The Human Face and the Golden Ratio - The Golden Ratio: Phi, 1.618

The Human Face and the Golden Ratio
The human face is based on Phi and Golden Ratio proportions.
The human face abounds with examples of the Golden Ratio, also known as the Golden Section or Divine Proportion. We’ll use a succession of golden ratios to create a golden ruler to understand design in the face:
The head forms a golden rectangle with the eyes at its midpoint. The mouth and nose are each placed at golden sections of the distance between the eyes and the bottom of the chin. The beauty unfolds as you look further.
Even when viewed from the side, the human head illustrates the Divine Proportion.The first golden section (blue) from the front of the head defines the position of the ear opening. The successive golden sections define the neck (yellow), the back of the eye (green) and the front of the eye and back of the nose and mouth (magenta). The dimensions of the face from top to bottom also exhibit the Divine Proportion, in the positions of the eye brow (blue), nose (yellow) and mouth (green and magenta).
Human beauty is based on the Divine Proportion
See the photo below which illustrates the following golden ratio proportions in the human face:
The golden ratio face calculator grid:
PhiMatrix provides transparent grids that can be applied to any image in any other software. In the golden ratio face grid shown above, it uses phi, or golden ratio proportions to identify the key dimensions of the human face. It has a free two week trial and is available for Windows and Mac.
Note that the PhiMatrix golden ratio circles grid can be used to identify golden ratio proportions in the human eye:
Even the dimensions of our teeth are based on phi
The front two incisor teeth form a golden rectangle, with a phi ratio in the heighth to the width.The ratio of the width of the first tooth to the second tooth from the center is also phi.The ratio of the width of the smile to the third tooth from the center is phi as well.Visit the site of Dr. Eddy Levin for more on the Golden Section and Dentistry.
Variations and other factors in beauty
Even with a perfectly proportioned face though, there are endless variations in coloring and the shapes within this fundamental facial structure found in the Marquardt Beauty Mask. Variations in each facial feature (eyes, eyebrows, lips, nose, etc.) give rise to the distinctive appearance of each race and provide for endless variations in beauty that are as unique as each individual. The human face also communicates an incredible array of emotions which are an integral element of one’s total beauty. The human face creates more phi elements in its appearance when we smile. You’ll be perceived as more beautiful with a warm smile than with a cold-hearted look of anger, arrogance or contempt.
Interestingly, symmetry in the face does not necessarily equate to beauty. Many, if not most, faces that are perceived as beautiful are usually not even close to being perfect in symmetry of the left and right sides. Perfect symmetry tends to result in a face that appears unnatural, animated or robot-like.
Other factors influence perceptions of beauty as well, including skin tone, health and age.
More importantly, the application of the golden ratio to beauty refers only to physical beauty, and that is only one element of what defines true beauty in humans. The saying “beauty is only skin deep” reflects this. Physical beauty is fleeting and passes with time. Other qualities of the mind and soul are the substance of true beauty. These include love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, to quote from the Bible in Galatians 5:22-23. Our inner beauty is reflected in many ways, through our creative works, expressions of thought, compassion, friendship and acts of service for others. So while Hollywood and fashion magazines may trumpet physical beauty, true beauty in the human experience and the things that lead us to love and be loved are found in a beauty that runs much deeper, and that ultimately impacts physical beauty as well.
That’s subject to debate. A naturalistic viewpoint would say that it’s simply the most efficient way for growth to occur. A theistic viewpoint would say that it’s the result of God’s design for beauty and harmony throughout creation. It does seem though that the golden ratio appears in some aspects of the human form where there is no purpose other than for its beauty, and our perception of it.
Would like to know, if there is even an psychological/psychosocial and brain-activity corellation … would be quite interesting to hawe an entire city and its life day-circle based on this an its effects on the human population.
I think that is an extremely interesting idea. However, I have an additional idea:
If the golden ratio manifesting itself in virtually every physcial aspect of our bodies is the result of God’s design, then we can also look at God’s temporal ratio for our new city to run on as well. As mentioned by Dr. Roger Barrier (site linked below), God has woven a 6:1 ratio into our schedule–6 days of work, one day of rest. So if we work best if we go through time 6 days on, 1 day off, what if everything was scheduled that way? 60 minutes of work, 10 minutes off, 6 times per work day (with the seventh block of 60 minutes being off and the end of the work day). Do that six days per week, with the seventh day off, and every seventh week being a vacation period. It’s a bit less work (as far as time spent per week and year) than we do now, but it might just make productivity explode, since it is the natural rhythm of our lives. Combine that with every structure being based on the golden ratio, and you might have the most beautiful city imaginable inhabited by the most productive and happy people possible.
That would be a perfect world, and you have a very interesting idea. However, I always thought: if there was a perfect world, what would happen? Would humans need a God and heaven if they already had everything here on earth? What would God do? Would he be happy that we humans were obeying his commands and living full lives, and then end the world in a peaceful way (such as merging the heavens and the earth together)? Of course, this will never happen, it is simply too impossible to believe that EVERYONE of the 7 billion people would be good, but it’s still achievable, so I always wonder…just food for thought in a very irrelevant place 🙂
Some more food for thought: Our “need” for God does not determine whether or not He exists, any more than your need for me determines whether I exist. God’s existence is either true or not true, and not a result of whether someone thinks they need Him or doesn’t think they need Him. Even if you think He doesn’t exist and you don’t need Him, you still need a very good explanation for how you got here that can never be answered by science. Why? For the simple reason that it’s impossible to observe the evidence or recreate the circumstances.
the scientific reason is the quantum of life and death as the body grows in its life and adapts to their surroundings this mean that the brain in our big heads are smart enough remake the dimensions on to our bodies. JA
Actually, its the genes in our trillions of little cells that remake the dimensions of our bodies. Our brain is just one of the many miraculous things they create. The genes themselves have no intelligence. They contain the code for how all life is to be created and function. Makes all our computers, cell phones and apps look like child’s play by comparison.
And yet the question remains, “Why?” Other animals manage to procreate and create healthy offspring without any awareness at all of beauty or desire for it. Do you think that fish, birds, rats or even monkeys are drawn to select a mate because their thoughts linger on an aesthetic concept of that mate’s innate beauty? Do they have an understanding and awareness of beauty that invokes similar feelings of awe, enjoyment, attraction and inspiration when looking at a starry night or the beautiful array of colors in a sunset? No, there’s something much deeper in the human experience of life that appreciates beauty for its own sake, and that is completely unnecessary from an evolutionary perspective for a species to procreate and sustain itself.
We might actually very well follow the same reasoning as animals when choosing a mate. I remember some social psychological research when attending university which indicated that what we perceive as beauty is in fact a proxy for health.
In the study in question students were asked to attribute from a list of given traits to images of different people; like this person is rich, powerful, nice, healthy, mean, beautiful and so on. In the results were there no correlations between the groups of chosen traits, except two: health and beauty. I.e. the study’s participants considered the people they thought to be healthy also as beautiful and vice versa, indicating both things are kind of the same. Beauty would therefore be just a human specific cultural concept for health, which in turn means healthy offspring in a darwinist sense.
Cut an apple in half through the middle horizontally and you see five seeds placed in a phi ration – the reason is that we evolved under the 8;5 orbit of the planet Venus. Venus forms five ‘petals’ as it orbits the Sun every eight years, 8 ÷ 5 = 1.6 of ‘phi’!
All relationships are not necessarily causal relationships, so we can’t really conclude the ratio of the orbits of Earth and Venus “caused” the genetic code of living organisms to happen in a certain way. It is possible, however, that a higher guiding principle caused both.
bc human being is the ultimate experiment moratal also immortal ,its finite since it have birth once born living forever,its a devination ratio a golden mean found every where from atom to galaxy to universe ,yet human body is a sample a derivative of universe
Here’s an article on the golden mean as clock cycle of brain waves The abstract says the principle of information coding by the brain seems to be based on the golden ratio. Psychologists have claimed memory span to be the missing link between psychometric intelligence and cognition. By applying Bose–Einstein-statistics to learning experiments, a fit was foundn by Pascual-Leone correlating predicted and tested span. Multiplying span by mental speed (bits processed per unit time) and using the entropy formula for bosons, we obtain the same result. If we apply span as the quantum number n of a harmonic oscillator, we obtain this result from the EEG. The metric of brain waves can always be understood as a superposition of n harmonics times 2Φ, where half of the fundamental is the golden mean Φ (=1.618) as the point of resonance. Such wave packets scaled in powers of the golden mean have to be understood as numbers with directions, where bifurcations occur at the edge of chaos, i.e. 2Φ=3+φ3.
Too me it replicates our progression through life.. As our Experiences build, our conclusions of those experiences will also build. One experience plus another experience will bring us to a conclusion/understanding (2) and life goes on.
what i dont understand is the images of the front portrait and the apparent sizes of teeth – these images are taken face on, the teeth are in a curve and should be measured as such, individually not as a 2d face image – i just get the feeling that some images are made to fit the “golden rule”.
The measurement from the front though is the view that is actually seen when viewed by another person. The golden ratios from that perspective are the basis for the studies of Dr. Eddy Levin in asthetics in cosmetic dentistry which are taught at numerous dental schools. Not everyone’s teeth conform to the golden ratio in this way, but teeth that do are in harmony with the idealized dimensions of overall facial proportions that are perceived by most people as more beautiful.
Yes, the teeth are in a curve, but you cannot see all the way around someone all at once. If you look at them straight-on, you see only portions of some teeth as they recede behind the front incisors and each other, consecutively. Some people might alter images and camera angles in order to fit elements to the golden ratio, but Mr. Meisner’s articles, insofar as I have read them, seem to be trustworthy representations of actual cases.
the picture of the girl with the freckle next to her nose seems to have a different ratio on her eyes than the woman with the towel on her head. The girl with the freckle has eyelid exposure equal to 0.618 x her eyeball exposure. The woman with the towel on her head on the other hand has the distance between her eye and eyebrow 0.618 x her eyeball exposure. Also how do the circles on the picture of the blue eye relate to the golden ratio?
The photos are showing two different aspects of the golden ratio. The freckle woman is showing the eyelid vs visible eye. The towel woman is showing the visible eye vs. eyebrow, and the resolution of that photo was not sharp enough to compare the eyelid vs. visible eye. When the golden ratio appears, its properties make for golden ratios within golden ratios.
Each circle has a diameter that is based on the golden ratio of the larger circle around it. The concentric circles define the width of the iris. The circles that are adjacent to the outer circle define the shape of visible part the eye.
“Soon will We show them our Signs in the (furthest) regions (of the earth), and in their own souls, until it becomes manifest to them that this is the Truth. Is it not enough that thy Lord doth witness all things?” 41:53
I suppose there are several ways. I used to do this manually, doing on screen measurements in pixels and then using a calculator to determine the golden ratios for the lengths of the other lines. You could also create a template. I eventually wrote my software app PhiMatrix, which turned thirty to forty minutes of work into mere seconds. You can try it for free for two weeks.
Daniel Craig was, is, and always will be the BEST JAMES BOND with his hella gorgeous SCOTTISH face which is a credit to his parents and ancestors! What insanity we have created by telling people, by this Phi Chart, you don’t measure up to a certain standard of beauty due to your parentage, LMAOF!!!!!
Dr. Silva’s article doesn’t say that Daniel Craig isn’t even strikingly attractive. He just says that he’s not as attractive as the other Bonds. Hollywood is not in the business of putting unattractive men in the role of James Bond, and there is correlation between attractiveness and golden ratios in facial proportions.
Yes. Please see the image at the bottom of the page and the reference to the work of Dr. Eddy Levin at http://www.goldenmeangauge.co.uk/. He developed tools for the application of the golden ratio in dentistry.
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