Character skin/hair tone swapping: textures or mat color?
Hi all,
I'm working on the character customization part for a tiny game in Unity and I want the player to be able to change the skin color for every face texture (or hair texture).
After some attemps I could think of only two solutions:
a) paint all face textures in all skin shades in Photoshop and then swap textures in Unity (cons: more textures to paint an to load? pros: better results?)
b) paint just the face textures (maybe in grayscale?) and then change the color of the material in Unity using a diffuse shader.
(cons: poor result? pros: less textures to paint and load?)
So:
Because my game will have the same painted look and feel shown in the Guild Wars 2 previews (see images at the end of the post) I was curious about:
Any tip and suggestion would be priceless 'cause I'm a beginner.
Thank you in advance!
p.
For reference: high resolution images from Guild Wars 2:
http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/3311/cc3face.jpg
http://www.arena.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/female_and_male_humans.jpg
http://stevivor.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/youngcalanice.jpg
http://allahweh.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/gw002.jpg
I'm working on the character customization part for a tiny game in Unity and I want the player to be able to change the skin color for every face texture (or hair texture).
After some attemps I could think of only two solutions:
a) paint all face textures in all skin shades in Photoshop and then swap textures in Unity (cons: more textures to paint an to load? pros: better results?)
b) paint just the face textures (maybe in grayscale?) and then change the color of the material in Unity using a diffuse shader.
(cons: poor result? pros: less textures to paint and load?)
So:
- What is the best technique between the two?
- What are the advantages and disadvantages of the two?
- Are there other better techniques?
Because my game will have the same painted look and feel shown in the Guild Wars 2 previews (see images at the end of the post) I was curious about:
- How many and which texture layers do you think are needed to achieve this beautiful painted skin effect?
- What skin shader for Unity 3.5 do you suggest to achieve this effect?
Any tip and suggestion would be priceless 'cause I'm a beginner.
Thank you in advance!
p.
For reference: high resolution images from Guild Wars 2:
http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/3311/cc3face.jpg
http://www.arena.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/female_and_male_humans.jpg
http://stevivor.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/youngcalanice.jpg
http://allahweh.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/gw002.jpg
Replies
We achieved a more stylized look using a simple base colour, an overlay to add reds/blues etc and a detail layer for wrinkles/freckles etc. we had a set of layers for each distinct ethnic group as we found that trying to cover all bases with the same overlay didnt work out too well.
Your best bet is to experiment in photoshop really
By a simple base color do you mean a texture or the diffuse color of the material?
I understand that you worked mainly with textures, didn't you?
Thank you for your reply.