i has eyebrows!

Isn't facial hair a pain?

I mean, it's not like I can even do anything about the fact that my eyebrows are horrific looking. Sometimes, I try to remain as expressionless as possible, so that maybe, just maybe, nobody will notice. Of course, with at least one person looking at me for great lengths of time on a regular basis, they're bound to notice. Plus, I can't keep still; I'm always smiling, bouncing in place, or, well, being full of life.

Yet, what can I do? I'm polygonal - there are no tweezers for me.

/sigh

Oh, the woes of the female Night Elf named Taeminas. In Blizzard's art, Night Elves like Taeminas are portrayed one way, but if you catch a glimpse of Taeminas, you can't help but wonder what the heck is wrong with her eyebrows!? Or, maybe that's just me.

... Are you confused yet? They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. So then, let me provide two pictures, for further clarity. Or rather, two sets of screenshots.

This screenshot was created using WoWModelViewer. The model is of my Night Elf, Taeminas (more on her tomorrow.)

Both figures are doing the /shy emote. The model has been rotated so you can better see the face.

On the left figure, you can see the "lower" set of eyebrows - they're very fuzzy. Yet, you can see a second set of eyebrows... Isn't that... odd!

On the right figure, you can see the result of my 5-minute editing job using the smudge tool. Basically, I took out the fuzzy, annoying eyebrows.


Now, I do admit that both the before and after look kind of odd based on the rotation I chose, so let's look at a second, more natural pose.

Here is Taeminas from a very normal resting pose. Again, we have a before and after created simply by removing the fuzzy eyebrows. The difference, to me at least, is not just "el oh el, no more fuzzies!" but the oddly aloof expression is gone. To me, the "after" model better matches the illustrations we see often produced by Blizzard.

The fuzzy eyebrows, I think, were some sort of placement guide. They're drawn onto the skin of the model, while the second set of eyebrows are, for lack of a better term, a separate layer.

(Can you tell that I'm not an expert?)

I think that the fuzzy set of eyebrows aren't necessary. If anything, perhaps they should be thinned down so that they still act as a guide, but do not overstep boundaries to produce an image that is different than much of what Blizzard portrays, as seen [here] for example.

The fuzzy eyebrows is one reason why the Night Elf model started to irk me. With Taeminas, I intentionally picked a skin tone and hair color that I hoped would blend better, making the fuzzies less prominent. Taeminas' appearance is the result of my desire to make a Night Elf model that didn't bug me. Aside from her skin and hair blending, I chose a short hairstyle to avoid clipping; long hairstyles can cut through the cloak model, which seems silly. The face and markings were chosen because I thought they worked well together.

Now, Taeminas' fuzzies are still around ingame of course, but with the help of my trusty FlagRSP description, anyone who reads about Taeminas will learn that her eyebrows have been *gasp* manicured! They're not long and bushy, but look more like humans' eyebrows - they're shorter and thinner. This is the beauty of roleplaying with FlagRSP (or even MyRolePlay).

Blizzards' character creation is rather limited - certainly nowhere compared to Oblivion for example. However, roleplayers don't let the limited choices get them down, no, roleplayers provide a description to bring new life to an otherwise cookie-cutter model.

Blizzard can make improvements to their models and add more choices - as they will in WotLK for hairstyles. Blizzard may even revamp character models entirely one day, allowing for more customization; height, girth, and other such features. Yet in the end, a person's imagination will always be there to break the game's parameters of what a character looks like and make things more interesting.