Collegian Online Edition

Forensics artist conducts workshops
by Janet Chang
reporter

Most students get no closer to forensics research and crime scene investigations than CSI, but NE art students got an upclose view recently.

In a three-day workshop March 29-31, a University of Texas-Arlington instructor shared her “rewarding experience” as a forensic artist.

Artist Suzanne Baldon works with the Fort Worth medical examiner, as well as teaching anthropology and forensic art.

“ Forensic art,” she said, “is typically used to identify remains, identify the perpetrator of a crime or find a missing person.”

Two main types of forensic art are composite imagery and reconstruction based on remains.

“ Techniques used depend partly on the goal,” she said.

To identify remains, 3-D reconstruction is preferred, but Baldon said that a composite sketch, based on verbal description, could be used to identify a suspect. A sketch also could be needed to identify remains that are too delicate for 3-D sculpting.

Baldon offered a number of examples of her use of reconstruction to identify remains, as in the case of the “scorpion man,” whose mashed skull was found in a shallow grave.

“ Due to the condition of the skull, a 2-D tissue-paper drawing was superimposed on photos of the skull,” she said.

The 3-D reconstruction procedure, described by Baldon and practiced by NE students on day three of the workshop, involves layering the skull with strips of clay. The thickness of the clay is determined by “tissue depth markers,” small pegs attached to the skull. A peg indicates how deep the tissue would probably have been.

Statistical information on tissue depth comes from three physical anthropology charts for American Caucasoid, American Negroid and American Indian.

“Some physical anthropologists, when first looking at an unknown skull, use the nasal root to tentatively identify the subject [as one of the three types],” she said.

Anthropologists do not tend to classify by race much today.

“ You can’t tell skin color by the bones,” she said. “There is more variation within than between racial groups.”

Age progression, another forensic method, is used to search for a child or a criminal who has been missing for several years, Baldon said.

Crime investigation is not the only reason Baldon has used her forensic skills. She once made a series of age-progression paintings of a girl who died at age 5.

“ Her family wanted to see how she would have looked at age 21,” she said.

At the beginning of a reconstruction, Baldon said, an anthropologist usually gives her an age range, based on skeletal features, such as the pubic synthesis, which smoothes out with age.

One factor in age progression is the gradual enlargement of the lower part of a child’s skull. For adults, the face gets longer and “certain features start to fall,” Baldon said.

“ In terms of aging, age 60 is what 30 years used to be,” she said.

Baldon said forensics textbooks show by decade what changes to expect in aging, and some computer software aids age progression.

“ The problem with computer aging,” she said, “is that it looks too polished. People may think that the computer image must be right because it doesn’t have the tentative lines of an artist’s sketch.”

Baldon said witnesses are not always reliable. People often interpret what they see based on who they are, rather than what they see.

“ This is called seeing through a cultural bias,” she said.

Another source of bias, she said, “is that reconstruction artists often subconsciously put a lot of their own features in their art.”

“ One problem in identification,” she said, “is the right person doesn’t get to see the drawing or reconstruction sculpture. A good way to show the image to a large audience is to get on one of the crime shows or publish it in the paper.”

On day two of the workshop, students drew composite sketches.On day three, students did a hands-on reconstruction, using clay and plastic skulls with tissue-depth markers and statistical tables. Although different students got skulls of different ethnicities, Baldon said most people are atypical, a mixture of characteristics for the three skull types.

Baldon explained that forensics professionals portrayed on television are usually a composite of what would be several skilled professionals in real life.

“ Most forensic artists work part-time in forensics and full-time in another area, such as trace analysis, fingerprinting or ballistics,” she said.

Forensics artist conducts workshops by Janet Chang reporter

Forensics artist conducts workshops
by Janet Chang
reporter