I just realized that in the excitement of posting about sticking Sopranoes characters into Rainbow Six: Vegas I forgot to walk you fully through the process of creating your own celebrity in-game faces for the shooter.

This all comes via Will, who actually took the time to put my wild ruminations into practice, and DigiMask the people behind the technology.

The first, and often hardest step, it seems is finding two really good shots of the celebrity you want to face map. They need to be clean, clear, up close pictures showing a head-on and side pose.

Here are some tips for what to look for in a photo:

The image should have a neutral expression, eyes open, mouth closed. No smiling if possible.
Make sure you can see both ears in the face-on image.
Make sure the hair isn't covering the ears or forehead.
No glasses.
You should only be able to see one eye in the side-on shot, not even part of the other, and the whole ear.
Make sure the profile faces to the left.
Even lighting with no shadows or bright highlights is important.

Once you find your celeb pics, photoshop them if necessary to get the brightness and contrast right.

Will pointed his Vision Camera at his computer screen to do the capture, which probably explains Gandolfini's angelic glow. I'll try to do some off of prints later this week.

Good luck and happy photo hunting. Make sure to send in any particularly good faces. Too bad Vegas doesn't let you save multiple custom faces.

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