Can't Even Read Smilies' Facial Expressions

Post Reply New Topic

Some of this forum's smilies confuse me. When I scroll over them, the description doesn't match the expression I see.

doesn't look like eye-rolling to me, it looks like shame or sheepishness.

looks like how someone would feel about something she was about to roll her eyes at; a mixture of slight irritation and slight confusion. A look that says "that's dumb." It's supposed to be "confused."

looks like strong sadness or hopelessness, not embarrassment.

In all three cases, you seem to be reading too much into the emoticons.
I don't know what the second is supposed to mean, but the eye-rolling and blushing ones are clear to me.

I will second that I think you are thinking too hard about them.

Although, the confused one doesn't look all that confused to me either.

I've farted!

I agree, irritated!

No, he's done it again!

I can read smilies and facial expressions on cartoon characters pretty well, because everything is exaggerated for effect. It's understanding real human's expressions that are hard for me. Most of the time real people just look like this smiley, the one that's supposed to show indifference.

I know that people usually look down, not up, when they are embarrassed or ashamed. Blushing is something of a physical response to embarrassment. I'm not sure why that is since when people turn pale from fear it's because the blood has left the skin's surface to prepare the inner organs for fight/flight, and possibly so there will be less bleeding. Rolling one's eyes to show that they think something is stupid is pretty much an art mastered in adolescence.

It's different than real life, people's expressions can change in a split second so there's less time to process. When I took tests about facial or eye expressions I did well at them, because I actually have time to think!

I don't think that I read into them. When I look at them, those are the thoughts that pop into my head. But regardless of what I think they do look like, I know for sure that they did not look like the expressions they are supposed to represent on first instinct.

Reading facial eggspressions is basically like your describe.
When you look at the eggspression, thoughts pop into your head of what it means.
Otherwise, you would be failing to read them, if no thoughts pop into your head of what they mean.
In this case, I think your brain read the emoticons into more complex thoughts than they were meant by the creators to represent, so they became confusing in their meaning.
When I see the eye-rolling one, my thought is that it is rolling its eyes, and when I see the blushing one, my thought is that it is blushing, and for the second one, I don't know what it means.

Its supposed to have a wobbly mouth, a bit like saying errrr...

I am trying to twist my mouth into that shape, but it's not working!

Its sort of more like the ? that is used in the BB Code (before the icons came in), basically saying R out of only one side of your mouth.

Animation is a hobby of mine so I use charts like this all the time... lol love the angry / no face here...
http://theovermare.com/blog/2014/09/the ... f-speaking

The problem with a lot of these emoticons is that if you were to actually make these faces in real life, you would look f*****g ret*d.

Are those letters underneath supposed to represent the sounds the mouths are making? Who pronounces the letter x with their lips together?

Yeah the X threw me too!
Here's the one I usually use:
http://blenderartists.org/forum/attachm ... 1336152993
* Link since image won't work


In response to boredome I was going to post some gurning competitions, but came across this instead:
http://www.scienceofpeople.com/2013/09/ ... pressions/

Last edited by rarebit on 05 Jun 2015, 8:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I know what this one means.

I think WP just has hard to read smilies. I have an easier time reading actual facial expressions.

I thought this site had the dancing banana emoticon, always cheers me up that one!



Could use these ones at times...

My fav ever for some unkown reason :gag:

And this is a new one on me oh its supposed to be Batman, I thought it was Cat woman! Errrr

A new one for my name even though I'm thinking of changing my avatar to a slice of cheese on toast.