Under Chinese law, the dead have to be cremated. But before this happens, many families hold open casket funerals so that friends and relatives can pay their respects to their lost loved one.

However, for those who died in an accident causing them to be badly disfigured, the Guangzhou Funeral Service Centre is now using 3D printing to comfort the family.

The center handles around 35,000 bodies every year and around 30 of these require reconstruction work which undertakers previously did by hand. An embalmer, named Liu, told local newspaper Southern Daily that once, when reconstructing the features of someone who was killed in a road accident, his hands were shaking so badly he couldn’t hold the tools.

Liu adds: “We are not professional sculptors, we had only the deceased’s pictures to look at, and tried our best to make it look similar to the real person.”

By introducing 3D printing, the undertakers are able to more accurately rebuild faces. The technology is also speeding up the reconstruction process so relatives can hold a funeral just ten days after their loved one dies. This is a much shorter than period than the 30 days required to traditionally reconstruct a deceased’s features.