Scientifically prove to be Britain's most beautiful woman!

There is a scientific definition of human beauty. Based on specific
facial measurements. Apparenly, according to tests, even young
infants respond more positively to a beautiful face than an ugly one.
Some appreciation for beauty isn't learned, it's instinctive.

http://www.reuters.com/video/2012/0...iful-face?videoId=234790523&videoChannel=2602

 

This news is very surprising.
Surprising because this "news" is at least a couple of decades out of date.

 

What a joke. She has obvious asymmetry in her face and other defects. Many of
her facial features are of questionable attractiveness, depending on what one
considers attractive (I find a bend in the eyebrows unattractive, and the
middle of her face is too wide for my tastes). And the really big problem is
that she's blonde.

Perhaps people in the UK have lower standards, or at least different standards
from mine.

Yes, science does know some things about beauty. Human beings are attracted to
average faces. The closer one's face is to average, and the more symmetrical
it is, the more attractive one will be considered. However, "average" varies
from one culture to another, so someone who is perfectly average and thus
beautiful in one society may not be so in another. When all faces from around
the world are averaged, though, just about everyone considers the result
moderately pretty.

 

While facial symmetry is one of the things we judge beauty on, not
having any obvious asymmetry would look very strange to us, almost
ugly. Try doing the old experiment of taking a picture of a face, crop
out one side, flip the other and put it in place of what you cropped
out. It will look "interesting"

 

I think a more intreresting varation is to swap the eyes or invert
them.
Invert the lips and things start looking really odd. I fyoy do all the
above and turn the photo upside down
I think you can still reconginse the person but they look odd.

 

Not so. Perfect symmetry is considered beautiful. Many studies have shown
this.

 

....and here I was thinking immediately available was considered beautiful.

 

See for example the casting of the elves in Lord of the Rings.
You can create left reflection or right reflection portraits of most
people that look different enough to be two individuals. Simple trick in
photoshop provided they are staring down a 100mm or longer lens.

 

You also have to factor in lateness of night, and blood alcohol level.

 

Humans are very adept at detecting facial symmetry. When selecting
partners, bi-lateral symmetry, including facial symmetry, indicates
less genetic problems and less exposure to environmental stresses like
disease, toxins, accidents, etc. So we judge greater symmetry as more
desirable, i.e., beautiful. But only to the point where perfect
symmetry is reached. Since we are so good at percieving symmetry, and
since no person every born has perfect symmetry, a perfect symmetrical
face would look unnatural.

You need to do the experiment for yourself. Using photoshop, gimp, or
whatever editor you like, take a face that you consider beautiful (one
that probably has a very high degree of symmetry) and edit it so the
face is perfectly symmetrical. I.e., take the left side, flip it
vertically and place it over the right side. You'll be surprised at
the results.

 

The perfectly symmetrical faces I've seen look entirely natural.

That happens because of minor misalignments in the two halves, not because of
high symmetry.

 

And because one half is upside down.

 

If you're looking at real faces, you haven't seen a perfectly
symmetrical one.

Misalignment in the process above can cause a beautiful face to turn
ugly. You have to place the halves so that the eyes are the same
distance apart in the processed image as the original. IOW, cut and
flip the image exactly between the two eyes. If you do that, you're
not misaligning the two halves.

 

Exactly. They may look beautiful to you but they still look unnatural.
They don't look like a picture of a real face. Not even a picture of a
really beautiful real face.

You can't rotate the halves. You have to mirror image them.

 

They look both beautiful and natural. Without being told, I would not know
that they were not pictures of real people.

You have to do both.

 

If you had a photo lineup of computer generated perfectly symmetrical
faces vs. pictures of real faces that are considered beautiful, you
would be able to tell which are which. And if not, maybe your powers
of observation are just not that developed.

The only time you would need to rotate the flipped half is if the
original picture was not vertical.