head mesh. The last opening in the mesh that had to be filled was a triangle ofcourse… I think i have struggeld an hour or so (or even more) to think on that edge loop configuration (and the triangle was no more). You see that i have deleted that edge loop configuration and found an other much better edge loop for it
The overall bad proportions:
Ok, this is hard… Suddenly i am looking on a whole other way to people there face. Further, i have studied alot faces and how they look. So what have i changed?
I have tweeked the nose a bit, scaled the ear and mouth a bit down. I have pulled the upper headpart (upper headpart till just above the eyes) a bit down thowarths to the eyes, and the lower headpart (selected from down till just above the mouth) a bit up to the nose. Then i have tweeked the mesh a bit here and there in general in the face.
Anyway, i think the face is overall looking better then in my last post. Tell me if i am right or not… :rolleyes:
Work on the brow and defining the chin line, you’ll want a edge running along the side of the chin from below the ear to the base of the clef in a chin. I post an image on some little things you can do to help the topology
This is a good start keep it coming remember the edges of polygons need to sit in the peaks and valley on your model.
My advise would be to step away from the computer and leave Blender alone for a few days. Hit the art store, flee markets whatever and buy yourself a realistic bust of a person. It doesn’t have to cost much it just needs to be realistic, than grab a sketch pad and a desk lamp and light that sucker from as many angles as possible i and sketch away. Break up how the light falls onto the bust into planes, take a look at Cezanne’s work to see what am talking about.
This will teach you how to break up a subject into planes so that you capture the form and bulk better. Photos never teach you how to do this. The bulk of you planes don’t in any way follow those of a real head at the moment.
Andrew Loomis in his head drawing book had a great page where he breaks up the face into its major planes take a look at that if you can for a start.
To add to what TM said also check out George Bridgman. You can pick up his books cheap and they are invaluable when it comes to studying the planes of the human body.
Thanks all for all those reply’s. Now i know what to do and what direction to head in search for valuable resources to study the human body. I decided that i will stay working on this head “when i feel like it” between other Blender projects and try to get it better and better in time when i learn new stuff. This human face started when i went trough the “modelling an human head with extrusion modelling” chapter in the “introducing character animation with Blender” book by Tony Mullen. The human face in the first post is pretty much the result of that (exept that i have added already some more edgeloops then the model in the book since that was needed to connect the ear to the head).
To tyrant monkey: I have already started to look into some books from Andrew Loomis, and i have to say that it was already much of a help. I will continue to read his books in the future.
To linuxpimp21: I had already found the human modelling tutorials from Jonathan Williamson before. In fact, ive used his “modelling an human ear tutorial” for the ear. But, thanks anyway for giving the link
To Shatter and jessegp: I have tried to soften the brow, i got rid of the bump below the ear and tried to give the nose some more volume at the bottom. I have worked on the cheekbones to. Then the topology: i have added the edgeloops jessegp pointed out. And after,that i did some overall tweaking on the face.
To Robo3Dguy: I will color/texture it ofcourse, eventually… Since i have total no experience in texturing an human being at all for the moment. Now i mainly focussing on the modelling process.
I feel like the crease around the mouth/nose area is too sharp. They should be there, but perhaps not that much. I also suggest making the cheeks rounder in general. There’s also another crease near the mouth pointing up that I’m pretty sure shouldn’t be there at all…
Well i found some time at last to do some more tweaking at the human head.
Here are 4 images from the progress so far. One in front and side with wire (orthographic) and 2 in perspective (one with wire and one withoud wire).
I want espessially thank Djordhan for the modified .blend file that he send me from my head. Because of this i better understand the head proportions in Blender now.
I know its still not looking “right” but i have a feeling that i make some progress, no…?
There no forehead. You have to raise that up.It will take away the ugly. You also have to bring the chin out. These are just things based on a female…but even working off a photo. Take the top of the nose in…Brink it back “y”. I like what your doing, but you have a lot of little mistakes that kills the reality of a female…(I know believe me…my last date looked like yours…)
Edit: I looked back…your not hitting your photo…even the seemingly small differances in the forehead, nose…and bring that chin out! …your just missing these…if you can hit these it will make a big differance…good work though!
The thing that really sticks out to me is how far back of the references face your models face is. If you selected areas one by one and pulled them forward one by one it would do a lot for your model.It leads me to wonder if you are shying away from using the transparency setting for the whole model, I found it very daunting at first but quite useful in working on my sense of proportion.
JF
Another thing to look out for when modelling from a side and front view is that the head ends up square from the top. This causes all the planes of the cheeks and brow to become too flat and the face to have ‘corners’ on it.
Keep up the good work, promising!
Now i know what to do and what direction to head in search for valuable resources to study the human body. I decided that i will stay working on this head “when i feel like it” between other Blender projects and try to get it better and better in time when i learn new stuff. This human face started when i went trough the “modelling an human head with extrusion modelling” chapter in the 
