Ogee Curve.

What an ogee curve is

“Ogee” is an architectural term for an S-shaped curve with two opposite curvatures — convex up top, concave below — most often seen in Gothic windows and Islamic arches. Applied to faces (the term comes from cosmetic surgery literature, particularly the work of Brazilian surgeon Mario Gonzalez-Ulloa), the ogee curve is the side-profile line that runs from:

1. The front of the malar bone (cheekbone) — the convex peak
2. Down through the submalar hollow — the concave dip
3. Out to the jawline — recovering toward the gonial corner

When that whole line is sharp and reads as a clean S, the face has “model cheek definition.” When it’s flat or rounded, the face reads as soft or “babyfaced.”

Why the ogee dominates fashion photography

If you scroll through any high-fashion editorial, the lighting is consistently set to maximize ogee shadows. There’s a reason:

• Convex cheekbone catches light — the upper half of the S highlights bright
• Concave hollow casts shadow — the lower half goes dark
• The contrast is huge — light/dark side by side on the same cheek

That high-contrast pattern photographs aggressively. A face with a strong ogee can carry a flat, low-information photograph by itself; a face with a weak ogee needs significant retouching or lighting to look the same. Casting directors know this, which is why “cheekbones” is the most-cited feature in modeling agencies.

What a strong ogee requires

Three things stacked together:

1. High, projected zygomatic bone — the cheekbone itself, anatomically. Fixed past puberty.
2. Low subcutaneous fat in the submalar region — needed for the hollow to show. Movable with diet.
3. Sufficient buccal fat above and below — too thin loses the convexity, too thick loses the concavity. There’s a narrow window.

This is why the ogee gets sharper as people get leaner — but only up to a point. At very low body fat (think male competition bodybuilder), the buccal fat pad disappears entirely and the cheek goes flat. The sweet spot is ~10–14% male body fat or ~18–22% female body fat.

How ogee relates to midface ratio and jawline

A strong ogee correlates with — but isn’t the same as — several other markers:

• A short midface ratio packs the malar prominence and the jaw closer together, which intensifies the S
• A sharp gonial angle gives the bottom of the S a clean end-point (see jawline score)
• Proper golden ratio thirds keeps the cheekbone-to-jaw distance balanced with the rest of the face

A face that hits all four — high cheekbone, hollow under, sharp jaw, balanced thirds — is what attractiveness research consistently rates 9/10 and above.

How to improve an ogee curve

Bone is bone. But the soft-tissue and apparent components are heavily controllable:

• Lean out — losing 3–5% body fat is the fastest visible ogee improvement available. Hollows appear, cheekbones stand out.
• Buccal fat removal — surgical procedure, removes the buccal fat pad permanently. Famously controversial because it ages the face faster — buccal fat is part of what keeps you looking young, and removing it can leave you gaunt in your 40s.
• Cheek filler — small amounts of filler in the malar bone augment the convex peak. Done well, undetectable.
• Mewing / tongue posture — see mewing. Long-term claims of malar development; evidence in adults is weak but not zero.
• Lighting and angle — slight three-quarter angle, with a high light source, can fake a strong ogee on a flat face. This is what modeling tests and dating-app photos exploit.

What Fazly does

The cheek/ogee sub-score in your scan estimates ogee depth from the side-profile photo by tracking the brightness curve along the cheekbone-to-jaw line. The app separates bone contribution (your zygomatic projection) from soft-tissue contribution (your buccal fat) and flags which one is the dominant signal.

Most users find their ogee score is dragged down by body fat — a 3-month cut moves it 5–10 points without any structural change. For users where the bone is the problem, the app will flag that, and the only honest answer is fillers or living with it.

Track ogee in side-profile scans, not front-on — the S only reads from the 3/4 view. Take three scans across the day to find your baseline, since cheek puffiness from hydration moves apparent ogee depth by several points.