Custom Face Texture

[azron]

I'm currently attempting to make a port(man) of this Oblivion mod

 

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=21441

 

I got Facegen exchanger to use on my player character to look like the attachment, it's not bad, but I feel it could be more accurate.

 

The .dds file for the face I believe is the missing key to make her look more proper, If Oblivion .dds are incompatible with fallout 3 .dds than fixing that shouldn't be too hard, just export the .dds to a picture file and re-convert it to a fallout 3 compatible .dds.

 

I hear that the only way to make a custom texture for a character face is to make a custom race, much like how Bittercup Restyled had her the exclusive member of the "gothgirl" race, I may have to make a specific race just for this character/npc when I make a companion version, which is fine by me, however even then I have no idea how to add a custom texture to a race, which is what brings me here.

 

Though I doubt even if I get it to work it will match up well with any of the body textures I can worry about that later, or possibly edit the skin tone to match via photoshop or something.

[fap6000]

Well first off Converting to or from .DDS is stuptarded. Yah it works but the file size is got a fat unused part, then if you were to open that with a program that directly edits .DDS in some cases the code doesn't line up so only part of the texture gets rendered, the rest is transparent. Oh sure fallout 3 will render it, but there's still the bulky file size, slowing your performance. All that being said I probably could have just said Paint.net an GIMP are free, an directly edit .DDS Geez I can even open you guy's crappy Photoshop .DDS textures and convert it back to true .dds in realtime. Photoshop is quicker anyway, then GIMP does the wicked tricks like turn something into fabric or estimated normal maps that are not stuptarded.

 

Okay so The face an body need to have the same size map for starters, if the body is 2048 then so must the head be. Hands are smaller, so you could get by with 512 or 1024. Hands also have two sets of textures 1st an 3rd person so you might not even need to mess with it. I've seen some folks texture a sort of border color too so that arms an hands blend, idk I like the vanilla.

 

From there you end up with a miss matched body, hands, head. This is usually because the body texture is off, even if it isn't, it's the easyest way to match it. Change one thing rather than changing 1-2 or 3. To match it you pretty much adjust color, you should use a tool that adjusts Hue/saturation/brightness Start with brightness. make a copy as a back up first, then open it apply the change, save it, go in game an look. Inside megaton is a good spot, real bland neutral light there. Repeat...

 

I'd say the kicker for that face in particular was the mesh, meaning it's FaceGen. Idk about that fancy facegen exchange. If it were me I'd input the data by hand, heck it's only Hexidec, least it looks like it. I'm not sure if you can open TES files with FO3edit, I don't see why not. You would have to create a NPC with the data to be able to hand copy it, but you might could get closer. Bash gary would open TES, an might have facegen edit ablity in save games, I know it's got some of that fancy stuff.

 

The eyes stink for your port, the eyebrows are off, the hair stinks too, lips are frowning :( boo hoo so sad. Get rivens eyes, they work well. There's others that are good too, but rivens doesn't have red-eye so much that the mip-map turns the eyes bloodshot 6 feet away.

 

The texture would probably help you out a bit. You don't have to create a new race for it, but if you don't it will replace every female human face in the game. I'm sure that would work well, pfft. Anyhow it's easy to swap out the texture. Just launch GECK, then go to race, duplicate the caucasian race, change the name to queeny gutter skank III, then you'll see there are tabs to edit the model an textures, just point the one for the head to use your custom texture. It's more easy to switch it this way, viewing a race inside FO3edit it's a long long long list of data, with faceGen at the bottom. which is the symetrical shape edits, color, an non-symetrical I think, big long lines of hexidec. I've copy pasted an drag an dropped them though.

 

The whole race interface in GECK is a nightmare, it doesn't work well, a total nightmare, so careful what you click or just practice messing up over an over. You would need a preset for that race or it will crash when you pick the race. I usually open things up with FO3edit, go to NPC's in fallout.esm, then click the name, so it's A-Z, go down to one of the pretty chicks, right click the top, copy as new entry into, then pick a place to put it, or create a new mod/new file. Once it's there just go to that new entry an make it so it's a face gen preset, then also change it to the race you added the texture too.

 

You get more options in the race interface in GECK, but it's so touchy, an there's so many ways to mess it up, it's almost un-useable. You're better off just geting the textures in there, and playing with the in-game face gen.

[azron]

Actually I already have GIMP and was planning on using that anyhow, the Hair was partially intentional, In that it doesn't copy over and it was on this character to begin with when I adjusted the face. as for the eyes and the eyebrows/lashes, that, I assumed, was a part of the texture issue.

 

I used Facegen exchange because the original Oblivion mod used facegen to make the face. I didn't use Hex because I don't know how, though I asked the question to the guy who made the FO3Edit version of Facegen exchange which does. (and will be needed in order to use it for an NPC which I plan to use.)

 

As for the lips frowning I figure if it doesn't look right after adding the new texture I'll fiddle with it a bit more.

 

The texture would probably help you out a bit. You don't have to create a new race for it, but if you don't it will replace every female human face in the game.

 

In other words, I do have to create a new race for it, since I'd rather not have to replace every female human face in the game.

 

Okay so should I open each texture file and copy/paste them into a single texture file and work on the tone that way? making sure the head and body texture files are the same size then split them all up again?

[fap6000]

You need a custom race. For that you need a face gen preset. The easy way to get that would be to have a NPC created which uses the FaceGen you shoplifted from TES mod. Then just set the NPC to be a facegen preset, and have it use the new race. Something like that. If it were me I would launch GECK, duplicate a race, then save that. Open it with FO3edit, find a NPC in fallout.esm then copy as new entry into (my new race mod) once that's done go to the race mod, find the NPC, check the flag "is facegen preset which is hidden in flags I think, then also switch that NPC to the custom race (you know the one you duplicated) From there you would need to shoplift the facegen data however that's done so that the NPC you just created uses that data.

 

I'd pick a body first, or shoplift the body that TES mod used, because it said in the discription it uses such an such. That very well could be the accesory parts which make her look so nice. So start there. If it don't work like that then you would need to pick bits an pieces from the fallout 3 mods, as an example using the BABE body, or creating a duplicate version of one of the lings races (as to get parts like eyelashes) She's a frankenstine IT'S ALIVE! IT'S ALIVE I SAY!

 

I'm going to look into it some more, maybe I can help. I reckon just see what you can get done an holla back at meh.

 

 

 

*EDIT* Pee UUU that TES stuff looks nasty, I don't think any of that is even useable in fallout 3 *EDIT*

 

I think it looks very good in TES but heh after viewing the content I don't think it will ever work in fallout 3. It's not a big deal. You have to ask yourself how much of that facegen do you think is going to carry over into fallout 3. I mean it's pretty obvious the content used to create it in TES would never work well for fallout 3. Not a big deal just use the stuff we have created for fallout 3, for example the fallout bodies even the vanilla one, head hands body, then mods like Lings that combine properties from beauty mods into races we can actually use. From there you just make edits to make it look like her.

 

I use tools I created to match body head an hands. Basicly it's a hacked mesh, take the body mesh, then paste branches of the head an hands (which you removed the dismemberment from before you copied) Then you have head an hands correctly placed inside the body mesh, save it, then point it to use certian custom named textures in a fake data folder you use for current projects, which nifscope looks for textures in. Then you can quickly make edits to each part, head hands body, an test them just open the mesh an look, real quick, you don't even close the texture, save your edit an open the mesh, this way if the edit makes it worse, you can just Ctrl Z (undo) an save that again an your back at square one.

 

If you could get me a copy of what you have so far, I might could help you with it a bit, from having experience messing with this stuff, then send you back a copy that's got more groundwork put down. I pretty much think you should just start from scratch an make a fallout version. I've kind of been thinking about merging the good parts of the type 3 body textures with the BABE textures, to make a better body texture. Which is hard because the meshes are totally different, just like the BABE an Type 3 are different from the vanilla, an such the textures are different too, but all 3 have good parts...

[fap6000]

You have done a heck of a job so far, after seeing what you have to work with.