So, things are moving forward here. New network creates toonified faces out of real or made up ones, also allowes mixing of two input pictures. >Our ReStyle scheme leverages the progress of recent StyleGAN encoders for inverting real images and introduces an iterative refinement mechansim that gradually converges to a more accurate inversion of real images in a self-correcting manner. https://yuval-alaluf.github.io/restyle-encoder/

>>10461 Oh, video: --write-sub --write-description https://youtu.be/9RzCZZBjlxM

>>10463 Thanks very much for taking the extra time to give a more full youtube-dl command to use Anon. Getting and keeping the description and subs will be important to anyone keeping personal archive of YT videos, once cancel-culture Marxism literally deletes anything/everything that could possibly have any bearing whatsoever on either robowaifu creation, or anything else that could possibly help men. Since the Lynxchan software adds an '[Embed]' into the text of the command, I always put such a command here on /robowaifu/ inside codeblocks, since the CSS here disables this embed tag. youtube-dl --write-description --write-auto-sub --sub-lang="en" https://youtu.be/9RzCZZBjlxM

>>10461 >>10463 That's really cool Anon. He's humorous to listen to as well, his enthusiasm is great.

That screen one looks nice for nanny.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4865223 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_wkbLL0fqM LED Matrix behind tinted plastic, cheap, easy, customizable

>>12938 Thanks, this might be something fitting very well into the basic idea of the board: Making affordable robowaifus, which don't need to look like humans but can be a bit more on the robot side.

>>12938 That's like Rina Chans board. She's am autistic that uses a board to convey her emotions because making facial expressions is hard for her. Her board could be a really cute face for a robowaifu.

>>13560 this will be a thing in the 5-10 years all those kids growing up around masktards are going to be incapable of expressing emotions

>>13560 This could probably get quite expressive with a high enough resolution.

>>13560 >>13563 >>13565 I don't know. It just reminds me of the cultist NPCs from the game Mace Griffin. Using a display seems like a trade-off for using a real tangible face, if you want more face customization, but a emoticon-like face just seems like a really bad trade-off.

Simplified non-human faces go a long way towards bypassing the uncanny valley

>>12950 >Making affordable robowaifus, which don't need to look like humans but can be a bit more on the robot side. Agreed. >>14870 I don't personally find that particular face appealing, but I think in large part you're correct Anon. At the very least, I'd suggest we all seek for ways to maximize the expressive potential of, while minimizing the underlying complexities of, our robowaifu's face systems and structures.

>>14935 Could you provide examples of faces that work in 3D at human scale? Most figures are cute at figure scale but, they look uncanny at human scale.

>>14955 The life sized Rem statue is the best I've seen with a full anime aesthetic.

>>14955 Anime is inherently doll-like so at human scale it's bound to feel unnatural when you go to kiss her on the cheek and her eyes are twice the size of yours. Even most weebs will probably prefer something semi-realistic. It's really a matter of personal preference though. Some find anime dolls creepy and uncanny but I completely adore them. People will have to come to terms with robowaifus being animated machines and develop new aesthetics that feel comfortable to live with.

>>15285 Also something to consider is faces will feel very different once they start moving around. SEER's cable eyebrows aren't human-like but they add a lot of expression.

>>15280 That Rem is gorgeous Her roundness and cat like features do wonders. >>15285 Good point about the eyes. Human eyes are approximately an inch in diameter, so that could be a dimension to keep in mind. The ones with smaller noses and less human-like features are the cutest. There seems to be some middle ground between cats and girls that's best. Also, fangs are amazing! >>15287 This is an important point. Looking good in motion is vitally important.

>>15280 Wonderful figure Anon, thanks for sharing it. >>15285 >>15287 Good points. >>15288 A cute. I think we can all take pointers from the dolls/figurines world for design aesthetics.

Main aesthetic issues I see with regard to making realistic robot eyes: -Eyelashes often get punched in all crazy. This robot's eyelashes (specifically on the lower half) are way too sparse and erratic, and don't extend to the outer corners of its eyes. -Eyes do not sit right within the face. Notice how there's this gaping hole in the robot where the real person has muscle. Realistic eyes need muscle surrounding them like realistic teeth need gums. I understand the eyes need a way to move around without lubrication, though, so this is a real issue. -Again, this probably has to do with eye movement, but the eyelid creases are too deep. I've never seen anyone who has a weird overhang like the one above the left eye and there's something about the way the upper skin hangs above the crease that makes it look old and "crumbly".

>>15997 The eye crease is unique to Engineered Arts robots. Take a look at Asuna's eyes, they are very cute!

>>15997 I'm quite sure the eyelashes are just a matter of how much work to put in, and about finding the right technique. The gap problem is something I realized myself, but this might differ based on the construction. Also, silicone rubber is actually very flexible and wouldn't resist that much. This might just not being used because these are all just prototypes.

>>15997 >>15998 >>16001 My $.02 on the matter of hyper-realism for eyes is quite simple. In a word: don't. As discussed briefly here (>>15962, ...), and frankly, across this board for years now, is that we aren't in any position (not just us, I mean mankind generally) to 'escape' the Uncanny Valley for hyper-real, general-use Gynoids/Androids/Mammaloids anytime "Real Soon Now"(tm). We're simply too well-tuned by God as homo sapiens sapiens to be fooled easily, just yet. And 'human' eyes in particular are a relatively small part of the body that a great proportion of our brains & souls are tuned specifically for. I don't want to discourage anyone here from proving me wrong (far from it, I eagerly look forward to that day! :^), but tbh it's a fools errand IMO to think we'll manage such right out of the gate. Therefore, I agree personally with the general consensus on /robowaifu/ thus far (indeed our tagline): >"Advancing robotics to a point where anime catgrill meidos in tiny miniskirts are a reality." At least the cute 'anime' bit at a minimum for now. Any other approach in the near-term will be a disappointing fall into that infamous valley IMO. Thoughts? >=== -minor spelling edit -minor grammar edit -minor prose edit

>>16004 >matter of hyper-realism for eyes is quite simple. In a word: don't. Devs should try, then we'll see. Filling the gaps in the holes isn't really ruining anything. >escape' the Uncanny Valley >fall into that infamous valley I always like to remind people of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKJBND_IRdI Just don't make it look creepy nor ugly.

>>16008 This video also addresses the history of "uncanny valley" and the fear of human-like dolls: >Why Are We Afraid Of Dolls? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHzwMVpiLD4 It's basically a attractive idea for creators to use dolls for horror, because they were meant to be fun (similar thing with clowns). The problem is, too man people let their media consumption shape their world view. Some might get traumatized by watching horror movies while being to young. >Pediophobia: The Fear of Dolls https://www.verywellmind.com/fear-of-dolls-2671875 https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/pediophobia Around 9% (of Americans) seem to have it, more women than men. Exposure seems to be a important part of each therapy. >The outlook is very good for people with pediophobia who seek counseling for their phobia. To improve the outlook, a person with pediophobia needs to be fully committed to their treatment plan.

>>16008 My $0.02 is that the Uncanny Valley theory (at least the media's interpretation of it) isn't actually 100% accurate. Specifically the notion that there's a "no zone" somewhere between inanimate-looking and totally human-looking that everything within is creepy. Rather, I think that as intended human-likeness increases, the potential appeal increases in a linear fashion. However, the potential creepiness ALSO increases linearly. An extremely realistic robot has the highest potential for human appeal, but is also the hardest to execute well and will be the most off-putting if not well executed. Uncanny Risk vs. Reward, if you will. Consider something like the CG in a recent Final Fantasy game. The characters are ALMOST human but not quite - according to the Uncanny Valley, they should be extremely unsettling. Yet that's not the case, I'd imagine most people would rate them somewhere between "mildly creepy" and "highly appealing". (reminder: we're just talking about visuals here) Now contrast that with the IEEE Creepy Robots poll (https://robots.ieee.org/robots/?t=rankings-creepiest-robots) and you will notice that none of the top 10 are nearly as human like as my aforementioned Final Fantasy example, but I imagine most would consider any one of them far, far creepier. In fact, the human likeness varies a lot between the top ten - there are plenty of examples of robots people would consider less unsettling than the top 10 in this list despite them being more human-like. Compare Pepper and Kobian, for example. Or Cutieroid and CB-2. The biggest implication of this is that the best way to fix a creepy robot design is not to "move it left/right of the Valley" by changing it's human likeness, but rather to improve the execution of the design itself. While making a robot less human like can resolve the creepiness issue, it does so at the cost of appeal.

>>15997 Though you are correct on your aesthetic reasoning, realistic faces cannot be made by man. There are numerous flaws you did not mention which would still fall into the uncanny valley. >>16004 Chobitsu is correct, going for a demi-human/anime inspired aesthetic is much more attainable. >>16008 One of my favorite videos. Though it is correct to say the uncanny valley is not real, it's a useful term to describe the general unease felt by these creepy machines. I do think good can come from researching solutions to the uncanny problem but, that's best left to corporations like Disney. >>16012 I think "cuteness uber alles" is the best way of thinking about it. Almost human can be quite cute indeed, it's just easy for almost human to end up creepy like Sophia. This is why I think sidestepping into the demi-human route is good. I also want to clang monster girls though so, I'm heavily biased. Picrel has big fins, a flat face, and spiky red eyelashes without eyebrows. Almost human but, not quite.

This is a great conversation going r/n ITT, /robowaifu/. I hope we can keep it going for a while, and I'd like to link to it in our mini-FAQ in the /meta's

>>16008 My 2 cents is that the uncanny valley dont exist and dont matter. This is robotics not a beauty competition, so we should be caring about the technical aspects, this is why i think robots like Sophia are inspiring. This is good since there are actual challenges that need to solved like budget, time, hardware, software and more

>>15285 After more research, I've come to the conclusion that anime doll faces are the only way to make her cute and simple. All of these could be printed on an SLA printer relatively easily and the eyes would also be relatively easy to make. The hair would somewhat of a problem but, adding non-human ears like cat or wold ears would help. Go for the demi-human route.

>>16246 >After more research, I've come to the conclusion that anime doll faces are the only way to make her cute and simple. I've suggested all along that the doll industries have much to offer us in our quest for robowaifus. This isn't a new conception either.

>>16246 >>16263 These are great and at least close to good enough. I'd prefer a bit more permanent texture for the face, but that's a minor issue. That said, pointing out the minimum which is achievable is as important as pointing out what can be done with enough effort (and money): Aside from the Alita bust here >>9260, the pictures related are actually a doll.

Spherical rear projection faces are interesting

>>16008 watching this rn. Good point. Personally robots should be robots. I don't want wrinkles, "eye creases" or synthetic pores and skin imperfections on my r-waifu. Synthetic humanoids should embrace their .. syntheticness. That is my philosophy. (I guess I can make one allowance for 2B's chin mole, lol)

Nvidia AI can create or change faces based on sketches: https://youtu.be/MO2K0JXAedM - Not always working out great, but might be useful to go from real face to anime like at some point, or at least do some changes to a pic like increasing the size of the eyes. Though, I'm currently more inclined to use Artbreeder or something alike. I don't really need any pretty actress as a starting point, after what I've got there without much effort.

>>16679 >nosering disgusting.

>>16880 Maybe, but also not relevant. She looks very human-like but even better.

A projection mapped bit of fabric and a small blue laser projector that you can get for like 50$ is enough to have a fully believable and awesome lifelike face. If we can do in vrchat and not care you can project on an opaque fabric doll head.

Realistic and Interactive Robot Gaze Abstract >This paper describes the development of a system for lifelike gaze in human-robot interactions using a humanoid Audio-Animatronics® bust. Previous work examining mutual gaze between robots and humans has focused on technical implementation. We present a general architecture that seeks not only to create gaze interactions from a technological standpoint, but also through the lens of character animation where the fidelity and believability of motion is paramount; that is, we seek to create an interaction which demonstrates the illusion of life. A complete system is described that perceives persons in the environment, identifies persons-of-interest based on salient actions, selects an appropriate gaze behavior, and executes high fidelity motions to respond to the stimuli. We use mechanisms that mimic motor and attention behaviors analogous to those observed in biological systems including attention habituation, saccades, and differences in motion bandwidth for actuators. Additionally, a subsumption architecture allows layering of simple motor movements to create increasingly complex behaviors which are able to interactively and realistically react to salient stimuli in the environment through subsuming lower levels of behavior. The result of this system is an interactive human-robot experience capable of human-like gaze behaviors. This Disney project has been around for a while now, but it's a good example of facial animatronics combined with perception & behavioral software libraries to drive lifelike facial character animation. https://la.disneyresearch.com/publication/realistic-and-interactive-robot-gaze/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_knausEgv3A >=== -add external content links

You can slap moe eyes onto industrial equipment and it becomes hotter than half the women out there. https://twitter.com/ZappyZappy7/status/1615344252485251072

>>18874 LOL. This is what happens when you turn bored engineers loose on the factory floor! >inb4 ''Robowaifus Unique Advantages

"Follow Me" eyes as indicated here by Kiwi >>18870 Cheaply made with a printer or by drawing and painting them, UV light and "glass cabochons" required - tutorials: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BwAM_V2Jhg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuFWAq5rssM Not sure how this will look with cameras inside. Looking forward to see someone trying it out. I already got resin and colors for another way of building eyes (like this, I think: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQO7Dkjr22A ), which will be posted in the prototype thread until it's finished.

>>19037 >long-redheaded waifu w/ freckles. A cute! Thanks for the information, Anon. >Not sure how this will look with cameras inside. It is a very tricky topic at this stage of tech advance. There are super-micro cams used in intelligence, but they are way outside Garage Anon's price range for now. Many projects currently seem to be placing a 3D-cam near the forehead?

>>19049 Cheao current cameras for Raspberry Pi and such are small enough for a human-sized doll or something smaller but with big eyes. 2.5cm squared, because of the board around, the camera itself is even smaller. Maybe not small enough for a playdoll like in the picture. But my point was rather that I wonder if it's going to work with the "follow me" eyes, and how well. Anyways, I like the idea of using these "glass cabochons". Might also be good to use them as the top for resin eyes to make the camera work well. >Many projects currently seem to be placing a 3D-cam near the forehead? Yeah, sure but preferably not.

>>19050 >Cheao current cameras for Raspberry Pi and such are small enough for a human-sized doll or something smaller but with big eyes. Yes I think so. I have one and would work for Alita-styled 150+ robowaifus IMO. I'm guessing that the follow-me's might not work so well with an actual camera in back of the 'lens'. And actually, that brings another issue to bear as well: camera focus. These are vision-related topics (>>97), but have some bearing on faces as well obvs.

>>19051 I crosslinked it. Eyes are for vision but also part of the face. I mentioned resin eyes in the vision thread here >>10995

>>19061 Nice! Thanks Anon. Yes, robowaifu eyes & vision are such a specialized area they deserve their own thread tbh. Obviously, the eyelids, brows, nose, & upper cheeks are also involved in vision-specific character animation, but are much more obviously part of facial.

An interesting take on a robot face that I haven't seen built before is the type of "screen" face used on Hatsuki from the Cutieroid project: It seems to be either a contoured screen or (more likely) a hollow plastic face plate that a projector displays on. I find it quite fascinating! The only obvious downside is that from afar, it's hard to see the details (perhaps that's just on camera, though). Here's a website covering the project a bit: https://gigazine.net/gsc_news/en/20200209-cutieroid-project-hatsuki-wf2020w/

>>19380 Thanks, I think this has been shown here from time to time, but not in form of pictures to the extend here. It's interesting, but no one seems to want to copy it. Pro: Freedom of animation. Con: Probably everything else. Worst case: Concept patented.