Help with mid-torso seams

Big frustration here......hoping someone has some tricks....

I've been doing my own skins for a while now and using the temps from Eloh and (another I can't immediately recall the name of.......) I add my own layers and alter certain elements of existing layers and so on.....I get it.....and for the most part I've been able to turn out some nice unique creations of my own. I use PSE 5.0 which so far I'm happy with for skins.

But....the midriff area drives me batty. I've gone so far as to upload the template grid itself as skin so I can see exactly where things line up but it seems no amount of tedius re-working gives me a smooth looking upper/lower belly.
WHAT are you skin gurus doing to make this work!!!?? LOL I'm so close...but if there's a trick or secret someone is willing to share...I'd be thrilled and of course forever in your debt!

Multi Chan Hax

http://tech-slop.serveit.org/wiki/index.php?title=Multi_Chan_Hax


MCH Repository

http://tech-slop.serveit.org/wiki/index.php?title=Multi_CH_Repository

In particular, SL_mucho23chans.


I honestly don't know if MCH will work with PSE 5.0, though.
Rawr!!

Abu's uber cool MCH filter works in PSE 7.0 (yay for extra software included with my wacom \o/ ). After a quick google search I think it should work in PSE 5.0 and above.

To install it, you'll need to copy and paste both the .8bf and .mch file(s) in to something like...
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Photoshop Elements 7.0\Plug-Ins\Filters

The next time you load up PSE there will be a new entry under Filters called "Tech Slop 3D", and then "Multi Chan Hax". You'll need to load the .mch file at this stage, so just navigate to where you pasted it earlier.

Half of me wishes Abu's MCH madness was kept a secret but the other half wants to scream with excitement over how cool this is. The screaming voice always wins.

Yep, if you're in to skinning, you need this. ^.^

Will this work in The GIMP or is there a GIMP equivalent?

Thanks.

Hey Revenant. Multi Chan Hax will work with GIMP so long as you grab all the stuff to make it work properly. I've written up a quick "how-to" on my blog if you want to follow along.

http://mistressofdesign.wordpress.com/2009/10/04/how-to-photoshop-filters-in-the-gimp/

A word of warning however... while it works, it might work strangely. For some reason the preview window sometimes doesn't show what it should. The filter still works when you apply it but you can't preview the results as you're flipping through the channels. Instead, the preview window displays as pure black or pure white.

I strongly suspect that the odd behaviour is a Windows 7 issue but I can't be sure. I only mention it because it's a common element with people having troubles. I guess the good news is that while you can't preview the changes, you can still see the magic when you apply the settings.

I recently grabbed the most recent Corel Painter demo. Black in the Preview happens there as well and I'm WinXP. I'll look a little deeper into this one of these days. It could very well be a FilterMeister thing.

Sidenote: I haven't been able to find anybody to script a Mel MCH exporter.
igh: