HowTo: Highpoly head conversion for Skyrim SE

[Kaspar482]

How to convert/morph your lowpoly Skyrim head into a highpoly citrus head for Skyrim SE

 

You also need to know how to make a follower in CK.

 

Tools Needed:

Blender (or your preferred 3d program)
BAE - Bethesta Archive Extractor

NPC Nif Merger version 1.0.6.beta
Bodyslide Outfit Studio
Nifskope latest version

Creation Kit SE
Skyrim
Skyrim SE

Use with CUSTOM RACE Followers.

1. Download the Citrus Head mod ressource.
2. Load your old Skyrim facegen head NIF (usually called something like 00000D62.nif) into outfit studio and export only the head as Facegen.obj
3. Load the "Replacer Citrus" head into Outfit Studio and export the citrus head as Citrushead.obj
4. Extract femalehead.nif from old Skyrim (not Skyrim SE) with the BSA file extractor.
5. Load femalehead.nif into Outfit Studio and export it as Basehead.obj
6. Load all three heads into blender (Important: KEEP VERTEX ORDER when importing).
7. Join your Facegen.obj with Basehead.obj as shapekeys.
8. Use a "Subdivision Surface" (1x Subdivision) and a "Triangulate" (Fixed triangles) modifier on Basehead.obj. No need to apply.
9. Use a "Shrinkwrap" modifier on Citrushead.obj (target Basehead.obj) to smooth out the minimal differences. Apply it.
10. Use Rich Colburns Surface Follow tool to bind the Citrushead.obj to Basehead.obj and morph it by using Basehead.obj's shapekey.
11. Export the now morphed Citrusehead.obj head as .OBJ (Important: KEEP VERTEX ORDER when exporting).
12. Load the "Replacer Citrushead" .NIF (also called femalehead.nif) as REFERENCE into Outfit Studio again (this is the unaltered original Citrus head).
13. Import the morphed Citrushead.obj - It will ask you to update the vertices - Click yes everytime.
14. Export the updated Citrushead as REFERENCE citrushead.nif
15. Extract eyesfemale.nif, femalebrows.nif, mouthhumanf.nif from old Skyrim with the BAE extractor (Important: from old Skyrim, not from Skyrim SE)
16. Load your original facegen.nif into NPC Head Nif Merger as "Source" and update each target - eyesfemale.nif, femalebrows.nif and mouthhumanf.nif - individually.
17. You now have all the .nifs necessary to make a HeadPart in Creation kit SE. Make All the headparts and Generate a new head in your custom follower tab. (IMPORTANT: Use the femalehead.tri, femaleheadraces.tri, femaleheadchargen.tri from the Citrushead Replacer mod for the Headpart)
18. Save and exit the Creation Kit SE. A new Facegen.nif has been created.
19. Update texture paths in Nifskope.
20. Done.

EDIT: Updated head conversion method in blender. Thanks to Levionte

EDIT2: formatting

EDIT3: Clarification

Edited May 24, 2017 by koiwe

[LeddBate]

Might this be worth a sticky?

[Levionte]

As I recall, I believe blabba once recommended setting up (In 3DS Max) a Morpher modifier on the basic, vanilla head to transform it into your sculpted head. Then, you skin wrap the basic, citrus head to the basic, vanilla head so that it mimics its transformation. But, since the citrus head is a slightly different shape than vanilla (mostly round curves instead of sharp edges) the results may vary a little (which you can touch up).

 

I suppose using blender's shrinkwrap would also get the job done, too. You'll have to watch for texture distortions. And you really have to be careful getting the mouth and eyes to line up as well as you can; which can be a little difficult if you've made drastic changes to your sculpt. Even if the eye sockets mostly line up, if they're off even a little, your facial animation morphs are going to start looking goofy with the parts of the eye that are supposed to go down during a blink being next to vertices that don't necessarily go down as much during a blink. It won't be that noticeable unless you're really far off, but it's worth mentioning. Same with the texture distortions.

 

I would also just replace the head mesh in your old face geometry mesh with your new citrus version. Don't worry about all the other faceparts as they should, in theory, be lined up already. Then you just run it through Ousinius' Nif Optimizer to make it ready for SSE.

 

On a side note, I absolutely hate that the SSE CK exports the face geometry automatically every time you save the plugin. But everyone should be aware it does that, as it'll erase these changes each time you do.

[Kaspar482]

As I recall, I believe blabba once recommended setting up (In 3DS Max) a Morpher modifier on the basic, vanilla head to transform it into your sculpted head. Then, you skin wrap the basic, citrus head to the basic, vanilla head so that it mimics its transformation. But, since the citrus head is a slightly different shape than vanilla (mostly round curves instead of sharp edges) the results may vary a little (which you can touch up). ...

 

That solution sounds good, better than approximating and shrinkwrapping the citrus head. I will try it in blender and update the howto if it works.

 

Edit: It works. However, you cannot use the "Shrinkwrap" modifier. You have to download Rich Colburns "Surface follow" tool. Unlike shrinkwrap, it actually pins vertices to the other objects surface. The result in combination whith a shape-key is a perfect morph of two different topologies.

 

 

I would also just replace the head mesh in your old face geometry mesh with your new citrus version. Don't worry about all the other faceparts as they should, in theory, be lined up already. Then you just run it through Ousinius' Nif Optimizer to make it ready for SSE.

 

That didn't work for me. For some reason I got the black basic head bug whenever I did this.

 

 

On a side note, I absolutely hate that the SSE CK exports the face geometry automatically every time you save the plugin. But everyone should be aware it does that, as it'll erase these changes each time you do.

 

One advantage of the headparts method is that you can use the facemorph and tint tools in CK, since Racemenu is not yet available in SE. And if you use a Textureset on the head you don't have to worry about the facegen being updated.

Edited May 20, 2017 by koiwe