MakeHuman head prototype

Status: local prototype, rejected by the automated visual gate, not integrated. The asset is a standalone head/neck extracted from the CC0 MakeHuman base in tmp/npc-research/makehuman/base.obj. It is kept as a reviewable experiment and is not part of the shipped NPC contract.

Asset

GLB: assets/models/blender_src/makehuman_head.glb
Review sheet: blender_previews/sheet_makehuman_head.jpg
Source workflow (development-only): tmp/npc-research/build_makehuman_head.py — extracts the MakeHuman head, cuts it at the neck, keeps the head/eye/mouth components, cuts an almond aperture through a skin eyelid mask, adds recessed eyeballs with flat iris/pupil discs, anchors brows to the face surface, renders front/three-quarter/profile and exports the standalone GLB.
Measurements (final build, inspect): 12,641 triangles / 7,690 split vertices; bounds approximately x ±0.094 m, y -0.180…0.042 m, z 1.530…1.803 m in project Z-up space. It is inside the 16,000/16,000 character cap.
Materials used: skin, eye_white, iris, pupil, hair. No textures are baked into this prototype.

What was done

Imported the CC0 MakeHuman base OBJ and cleared the importer axis rotation.
Applied the project scale/axis transform: 1.82 m body, Z-up, metres, front −Y.
Cut the head at the neck (z ≈ 1.53) rather than keeping the cut shoulders; capped the neck opening.
Built an eyelid mask by subtracting an almond aperture from a skin sphere centred on each eye (solver = "EXACT"), then recessed the globes so the cornea sits behind the lid plane.
Added flat iris/pupil discs on the globe axis; disabled backface culling so the discs stay visible at three-quarter angles.
Anchored brow strips to the skin with object-space ray casts and added a shallow supraorbital ridge so they do not float, then reduced the crown height to improve the profile silhouette.
Fixed a material-remap bug introduced by joining the extra eye objects: the joined head faces were pointing at the eye_white slot, making the whole head render as white clay. The largest connected component is now forced back onto skin after the join.
Rendered front/three-quarter/profile views in a neutral review studio and exported the standalone GLB.

Provenance

Base mesh: MakeHuman / MPFB base, CC0, from the local research set tmp/npc-research/makehuman/; see CREDITS.md.
The head is a derived prototype, not a shipped NPC. It does not enter assets/models/blender/npc/, npc_base, the runtime NpcAvatar path, CI, or a release package until the NPC overhaul plan accepts it.
Source photographs/proportions are not used as textures here; this is a geometry-only head built from the researched model data.

Review criteria

Accept only if:

the head reads as human at front/three-quarter/profile and the neck is a clean head/bust silhouette, not a shoulder cut;
eyes, brow, nose, mouth and ears are readable without spikes, holes or floating shells;
the asset is inside the character budget and has no script/contract violation;
the prototype remains clearly local and un-integrated until the part pipeline is approved.

Judge result

VERDICT: REJECT (vision judge z-ai/glm-5.3-flash, final build render set above). The gate is blocked; the prototype is not presented as an accepted head.

Blocking findings:

P0 — globe depth is inconsistent across views. The front/three-quarter reads still show a bead-like iris with a pale sclera halo, while the profile reduces the eye to a brown sliver. The judge reads this as a faked recess rather than a socketed globe under a lid.
P0 — no convincing lid overlap. The iris remains nearly circular in front and the upper lid does not visibly clip the globe; the skin lid mask reads as a crater around a bead.
P0 — iris orientation reads decal-locked at three-quarter, so the gaze appears to drift off the head axis.
P0 — the aperture/lid mask is too circular and lacks medial/lateral canthi, so the eye still reads as a doll eye at portrait distance.

Should-fix findings:

the brow tubes are better anchored but the medial ends still detach in three-quarter/profile;
nose lacks a defined tip/wing and nostrils;
mouth is a faint geometric seam with no lip volume;
crown/back-of-skull is still faceted and egg-like in profile;
the catchlight is baked geometry and is not consistent between eyes.

What passed: the skin/eye material remap is correct, the eye openings are closed, the standalone GLB reports 12,641 triangles / 7,690 split vertices with no issues, and an assembled npc_casual with this head passes inspect at 15,532 / 16,000 triangles, 13,310 split vertices, 14 bones, no issues.

Known limits: bald mannequin-like presentation, stylized geometry-only iris/pupil, no rig, no UV texture pass, and the neck cap is a review cut rather than a body-welded seam.

Next steps after the gate passes

Replace the radial lid mask with real upper/lower lid masses that fold over the globe, with pointed canthi, and pass the profile view.
Move the iris onto a curved cornea cap so its orientation follows the globe at three-quarter angles, and use a lighting-driven catchlight instead of baked white geometry.
Compare against the project _face baseline and decide whether this head is the base for the local head/face overhaul.
Add a clean UV/material pass and a contract armature/weights if it becomes part of a library character.
Keep the source script under tmp/; promote only the reviewed GLB and durable docs/preview sheet.

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