Historical Figures How They Really Looked | Amazing 3D Facial Reconstruction

Ca.

The Living Force
FOTCM Member
Featuring in this video:
01. Ava, Bronze Age Woman (ca. 1800 BC)
02. Cleopatra (69 BC - 30 BC)
03. Dante Alighieri (1265 - 1321)
04. George Washington (1732 - 1799)
05. Henry IV of France (1553 - 1610)
06. Huarmey Queen, Peru (ca. 700 AD)
07. Jesus Christ
08. Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750)
09. Julius Caesar (100 BC - 44 BC)
10. Lady of Cao (ca. 450 AD)
11. Lord of Sipan (ca. 300 AD)
12. Marcus Agrippa (63 BC - 12 BC)
13. Mary, Queen of Scots (1542 - 1587)
14. Maximilien de Robespierre (1758 - 1794)
15. Meritamun, (ca. 1500 BC)
16. Mozart (1756 - 1791)
17. Nefertiti, Egyptian Queen (ca. 1350 BC)
18. Nicolaus Copernicus (1473 - 1543)
19. Otzi The Iceman (ca. 3250 BC)
20. Owain Glyndwr, Welsh ruler (ca. 1359 - 14150
21. Philip II of Macedon (382 BC - 336 BC)
22. Richard III of England (1452 - 1485)
23. Robert the Bruce, King of Scots (1274 - 1329 AD)
24. Saint Anthony of Padua (1195 - 1231 AD)
25. Santa Claus (St. Nicholas) - (270 AD - 343 AD)
26. Simon Bolivar (1783 - 1830)
27. The Mycenaean "Griffin Warrior" (ca. 1500 BC)
28. Tiberius, Roman Emperor (42 BC - 37 AD)
29. Trajan, Roman Emperor (53 AD - 117 AD)
30. Tutankhamun, Egyptian Pharaoh (1341 BC - 1323 BC)
31. William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)
32. Ramses II, Egyptian Pharaoh (1279 BC - 1213 BC)
 
Oh brother, "Jesus Christ". What a howler! A guy who didn't even exist as such!

And Julius Caesar? It all depends on which statue/bust you believe is authentic or true to life.

The statue/bust of Marcus Agrippa looked more convincing than the "re-creation".

Bad painting of Mary Queen of Scots for comparison. Why didn't they use the death mask? It's authentic, at least.

Robespierre looks way too exaggerated.

Meritamun, very bad job. No excuse, either, because there is a lot to work with that is better than this.

Mozart: nope, unconvincing considering other images of him.

Nefertiti: very bad job, again, and no excuse with all the images and busts of her that are available.

Copernicus? Puh-leeeze...

And for the rest, if that's the best they can do, they're fired!
 
I agree that the reconstructions were, mostly, pretty poor. Even when placed side by side with their portrait there were obvious differences in things like the size of the nose size and so on.

I've been dubious of archeological facial reconstructions ever since hearing it was more of an 'art' than a science. I can't remember where i came across it but having a quick look online i came across the following paper and, at least for achaeological reconstructions, it definitely seems to me that it lacks any real scientific technique.


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2815945/ said:
Facial reconstruction – anatomical art or artistic anatomy?

Although facial reconstruction is used extensively in human identification investigations with a good level of success, and is frequently applied to archaeological investigations to depict the faces of people from the more distant past, the technique receives a great deal of criticism from both science and art perspectives. Criticism from scientists includes the contention that the technique is too subjective and heavily reliant on the artistic skill of the individual practitioner (Suk, 1935; Vanezis et al. 1989; Stephan, 2005). Attempts to automate the process have been poorly received and have not been as successful in forensic investigation, whilst accuracy studies have reported extremely variable results (Snow et al. 1970; Helmer et al. 1989; Haglund & Raey, 1991, Stephan & Henneberg, 2001; Wilkinson & Whittaker, 2002; Wilkinson et al. 2006), and this has led to claims of unreliability and lack of reproducibility (Stephan & Henneberg, 2001; Stephan, 2005). This has been exacerbated by the claims of the media and some practitioners, who state that success is dependent on uncanny intuition or psychic ability (Maxwell, 2001; Vaughan, 2004). On the other hand, some researchers suggest that facial reconstruction techniques are too reliant on average data and inflexible standards (Brues, 1958) and therefore will only produce a facial type rather than a characteristic likeness (Wilkinson, 2008).

This paper will discuss the facial reconstruction technique employed by the author, commonly known as the Manchester method – a combination method developed and taught primarily by Richard Neave (Prag & Neave, 1997) and Wilkinson (2004). There is a great deal of disagreement between practitioners regarding techniques, accuracy levels and reliability. Whilst acknowledging this controversy, I will attempt to assess the procedure employed for facial reconstruction at my institution in relation to the degree of scientific process and artistic interpretation that are involved in each stage. This will enable us to establish whether the process is an artistic interpretation of anatomical structures or a depiction of anatomy using artistic skills. The conclusions are not applicable to all other facial reconstruction methods employed by forensic practitioners and it must be noted that some practitioners apply a different level of artistic interpretation.

[...]

Traditionally the nose has been considered a feature with poor levels of reconstruction accuracy and there have been many studies assessing the relationship between the configuration of the nasal tissue with the bones surrounding the nasal aperture (Tandler, 1909; Virchow, 1912; Schultz, 1918; Gerasimov, 1955; Glanville, 1969; Macho, 1986; McClintock Robinson et al. 1986, George, 1993, Prokopec & Ubelaker, 2002; Stephan et al. 2003).

[...]

The morphology of the mouth is an area of the face where there is more reliance on artistic interpretation.

[...]

Ear shape is also very difficult to determine. Gerasimov (1955) considered the angle of ear to be parallel to the jaw line and stated that where the mastoid processes are directed downward, the earlobe will be attached (adherent), whereas where the mastoid processes point forward, the earlobe will be free. As yet very little information regarding ear shape, size and prominence can be determined reliably and typically standard ear casts will be attached to the reconstruction, which vary in relation to size and lobe pattern only (Wilkinson, 2004).

[...]

There is an assumption with the use of these datasets that the individual has an average amount of fat over the surface of the face. This may or may not be true, but since it is currently impossible to determine facial fatness from the skeletal structure

[...]

Age-related changes to the face have been well documented and follow a predictable pattern

[...]

Ancient Egyptians have provided a rich source for analysis, as the mummification process preserves (with some modification) the soft tissues of the face as well as the skeletal material.

[...]

Often the assessment of mummified soft tissues will reveal details of facial morphology that cannot be determined from the skeleton alone (Fig. 9A), increasing the reliability and reducing the artistic interpretation of the facial reconstruction.

[...]

The facial appearance of bog bodies has been of great interest since the earliest discoveries, as the soft tissues are preserved by the acidity of the peat bog environment (Asingh & Lynnerup, 2007).

[...]

Conclusions

Sculptural skills are clearly useful when reconstructing the musculature of the face, but where anatomical accuracy is achieved the reconstruction process should involve no artistic interpretation and the procedure is reproducible. Determination of facial feature morphology should follow scientific procedure, except for the lips and ears, which require a degree of artistic interpretation. The skin layer in a child or young adult can be determined relatively reliably, but the degree of artistic interpretation of surface texture increases with increasing adult age. More artistic licence may be appropriate in archaeological reconstructions than in a forensic investigation, as recognition of the face is rarely the primary objective and producing the most likely depiction may be more important than individual identity. Some archaeological investigations may provide additional facial appearance information from preserved soft tissues, portraits or pathological conditions.

The paper considers a reconstruction of Bach as an accurate example, which used both a skull scan and a painting. Although, maybe they could have done as good a job with just the painting?

The combination of skeletal assessment and portrait evaluation presents a facial depiction of Bach that can be considered as accurate as is possible with the material available

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Fig. 10
The facial reconstruction of Johann Sebastian Bach. The computerized facial reconstruction (A) utilized a 3D model of the skull from laser scan data. Texture was added to the resulting face (B) using the Haussmann 1746 portrait (D) as reference material regarding the degree of fatness, eye condition, skin colour, eye colour, hair colour and skin textures (C). Courtesy of the Bachhaus, Eisenach, and Dr Caroline Wilkinson & Janice Aitken, University of Dundee.
 
That 3D Bach example is odd. If the painting is the reference, I'm confused with the skin tone, eyebrow placement, eyelids and nose width...mouth looks good though. With many of them, it's as if the developers have just looked at the reference and gone, "nah"...
 
I agree, they are not so good after all. The guys or guys who did the job maybe were stoned? Who needs 3D when you have extraordinary paintings by masters? Or artists from the epoch? A painting gives space to feel the character, go inside the painting or statue and be, yourself, also creative mentally. 3D gives you something dry, without art. That's the way things go today!
 
Currently I'm doing a somewhat similar task for our current project. Finding expressive, interesting, attractive, attention-grabbing faces, then matching bodies with eyecandy-clothes on the internet - only as an excellent reference and creating from them a 'wallet-opener composite', just the like the above, entirely in 3D and anew [evading any copyright issues] with the intention to sell tens of thousands of copies of our product, when people will see these there. I'm doing nine of such "reconstructions".

From this viewpoint, regards high-quality work and love that went into these reconstructions, if it were similar to my aim to create the most wanted merchandise - I would buy only these three below:
Nefertiti, Otzi the Iceman, Simon Bolivar.

I think the rest is worthless junk. I would fire their creators.
 
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I've been dubious of archeological facial reconstructions ever since hearing it was more of an 'art' than a science. I can't remember where i came across it but having a quick look online i came across the following paper and, at least for archaeological reconstructions, it definitely seems to me that it lacks any real scientific technique.

I agree, my guess is that face reconstructions are almost never representing reality.

There would be a relatively easy and sure way to test the credibility of face reconstruction techniques based on a skull. You make a blind study, or several of them, and give the "experts" skulls of humans of whom we definitively know how they looked like; like from people where we know for sure how they looked like, since we have photos. To make sure they do their job, you just don't tell them who this person was. Then we can see the results and compare them to reality. Further studies could be done to see how and if background information provided to the "experts" distorts the result; like race, epoch, area where he or she lived and so on.

I did a quick search and couldn't find such a study. Maybe there is one out there?
 
Came upon a relatively new YouTube channel with a host of reconstructions using colorization & AI Technology to bring historical portraits and statues back to 'life'. Slightly creepy yet also at times really quite effective, even moving.

MYSTERY SCOOP

This video uses the bust of Julius housed in the Vatican:


Untitled1.jpg

And here's a still from the video starting at time stamp 1:01 for comparison - which has subtle animation/AI movement added...

Untitled2.jpg


I leave it to you to judge if the results are worthwhile - video also includes representations from statues of Agrippina The Elder, Antinous, Livia Drusilla, Julia Titi Flavia, Gordian III, Poppaea Augusta Sabina and Pompeia Plotina.

Two further videos of interest linked below covering emperors from 1st and 2nd centuries as per MS dating:

1st c
Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titu, Domitian, and Nerva




2nd c

Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus, Commodus, Pertinax, Didius Julianus, Septimius Severus and Caracalla


 
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