FORENSIC FACIAL RECONSTRUCTION

 

Forensic FACIAL RECONSTRUCTION 

 By- Sanskriti Rani Sharma

2nd year BSC Forensic Science Criminology

Annai Fathima College of Arts and Science

INTRODUCTION

Facial reconstruction is the combinations of techniques that helps us to restore the face for the purpose of cosmetics or any functional reasons or even for the identification of the people by the police personnel. But forensic facial reconstruction, is slightly different from normal reconstruction and the techniques and the methods that are being employed as plastic surgery, normal surgeries carried for nose alignment and chin angle. Basically forensic facial reconstruction also termed as forensic facial approximation is the process of recreating the face of an individual from their skeletal remains through an amalgamation of artistry. In a simpler term when the artistic work is comingled with the scientific method and techniques then it will be a forensic facial reconstruction.

HISTORY

Hermann Welcker in 1883 and Wilhem His in 1895, were being credited for the first ever three- dimensional facial approximation from a cranial remain. Not only this, His also produced the average values for the reconstruction method which is Tissue Depth Thickness that is still being used. Kollmann and Buckley added other additional details and data in the form of tables that make it more organized and authentic. Rose Koller in 1936, led a team of sculptors that are recreating likeness of “Ancient Austrians” from skull. Forensic field witnesses the reconstruction technique because of Wilton M Krogman in 1962. In 2004, forensic expert came across their first case where the creation of an approximately 2,200 year old mummy based on CT and Laser scans came. This reconstruction was named as “Sulman Mummy Project”.

TYPES OF RECONSTRUCTION

1. 2D Reconstruction- This type of reconstructions are based on ante- mortem photographs and skull. The most common form of 2D reconstruction is sketching. When the forensic artist makes the sketch of either the suspected person or the culprit as described by the witness about their facial features by showing pre- made sketches of the various features of human face.

2. 3D Reconstruction- This is further sub divided into two parts namely, first one is Sculptures that are made from casts of cranial remains prepared with modeling clay. And the other one is with the help of High- Resolution Three- Dimensional Computer Images.

3. Superimposition- This technique is not mostly used because it requires the picture of the person that can be superimposed either manually or digitally by the investigators.

METHODS OF FACIAL RECONSTRUCTION

• Craniofacial Reconstruction is carried out using multiple disciplinarians along with various techniques and methods. Basically, we have three methods:

i. American Method- This method incorporates the tissue depth thickness. This is being done by the data that are being recorded using tissue puncture markers and ultrasounds.

ii. Russian Method- It uses musculature of skull. It mainly focuses to build the muscular form using clay substance.

iii. Manchester Method – This is the most commonly used method now- a –days because of the benefit that is being provided to the executing team as it incorporates both tissue depth markers along with the musculature considerations.

CHALLENGES ASSOCIATED WITH FACIAL RECONSTRUCTION

• Insufficient tissue thickness data

• Lack of methodological standization

• Subjectivity.

CONCLUSION

Not only the anthropological department but also our anatomical and osteological approaches are incorporated along with the contribution of the artistic work. This reconstruction have made the cases more easily solved as it provides the most important purpose of identifying the individual. So, this also add to the cases where less or no evidences are found. Steps like computer assisted method are being used along with digital image processing, pattern recognition to overcome the limitations that are faced.

REFERENCE

• https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/

• https://anthromania.com/

• www.en.m.wikipedia.org/

• www.sciencedirect.com

• https://epgp.inflibnet.ac.in

• www.usg.edu>ebook