I Just Don't Get Skins!

I have a selection of favorite skins that I go to depending on the outfit I'm wearing. To deal with the problem of a seemingly changed shape, I 'tweaked' my shape (usually just the mouth) to work with the ones I use most often, named each one to match the skin it was for, then saved the 'tweaked' version in the folder with the skin.

Didn't take a lot of time, and since I only have a few favorite skin creators, if I get other color variations from them, I'm all set.

This is the great myth about no-mod skins. The shading on the skins can be exactly as opaque as the designer wants it to be, without any effect on how transparent the "base" layer has to be.

Now, if all the shading were monochromatic, this would be the end of the story, and just removing the base layer (or doing a color separation and alpha-ing the base color) would permit fully flexible modification. But because some artists use colored shading and highlights, those tints may not look right on a very wide range of base skin tones, so usually the base layer of modifiable skins is only semi-transparent.

The other problem is alignment with the avatar textures themselves. Eyebrows and nipples are two places where the problem is particularly apparent: if the skin tries to do anything with these, they better align with the underlying avatar locations (which, especially in the case of eyebrows, moves--a lot!), or else the surrounding skin better be opaque enough that the avatar features underneath don't show through.

Now, all this said, the really hyper-realistic photo skins (like at SSL) are so detailed that, even though one could make them tintable and retain the same level of detail, that detail just wouldn't look as real with a different tint.

Qie, I might not have been clear...or maybe I'm not understanding you.

Yes, you could make the skin as detailed as you want...but in order for the details to show up, they cannot be wholly transparent. The more transparent they are, the more the underlying avatar skin shows through...but the less apparent the details are.

If you make the details a separate, opaque layer, then you have, as you pointed out, trouble with possible mismatches between the painted details and the underlying skin tone...in extreme cases, you could have "shadows" that were lighter than the skin tone chosen by the user.

To get blending that looks good, the skin has to be only partly transparent...and therefore will also lose some resolution in the details. It's a compromise.

I think we're pretty much on the same wavelength, with the possible exception that I just don't see it being much of a compromise of detail to permit at least tinting through a semi-transparent base-layer, with however much opacity is needed in the detail shading and highlights. The place where this gets impractical is where the skin detail depends on chromatic contrast (where the hue or saturation differs but not necessarily the value). This is where photoreal skins (like the SSL example) could really lose when tinted.

And that's why ultra-real skins are never offered in multiple shades. But skins that come in a variety of base tones: I mean--how do we suppose they do that? By adjusting a base color layer. Whether they do that in Photoshop or the customer does it in Edit / Appearance, it's pretty much the same effect--except one generates revenue for the skin designer, and the other satisfies the customer.

"Skin Within" skins are the most responsive to sliders that I've seen, and retain their detail well. The tradeoff appears to be that the highlighting and detail is not as subtle as on a less translucent skin. Compare demos from Celestial Studios and Skin Within -- big difference.

I've come to like Skin Within a lot when I'm looking for a very dramatic skin.
.

Nyte and Day Asian skin above



Same shape in Toffee skin from Nora Samantha