Facial Feature Manipulation for Trait Portrayal in Realistic and Cartoon-Rendered Characters

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Previous perceptual studies on human faces have shown that specific facial features have consistent effects on perceived personality and appeal, but it remains unclear if and how findings relate to perception of virtual characters. For example, wider human faces have been found to appear more aggressive and dominant, whereas studies on virtual characters have shown opposite trends but have suffered from significant eeriness of exaggerated features. In this study, we use highly realistic virtual faces obtained from 3D scanning, as well as cartoon-rendered counterparts retaining facial proportions. We assess the effects of facial width and eye size on perceptions of appeal, trustworthiness, aggressiveness, dominance, and eeriness. Our manipulations did not affect eeriness, and we find the same perceptual trends previously reported for human faces.