The team created a database of “microexpression reference materials,” analyzed “pore-level resolution images,” and tracked the elasticity of subcutaneous layers to understand how the skin on Smalls’ face moved, Scott explains. Those small changes in facial expression were crucial to creating an avatar that was as lifelike as possible.

All that research paid off. “I’ve seen the avatar throughout the build process…and it looks very real to me. I see the characteristics of my son in the details,” his mother, Voletta Wallace, said by email. “The avatar turned out to be everything she hoped for.” Scott says that when the team showed Wallace the avatar of Smalls, she said, “That’s my Christopher.”

“There wasn’t a dry eye in the room,” recalls Scott. “To that…