Adjust skin tone on Photoshop ?

[EdinMG]

I have a question for the texture experts of the forum, I've been trying to use the Barbarian skin on my character but I'm having a huge difference between the head and body skin tones, the head texture is a lot darker than the body texture, I've never had this kind of problem before, I already used SG Female Textures Renewal, Porcelain Skin, Mature Skin and Fair Skin Complexion, and all of them worked flawlessly, not even a single issue, no seams, nothing, so, it appears that I'll have to adjust the head skin tone on Photoshop, but the thing is, how do I do that, what do I have to do ?!? I would be very grateful if someone could help me with this problem !!!

[Melodic]

aint easier to use texture blender?

[EdinMG]

Nope...I've tried that and it didn't worked, I also tried to change the specular maps and nothing, same thing, it's not just a neck seam, it's the entire head texture that is darker than the body texture, and this is really pissing me off, such an awesome skin but I simply can't use it... o_O

[Lagoon0654]

What I would do is:

(btw I use the free copy of CS2)

 

1) Load the body texture in PS

2) Then load the head texture

-Now you should have two sub windows containing each-

3) go to image -> adjustments -> Brightness and contrast, or Hue and saturation.  I can't really give you exact help as you'll need to play around with the various options within "adjustments" to get what you want.

 

4)Keep the head texture zoomed in, and pointed towards the neck area. then do the same with the body (see screenshot).

 

 

Then just keep making adjustments until you feel like the neck and body will match. In these situations I'll load both the head and body into Nifskope and apply textures, see how they match, then go back to PS, make adjustments, save, then go back to nifskope and I'll rotate the body as this "refreshes" the texture. I do this cause it's faster than booting up skyrim/fallout constantly. Just keep in mind normals and such don't render in nifskope well if you choose to do this method for checking.

 

 

 

 

Like I said, I can't tell you exactly what you'll need to use, as body textures vary a lot. I also tend to wear necklaces to hide gaps(thanks to fallout for getting me into this habit)

 

Hope I helped some...

[EdinMG]

Thank you very much for your answer Lagoon0654, I'll do what you said and see what happens !!!

[ianmagus]

I use the same method Lagoon0654 mentioned.  I keep the textures I'm trying to match open in separate subwindows and toggle the adjustments.  Brightness/contrast is especially useful (mostly the contrast option) if one texture looks particular darker than the other.  For matching color, Hue/saturation is a good general slider set.

If you're trying to get the color of the skin just right, I usually prefer color balance.  In color balance, playing with the midtones first helps if the colors are vastly different, then shadows, then highlights last.  When you're adjusting the sliders during preview mode, start first by pushing the slider you're toggling far left or far right.  The texture you desire obviously won't be full green or full magenta, but the idea is too push it too far so your eyes readjust to the image in the wrong shade, then gradually nudge the slider back towards the center until it feels right.  Then if you start to overcompensate in the other direction, you know you can start scaling back and you'll find the right balance.  I find that works a lot better than doing minimal nudges from the start because it helps my brain refocus on matching the color to the texture I'm trying to copy rather than second-guessing if -13 blue is too much.  If it looks right, it is right.  Use hue/saturation again after you color balance to make minor adjustments.

Another really useful tool is the vibrance option.  It's a more subtle variation of saturation and it's probably the best tool if you just need to give a texture a little more "flesh and blood".  I'll usually use the vibrance option last and just play with the vibrance bar and not touch the saturation settings.

Also, sometimes you may need to just adjust one area of the texture (usually on darker sections of the skin, like the neck shadow), but when you get the colors matching, the rest of the face (or body) is too drastic.  When that happens just make a duplicate layer of original image then apply a layer mask in the "Layers" toolbar.  Paint the mask black, to make the duplicate disappear.  Then pick a paintbrush with a soft, faded edge and use white paint on the black layer mask to reveal just the section of the texture you need to make skin tone adjustments to.  When you've got your masked layer set up, select the duplicate and just make your hue/contrast/etc adjustments to that small section so you can leave the rest of the image intact.