I was messing around in Photoshop with two renders of a scene I made. One was without textures (I was checking the lighting) and one with them. I must say, I think layering in 'Shop is a good method of getting the depth of complex skin tones.
This is only one method of compositing, and I've only done it with dark-skinned figures. Another type of compositing (which I *think* was pioneered by... it was Anton or AARoberts, or somebody whose name begins with an A...I think) involves doing two or three renders in Poser, with the lights in slightly different locations and with different colours, then compositing them, including some blurring on at least one copy.
Formula 1:
This is the forumula I used for my dark-skinned figures.
On the top, we have the two Poser renders. On the left, no texture. I have got the lighting doing some nice things with colours and shadows, etc. Then I go and mess it up with textures on the figures! On the right is the figure with Daio's Dion texture. I have also changed the skin base colour from white to a pale, desaturated red. I have also boldly gone and changed the highlights from black to another red, but darker and less saturated than the skin tone. I did this to get the shiny highlights of dark skin. That worked reasonably well, actually, except on the back of this figure, where it caught a lot of light and is starting to look too shiny and buttery!
Not to fear, though. Using the no-texture render
in Soft Light mode did wonders for it. But I didn't stop there.
On the bottom left is what happens when I overlay the no-tex
in Hue mode. Ugh, neon purple! Still, I was intrigued and wondering
how to get some purplish variants in my skin tone... this might come in handy.
And on the right: here are all the layers composited together.
Compare it with the version directly above. MUCH better!
Formula One:
Layer 1: no-tex - Soft Light, 100%
Layer 2: no-tex - Overlay, 71%
Layer 3: (Layer 1: no-tex - Hue, 100% + Background: tex - normal) -
Exclusion, 30%
Background: tex - Normal
note: to get Layer 3, apply Layer 1 over the Background as indicated (Hue, 100%). select all, then copy merged, and paste. this will be Layer 3, which will be applied as noted (Exclusion, 30%)