Forensic Art

Forensic Artists can closely depict what a person looked like from their skull.

As there are variables and features not evident from the skull alone, these facial approximations are generalizations used to trigger recognition.

If you recognize someone in Active Cases, please connect with the contact in their CASE FILE.

Forensic Sculptors combine art and science to create a facial approximation over a skull or replica skull. This can be done physically or digitally.

Marina uses this traditional method or sculpting over a physical skull replica:

• A 3D scan is made of an unidentified human skull.
• A replica is 3D printed from the scan.
• The skull arrives with a  Case File which includes information from a medical examiner and/or other experts. It should include the subjects suspected age range, population affinity, and any distinctive facial characteristics.  This is reviewed before sculpting.
• Based on the case file information tissue depth markers are applied to the skull using verified data sets. The tissue depth marker projects the thickness of flesh at specific points.
• Using plasticine, the face is sculpted over the skull, starting with the anatomy and finishing with the skin surface, which will terminate at the end of the tissue depth markers.
• Artistic skill is used to create a lifelike human face and features based only on the skull, info, anatomy, data sets, and tissue markers.
• Artistic license is consciously excluded. Care is taken to not infer.
• Elements of the facial reconstruction that cannot by dictated by the skull alone are treated with artistic generality. For example, aging is sculpted to mimic the likely facial characteristic of a person the age listed in the case file. In reality, people age differently based on physical, environmental, genetic, and socio-economic factors that can't necessarily be read from the skull alone.