# The Night Garden explorers

Damon v29 is the v28 anatomy refined against Damon's photographs (landmark fitting), with Variant C's nose, photographic eyebrows and iris texture transplanted, a swept-up curtain regroom, skin micro-texture with a normal map, fuller limbs, smoothed joint weights, and slider-tuned proportions chosen by Damon on 21 September 2026. Provenance is unchanged: MakeHuman CC0 anatomy and hands, original hair, and authored skin; photographs are used as projection sources only in the nose and brow regions. The existing 47-bone rig and jawOpen, mouthSmile and blink morphs are preserved. This is a stylized interpretation, not a scan or an exact digital double.

Newton and Galileo are portrait-informed interpretations. References: [Godfrey Kneller's 1702 Newton portrait, National Portrait Gallery](https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw04660/Sir-Isaac-Newton), and [Justus Sustermans' 1635 Galileo portrait, Uffizi](https://www.uffizi.it/en/artworks/portrait-galileo-galilei-by-justus-sustermans). No museum portrait is embedded as a texture.

- Human anatomy and hands: MakeHuman hm08, Data Collection AB, Joel Palmius and Jonas Hauquier, [CC0 asset licence](https://github.com/makehumancommunity/makehuman/blob/master/LICENSE.ASSETS.md).
- Other human explorers' skin: MargaretToigo and OnlyTheGhosts; hand skin and anatomical corrections: Mindfront; knuckle corrections: jujube, CC0. [Skin sources](https://static.makehumancommunity.org/assets/assetpacks/skins02.html), [hand sources](https://static.makehumancommunity.org/assets/assetpacks/hands01.html). Damon v28 uses authored skin colour with the CC0 anatomical corrections.
- Damon v28 uses continuous MakeHuman head, jaw, ear, neck and upper-shoulder topology, fitted to the supplied references in Blender. The earlier MediaPipe face-mask construction and analytic neck rings have been replaced; historical licences remain available. Generated reference artwork guides authored skin pigment without embedding the supplied photographs.
- Damon v28 skin paint, iris colour, brows, opaque hair geometry/colour, knit surface, clothing, shoes, rig refinements and three facial morphs were authored for Night Garden. This revision uses neither the previous photographic face mapping nor the older Damon model’s Elvaerwyn hair.
- Galileo beard foundation: Sigmund by grinsegold, CC0, adapted with additional strands. [Source pack](https://static.makehumancommunity.org/assets/assetpacks/bodyparts05.html).
- Astronaut by **Poly**, [CC BY 2.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/). Modified for Night Garden: rigging, skin weights, articulated hands, wrist seals, resized textures and compression. [Original model](https://modelviewer.dev/shared-assets/models/Astronaut.glb).
- Alien outfit, additional costume details, rig adaptations and emote choreography were authored for Night Garden. Existing [historical credits](HISTORICAL-CREDITS.md) and [visitor and hedgehog credits](VISITOR-CREDITS.md) remain available.

Every explorer has articulated fingers. Full/mobile pairs retain the same rig. The current Damon v29 uses 267,592 triangles and 2,720,688 compressed bytes on desktop, or 114,119 triangles and 1,916,564 bytes on mobile; other mobile explorers use approximately 40,000–45,000 triangles. The mobile groom retains complete strands and a continuous undercoat. The final refinement adds fuller brows and a measured 2.8 mm lower-face adjustment, preserving the repaired neck and rig. Models and textures are shared between instances of the same explorer. The resident Damon guide preloads after the garden’s first frame; additional explorer types load when needed. Transfer sizes are not decoded graphics-memory estimates.

Walking is adapted from CMU Graphics Lab sequence 07_01 through Bruce Hahne's MotionBuilder BVH conversion. Data obtained from mocap.cs.cmu.edu; the database was created with funding from NSF EIA-0196217. The motion is retargeted to the garden rig with articulated feet and bounded contact correction.


Local v30 refinement: linked 12 mm head/eyes/hair setback, reduced rear groom lift, cleaned frontal hairline and original opaque hair foundation. Same underlying provenance as v29. See DAMON-V30-ASSETS.json.