did they use real people as models?

[riverf78]

The 1st thing i thought about playing HL2 was how real-life looking the models were. I am wondering if actual people were used as models for the faces/bodies?
I know some famous people were enlisted as actors but I dont recall Robert Guilliome looking like his ingame character.

 

[Hectic Glenn]

Yes you are correct! They did use real people, if you buy the book raising the bar and go to page 122-123 theres all the faces and their real life counter parts. Its quite scary, although we can't scan or link you to pictures due to legal reasons. So if you are really interested buy a copy

edit: with Eli, indeed Robert did the voice for him, but the guy he looks like (a guy they found on the street) is remarkably identical to the one in the game, as is Barney, Kleiner, Breen and Father Grigori

 

[Beerdude26]

Yes.
[BLATANTCOMMERCIAL]
Read it all in 'Raising The Bar'.
[/BLATANTCOMMERCIAL]

EDIT : That's unfair, Hectic Glenn read my mind then typed it :'(

 

[SLH]

Did they actually use them for the models as well, i thought it was just the textures?

 

[Beerdude26]

Just textures? They used clothes for that one.

Hmmm naked Alyx
*gurgle*

Edit : This topic is more like a chat room than a forum topic lol

 

[clarky003]

there are people out there who look pretty much identical to the game character's.. spooky.. I saw picture's of them on the forum somewhere, but that was ages ago

 

[riverf78]

thanks for the replies. I'm going to look for this book now. This is the 1st time I've played any kind of Half-Life game and I really dig it. I have not finished the game yet (if I play too long it starts to make me feel like I'm going to throw up; think its the way the view moves around so quickly). Barney is my favorite so far.

 

[Beerdude26]

doesn't he just look like Whiskey?

*Shudder*

If you don't understand the joke, shame on you.

 

[Harryz]

Yeah, the models are based on real-life people. If you buy "Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar" Artwork book, it shows the original people that that characters are based on. Heres a favourite quote from the book:

"We thought we had Dr. Kliener's model in the bag, until we laid eyes on Ted Cohrt. We were in the elevator with him and we said "Oh my god, that's Doctor Kleiner!" We spoke with him and he was happy to let us use his face, as his two teenage boys were both Half-Life fans. It was always fun to run into him at Starbucks with Team members that didn't know where we got Kleiner's face. They'd just start staring at him, trying to figure out why he looked so familiar."
- Bill Van Buren, Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar.

Heh.

 

[Beerdude26]

(if I play too long it starts to make me feel like I'm going to throw up; think its the way the view moves around so quickly).

Nope, that's motion sickness for you.
See?

 

[Laivasse]

Yeah, it's really cool. Apparently for Kleiner's face they used some guy they met in the lift - he was an accountant or something working on another floor in the same building, and they just nabbed him. Something like that.

OT - for motion sickness, set the refresh rate to max by adding the command parameter "-refresh *your monitor's refresh rate*" (no asterisks) to the game shortcut. Also turn on cheats, and change the fov from 75 to 90 - most FPS have it set to 90, but HL2 has it smaller, which supposedly makes motion sickness slightly worse. There's something you should do about light placement in your room, too, but I forgot....check steampowered.com, the forums there have a few threads on it. Hope it helps.