I doubt that makehuman has enough fidelity for it.
The starts we had tackling this were always cartoony, and I prefer that direction too. (Too bad I didn't had the time to actually start working on any of this :/ )

if little me is allowed to resurrect a old idea.

you are right, if i show pioneer to younger friends oft mine, which are no space game players, it's the first they argue about, the humans in pioneer.

even if i explain Them our idea we had, they still don't like it, which i understand well.

heads could be 3d, generated and could even really interact with you, that's State of the Art.

but we missed this and sorry with the chosen model system it's not to imagine, collada isn't made for games, basta.

we would need a open, programable model system.
eh, sorry let's say almost as the scripting system we had.

with restriction oft real interacting, or OK, maybe just restricting animation oft the head, i can even imagine to use something like DX meshes.
direct-x gives you at least the possibility to make skinned Animations and this is a must to procedural generate faces and to let Them talk, in some sort of way.

you see...
old Problem and i fear to rant about.

what i don't really und er stand is,
what is so cheesy about the models?
many are not my style, but nozmajner does a good job with Thema, IMO.

choices are different and well pioneer is (or would be) open enough to exchange all models.

though, spacecrafts are to me More a style question.

though yes, what annoys you in the models (faces, humans i under stand well)

The faces have never bothered me. Also I think that 2D is the correct approach for us.
I've worked on projects where we wanted 3D customisable avatars and it was a huge amount of work for a *team* of people for almost 3 years!

Simpler systems use 2D texture changes on more basic 3D models, that's things like Nintendo Mii or the current (old) Xbox Avatars.
Those are a good compromise between the complexity of full 3D (like future Xbox Avatars will be).

Mostly it just needs some artwork updates like we have hoped several times would happen.

for the role the avatars have in pioneer it's what is needed.
and of course "would keep a team busy" i stated myself years ago to this topic.

but perhaps rendered scenes would grade the "cheesy pictures" up?
also faces (parts of) could be pre-rendered and give the whole thing a more
unified, serious (even artificial) look.

it's open enough to experiment with a different style
i.e. manga (i would like a comic style, it doesn't have to be manga)
but it has to be done.
and it's no secret how it works, it's just a lot of puzzling
(as a hint for those who think they look cheesy, it's up to you).

you can't please everyone.

I like em currently. Something refreshing about having ugly characters most of the time more realistic =)

shodan, ugly like this?

no no, no fear i'm no longer sitting in this shitty wheelchair

Actually, a cropped version of that photo would work fine in Pioneer. I'm using the Facegen-sci fi mod which as you may recall, replaces the generator with drawings culled from the internet. It works well but it needs more images. Cartoony doesn't work for me. The ships and planets are becoming more realistic but the faces are going to be less so? Here's a crazy thought. How about everybody submitting a photo in costume and use that as the facegen?

hi hi hi, marcello, i guess not everybody is like me and doesn't cares much. it's interesting most ppl keep their identity secret, except for sure on facebook or instagram. very strange.

I have no idea what "the Facegen-sci fi mod" is, can you enlighten me?

choices are different, i guess i would like cartoony stuff, something that reminds me of the good old days of pixel art, like D1's counterfei.

but as i said in mind i have something different and i would really like to build up on the idea of "anonymous" who seems unfortunately to be no longer present here.

once setup you could make a lot unique stuff with it, pseudo-realistic or cartoony.

so said personally i wouldn't mind about a lot of pirated images from old games, yeah does work only as mod and not for the official release, while homebrew stuff would be ideal.

actually i didn't dislike the standard facegen, the backgrounds could be more like this (while i have no idea how the recent pioneer looks like)

just as an idea what woul please me, the background would have to be less detailed and in the foreground you should see a lot of computers of some sort - of some sort.

of course such would be no facegen, very repetive and from my pov uninspired.

someone could steal that stuff, i have for good old Sims a face generator, one could extract easy the needed snippets from that, but neither this is really good, thus i'm for let's do it ourself.

if i'm in the mood for i will try one (or a couple of) to show off what my imagination is, i guess it can be automated, i'm pretty sure, all what would be left to do is to set the parameters for the humanoid generator of blender i.e. the renderings would look as good as a model with the simple exception that they are stills. i guess it would look quite professional but we would still keep the full capacity of the facegen. i.e. the necksize can be made uniform so that clothes/uniforms will fit exactly no matter what face gets generated, hair the same, no smearing needed, it could be sharp as a razorblade. you could render the hair seperately from the head, if you overlay this on a complete baldhead it would always fit. it's just that all participants who like to do this must keep certain parameters, but like i said this is no problem a once elaborated blender scene is interchangeable.
i guess it would be even possible with the right camera settings to extract the snippets while you render the head, resp. render each snippet alone ready to use in size. it's quite a lot of work to set all nicely up, but after it will be done by pressing of a button, or almost.

one could think even about alien races or ok alienized humans, because what would happen if humans live for generations under a flare stars light? certainly they would look alienized.

micros & macros?, my imagination goes wild.
green faced littles from a planet with extraordinary high gravity, flat like a cream-puff, lol.

"i should have done it before" 😉
one can automate a lot of things, not only FS hangars.

(one idea pushes the other).

It's just i can't do it all and i really like to work on phoenix, also i fear pioneer won't run on my recent notebook. and you know for sure certain things i dislike totally (colored nebulas i.e.).
i like it "slim" and not blown up, i dislike chewing gum colors in space the ships are colorful enough and should be imo a contrast to the hostile environment. and the thing with the nebulas is - well you can see them only this beautiful from our far pov, if you are close there is nothing to see of that beauty. take the beautiful orion nebula as example, it looks fantastic from here, but if you would be that close that it would fill the sky there would be nothing to see of that, them are only a few atoms per cubic kilometer, the density is far to low to be recognized from close as color or anything. besides keeping this in mind we can't even tell if we are in a nebula. compare it to the situation on our blue ball, if i look into a valley i can see the fog hanging in the valley, but if i'm in the valley i don't see that fog like this, ok it will hinder my sight but it doesn't looks like from far. if the density is low you would still recognize the fog from far while "i" as valley inhabitant will say we have blue sky. you can see a cities fog dome well from far, but you can't if you are in the city. and yeah, do you watched the nvidia clip i posted, cool no, absolutely not possible that you can see a single star as long as you are in solar system, the fucking sun is that bright that you either see all black or all white. if you filter the light so you can stand the brightness there will be no stars to see, otherwise the sun will overpower all. thus i stand to tomm's expression "what we have (had) is already to much".

sci-fi movies gave us the wrong imagination of that, foremost star-trek, with those thick colored nebulas, but that's unrealistic as it can be. as closer i am as less will be to see of it.
they gave us a lot of wrong imaginations about the look of space. it's mostly black and hostile and not very interesting at all. this blue ball here is still a big exclusion to all that what we discovered so far. eh like the light when you would travel at speed of light it would concentrate to you, all fucking energy would concentrate to you and not fled from you.

about certain things like the light of a suns temperature, because the classes we gave are temperature and not specific the color of their light. the spectrum reflects the temperature not the definitive light color. things i really like to talk about with someone like Harald or any else theoretical Astrophysician. i have a lot of questions to that. let's do a comparison even here, if i lighten up something with a xenon lamp does all become blue? no. if i use a candle is everything yellow-orange? no. a suns light is not a color filter, it's not substractive it's an additive color if it's to recognize as color at all. i guess even a red dwarf is still that bright that we would recognize it as white and not as red light, it's not a filter like a red lightbulb. natrium low-pressure bulbs are orange in spectrum, a little effect it has on the color, but dammit in my growing room it was bright white light. mercury bulbs are blue in spectrum, i never used them they are a pain for environment, but for sure all is bright white light to us. erm not only to us, the colors keep their color, it's not a filter. a green surface stays green under orange or blue light because this color is substractive, it can only reflect the green part of spectrum. it would only turn grey if that section of the spectrum would be missing, but it will be never blue, red or orange. yeah ok a tiny little bit, the reflection, if a surface is glossy, will reflect the color of the light, while even here i'm not sure how strong the effect will be, the spectral color classyfies the temperature not the actual color of light. pardon me if i repeat myself, it's no filter.

as textiletechnologist (tüechlidrugger) we used different colored lightsources to come close to the spectrum of the sun, it has a tiny tiny effect on color, but it never turns blue or orange, it's a scent of more blue or more orange. it greys out colors if the spectrum is one sided but it doesn't turns to the color of the lightsource. red stays red it's just less saturated if you leave away red light, up to grey if there is no red light. nearly black even because if the exact color is missing and the surface would be fully saturated in one color it can't reflect a shit.

let's ask isaac newton what he thinks about that 😉

pardon me a short addition.
so if my lightsource is orange the surfaces won't turn orange, just all other colors as orange are less saturated. A star never emmits energy in one section of the spectrum it's shifted more to one or the other side. but still it covers the whole spectrum of electromagnetical waves, from longest long wave to shortest x-ray.

The Facegen sci-fi mod is here in the downloads area. I can't remember who made it. The author's name isn't in the .zip. I may be able to help with this. I've started doing art after a 25 year hiatus, and am beginning to get my skills back. You can see my progress at my webcomic, Dear World.

is that the same marcel?
i'm amazed!

i couldn't do it that good.
(can't get off my naive stuff, i can't do mean or ugly it's always nice, i can draw a monster and it turns out to be a puppy)

why this gap?
it won't matter, one is only getting better in the age no matter experience.
the life one lived gets reflected in his work and if you are young your life is still ahead.

really a great job, i like it and it differs much from what my best buddy or i do.
he's cool, but his kind of drawings are urban, stinking, ugly, mean, but also good.
he reminds me much of a comic magazine we had in zurich, "strapazin" typical urban zurich underground.
he's still a skinhead and this is to see well. Phil is Oi.

Yep, the same Marcel that did the Hometowns mod. Thanks! Glad you like it. Check back on Halloween. There should be one or two more comics posted.

OHKEH! (for halloween)

OHKEH, i expected a little more of the facegen mod, a little bit at least, i expected simple pictures.
- somehow.

but i'm happy, this means the idea of generated images is still senseful, phew.
the thing is just, that i won't do it myself, not that i couldn't but i have else enough up and i don't like andy to wait to long for a few more FFED3D models.
i would like, but i don't like to displease the few who depend on me like andy or especially steve.
already i feel a little guilt to let them wait such long thus i didn't wan't to start a third thing.
i would like to participate a little, but i won't lead the team or can't/won't do all.
but we will see, if there is no one else...
it's not such a big thing, it will cost me a lot of time to elaborate an interchangeable blender scene. the mean thing is that if that is once done it's easy to create them. at least how i imagine it, if it works out as i expect i didn't know yet.

i will see, maybe it's an option to ask for support in the blender forum.
or maybe i need just a little more patience and someone will jump on the bandwagon.

it was i good idea of you to publish them and especially to show your work to me.
i haven't much cartoons to offer, made last year some, one to keep that what has happened to me in my mind (when the police kicked me out of my wheelchair) and two sketches about my thoughts to what is going down or on in the world.
foremost i'm not a good storyteller.
yes i'm a blabbermouth, but not a good storyteller, i know if i tell a story it's not very interesting, ppl don't like to listen to this plain stuff, they like it in full color on broad screen with a lot of special effects, in other words if you lie and blow your story up they listen, but if you just tell what happened for real it's not of interest. "aha ja, well, so so"
neither i'm good in telling jokes, to flat, to short, maybe i'm to serious in telling but i can't change that. i concentrate to much on the essential things and that's not funny.
i guess my sketches tell a lot more as my stories do.

to return to topic.
i would even like cheesy clips like in FFE, really i like that.

so yes the idea of counterfeis of co-devs and players as far as they like to publish that isn't such a bad one.
imagine put on a helmet of some sort and say "we don't like your kind around here". "that was a close one" i think that's hilarious.
i really though for a while about to engage my friends for such, i mean they just hang around, drink a lot of beer and smoke a lot of green leafy stuff (parsley of course what else did you expected?).
Phil's a great buddy, but unfartunately it's hard to do planned things with him. last year we took some chalk and uglyfied our railroadstation. it was great and the passengers liked it (not so the guards). but you can do this with him only when it's illegal, as soon as i say "let's go to the city and ask for a place where we can do this, they will be for sure cooperative" then he's off and didn't likes to. no it has to be illegal else it's not good. often you just have to ask and mostly the answer will be yes. you can still rebel if they say no.

dunno what i should think of it, i guess i prefere the pioneer way.
that's maybe also because my namegen table differs much, i use only surnames of astronomers, physicians, mathematicians and a few chemicists and very few actors and the whole russian and us manned space flight team. +100 from each faction.
that is from my pov a quite good blend, only some asian and african surnames are missing.
for the first names i did a quite deep search in web and i use a lot of arabic names (they sound good)
first names of some of the above.

i feel they don't fit to the facegen mod.
sometimes they do

sometimes it fails completely

i guess i really prefere this

no i didn't sorted them, but i tell you it's surprising how well faces and names recently workout.

c'mon that's Thalia Makarov, she looks exactly like.

or even this,

Ana Pannekoek, what else, imagine now some weird robot, it won't work.

Thalia Makarov is a lucky throw, but you will encounter many such lucky throws.

i know it's coincidental, but exactly this is good.
i merged also some names from walterars scout,it's a bit crazy to have all those marias and juans.
but since the table grew very large they are just some.

like i said i feel the sci-fi face mod, apart from beeing less shuttered, didn't works well with the international names i have.

and well stations, that's great if they are named after all these physicians and astronomers.
for the high pop outdoor world i made even a quite large table, most names are Heaven or Paradise in all kinds of human languages.

sometimes they are such grouped that one could think it's planned
but i sorted the names alphabetically, there is no grouping except this and because it's more or less random this is coincidentially.

a lat example from a highpop outdoor world

the other planet is named "New Tombogandhi"
100 pts for you if you know where or what Tombogandhi is

oh, i needed a little to long to edit my post, never mind.

the only thing which is maybe of real interest is that i reached better results with the namegen since i sorted all alphabetically, there is no chance that it could be coincidentially "orderly" or appear orderly, that some will stand exactly in a alphabetical order.

It looks like I have done this post before but it doesn't show up. If it does with you... sorry about this.

For those who like new faces in Pioneer:

https://spacesimpics2.weebly.com/