Federation Booker boasts a staggering range of almost 200 heads! When you consider that each of those is fully animated, with both clean and bloody versions, it appears to be quite a workload. However, making the heads was actually my favourite graphical task. After churning out that many, you soon figure out the best technique for getting the job done. I certainly did, because by the end I was producing my best-looking heads yet in a matter of minutes! Here are a few pointers for those wishing to create their own...

Graphics Tools
No special software or tools are needed to make the heads. They're all done from scratch in Microsoft Paint. All you need to edit them is a similar package that handles bitmaps or PNG's - preferably one that's good for copying and pasting. Whatever your using, just go into the "chars/heads/" folder and open an existing head to use as a template...

Know Their Role
There seems to be an unnecessarily large selection of frames, but rest assured they are ALL used at some point - so you can't ignore any of them! When you break it down though, relatively little work goes into creating a head file. For a start, there's a lot of copying and pasting going on in there. All you need to worry about at first is the very first head, but make sure it's done perfectly because it's going to be copied a few dozen times! Once you've got it as you want it, copy it over the first 3 heads - these are the key expressions for a Face character. As you'll see by using an official head as a guide, each one should have a different mouth expression. Once you've drawn those in, copy all 3 heads from Section 1 to Section 2 - the Heel heads. These heads need to have a more evil/angry look about them. Do that any way you see fit, but the best way is to simply pull the eyebrows down to make the eyeballs narrower. Once those first 6 heads are perfect, simply copy them down to Section 6 and flip them horizontally - for use when looking the other way. All the time make sure that the new heads are replacing the old ones pixel-for-pixel - otherwise they might look out of place during the game. So that's 12 frames done already! Next do Section 3 - the various facial expressions of a lying character. It's not particularly important, but you ought to replicate the expressions used in official heads. Once you got those, Sections 4 and 5 are simply a case of copying and flipping/rotating them into place. Then all that's left are a few miscellaneous heads that shouldn't take long to draw up. Once you've got the whole clean set done, making the bloody version (Section 7) is easy. Just copy the whole top half over the bottom half, and then pull out the "Blood Mask" file from the Tools download. Copy that series of splatters into your file, making sure the pink colour is transparent, and if you line it up properly you should find that it makes them all look suitably bloody. That's it - the whole range of frames ready to use...

Keep Your Head
Once you're done you'll have to save the edited file as a .PNG - because that's what the game will be looking for. Furthermore, you must save it over an existing head - making sure to retain the name. You can't add 'new' heads because the game won't recognise them - but since there are hundreds to play with that shouldn't be too much of a problem. One last thing to do us update the "heads" file to include a portrait of your guy. Paste your guys' first frame into the file and place it over the one you've replaced, again pixel-for-pixel. This is what the game uses to draw your character outside of the game (in the menus and office screens, etc.) so it's very important that it looks right. Another important thing to consider, in Federation Booker at least, is the gender and race of the characters you're replacing. Whatever was there first, that's what the game will think is there now - so always try to replace like for like. Otherwise the game could end up treating a guy like a woman, and vice versa!

Master Class
I can't really explain how best to draw your own head styles, but if you study the various official ones you should be able to piece together any look that you can think of. Copy this hair line, that nose, these eyes, that mouth, this facial hair, etc, and you'll soon figure out what makes them look the way they do. Good luck and enjoy using your own heads! And if they're any good, just pass them on and they might end up in a future patch to be enjoyed by the masses...