I found your toolkit incredibly helpful for setting up materials in blender, so I was going to add more color profiles into it for my own personal use. Using Norbyte's BG3 search engine I was able to find all of the material presets that have all the values I need for the various skin tones. Human tones (marked SKIN_HUM in the files) work fantastic. As a reference, I compared what you put into the toolbox as "Neutral 1" to the SKIN_HUM_Neutral_-1 material preset and it's a match. However, I seem to be having issues with the tiefling colors, especially the reds. SKIN_TIF_Red_3 ends up looking yellow, for example. And that's not the only tiefling skin color that looks weird.
Do you know if I'm personally doing something wrong or if it just needs a different node setup in your toolbox?
I hope this question isn't a bother and I appreciate you so much for making this toolkit, since I struggled setting up the nodes myself for a bit now! Great work!
thanks I'm glad you found it helpful! The issue with red skin tones is not any fault of yours, its because the skin shader that I made is not an exact replica. Human and blue skin tones work fine, yellow gets washed out, and red just doesn't work well at all. I didn't put more work into fixing back then because at the time most people where just using it to edit textures and tended to never used anything but the default skintone. (there's actually like 3 other skin tone presets in the file but almost never see anyone use them ;w;) I am however almost done building a new version of the shader that is based off of more accurate information and should fix this issue (I've just been dragging my feet on getting it finished.), you can see a preview of it further down in the comments. In the mean time, I recommend going into the skin shared group and manually adjusting the colour by adding something like a hue/saturation node or a mix colour node into the node tree (right before it goes over into the 'mask + normal' section is a good spot). Additionally, if you use substance painter, I already have a much more accurate version of the skin shader for use in that program. I hope this comment helped, and I apologise for the inconvenience.
You rock for replying so fast. I was actually worried I wasn't the issue, but I'm so glad to hear you're working on an update. The main reason why I wanted to use the blender version instead of the substance painter version was for fan animations made in blender, so being able to actually use the in-game materials for subsurface scattering and ambient occlusion was my end goal. A more accurate shader would be so so so appreciated!
In the mean time, I recommend going into the skin shared group and manually adjusting the colour by adding something like a hue/saturation node or a mix colour node into the node tree (right before it goes over into the 'mask + normal' section is a good spot).
This is pretty much the workaround I used to try to get the colors looking closer in the mean time so I'm glad you recommend it!
My skin textures stay washed out and I have my texture set to non-color (or rather the only option I have is "generic data"). I'm sure there's a setting somewhere that I'm missing. Any advice?
I have the dds importer thing through guide mentions. These are the same texture files I've been using in game and they work fine in there. I get a similar effect on the character in your provided blend file too, which makes me think I have something configured wrong lol.
sorry, saw this and forgot to get back to you. I would try importing your maps a different way, ie converting them into another format outside of blender. I have actually been having some issues with the addon I mentioned in the guide, and had been planing on removing it as a recommendation in future versions
Hey no worries. You're providing this stuff for us and I couldn't be more grateful :)
So, here's another thing that's weird. I updated Blender- didn't realize I was a bit behind. Your blend file was doing the same washed-out thing in Blender 3.6, but it looks correct in 4.1. My skin texture is still washed out in 4.1, but it's not as bad this time.
As an experiment, I reimported a head I already had customize, saved as a .gr2, etc, and the textures stick to that one just fine. Near as I can tell, it's something about the mesh itself. The same textures that look weird on my mesh look correct on the mesh in your blend file. Could the gr2 - dae conversion be the problem somehow?
Different file types don't seem to make much difference either :/
oh that yeah, there where changes made to Blender's principled bsdf shader in 4.0 and the current version of the toolbox was made in and for Blender 4.0+, so I am not surprised that there are backwards compatibility issues. I would try re downloading the toolbox so that you have a version that was never opened or saved in 3.6, and see if your issues still persist there. I will also note that the skin shader in the current toolbox does not create skin that are completely accurate to the ones ingame; this is because when I built it I was going off purely guess work, as a result some colours are more accurate than others. Normal human skin tones tend to be alright, blues are also fairly good but get a little washed out, yellows are there but VERY washed out, and red tones? well there's a reason I didn't include a red tone as a preset. (note: this is something I have fixed in the new version I am working on, which will HOPEFULLY be out soon. Got taken by a fae mood and made the shader for substance painter lmao)
as an aside, I doubt that its your mesh that's causing the issue, your uvmaps appear to be coming in just fine and there's not much else that can really effect the textures/shader on the mesh side of things. Its going to be something with the shader/a setting in blender. My best advice for you is to start a fresh blend file in 4.1 and start again, reimporting everything from scratch (don't append things from the old file, work just with new versions). If you're still having this issue let me know, you might need to send me your blend file so I can have a hands on look through it.
Deleting and reimporting your blend file fresh did the trick. That's such basic troubleshooting that I can't believe didn't try it first lmao. Thanks again for all your efforts in making these tools for us. I went from stumbling and struggling to actually putting something together that I can be happy with.
Huh, was going to ask a question on found it in the comments then just say your guy looks great! Thank you to the author for the guide it saved my life
Hello! Thanks for your work. I have a strange question, for some reason my models ears and the area around the hair have a blue tint. This is repeated both for my tav and for the models in your file. I found out that when I hide my hair, the blueness disappears
Hi! thank you very much for this great work, even a beginner like me almost got it all. can you please tell me if i can somehow make the eyes different colors? heterochromia. i can't understand how to do it...
hey no problem, glad you're enjoying it. There's a few ways you can do that, but I've found making a set up like this is the easiest to manage. You'll want to go into your eye material, duplicate the existing set up, add a mix shader node, a colour attribute node, and a separate colour node, and then set up your node tree like this:
from there you can change the colours on each eye separately. What this is doing, is taking the vertex colours from the eye mesh (if you go into vertex colours in blender, you will notice that one of the eyes is painted red), and using them as a mask to determine how the two shaders should be mixed. hope this helps!
Hi, just wondering how to put edited heads back into the game? I've tried converting files and searching around, but can't really figure it out. Sorry if it's a stupid question!
there are no stupid questions asked in good faith. Getting heads back into the game is a bit of a processes, but thankfully there are a few templates/guides out there. I recommend either Weeviljester's template or Padme4000 template (Pademe also has a few tools and blender addons for modders, so check those out). I also recommend checking out the BG3 Modding Community Wiki, but it is currently a bit bare bones right now (though it should fill up with time)
ahh thank you so much for the reply!! sorry again but would you happen to know how to choose different heads or import them into this? i find this much easier to edit than with normal blender, but have only practiced with the default female head. i have the bg3 multitool and have tried putting other heads in but have had no luck yet.
You need to make sure that your texture maps are set to non-colour (unless otherwise specified). To change a skin colour from the defualt preset to another provided preset, look for the node group plunged into the skin shader labelled "skin colour", then at the bottom of that node click the checkered circle icon to open a drop down menu to show a list of all available node groups inside the file, select any node group with "skin:" in its name to change to that preset.
I am eternally grateful to you for this beautiful toolbox, it really makes my work much easier.What's wrong here? I can't get the tattoos to fit the face. I'm using the latest version of Toolbox and Blender 3.6.
hey no problem I'm glad you enjoyed it. As for the tattoo, as of version 1.5 the atlas needs to be cut up into individual tiles first, and there are instructions on how to do so inside the provided guide on page 6 I believe. (note to future readers: this may change in later version of the toolbox, always check the provided guide just to make sure)
Additionally, I would recommend updating blender to the latest version if you can as this shader was built in blender version 4.0 and may not work as best on older versions. it should be fine for the most part tho.
hey no problem! and thanks for sharing, funnily enough I've actually been working on the next version of the shader which has support for freckles (as well as Vitiligo) built into it. Hopefully, your suggestion helps a few people while I work on getting the update out (it may be a little while). But here's a preview if you are curious:
Hey Volno, thanks for the mod, it's super useful and im still getting used to it but i wanted to ask you somenthing regarding the textures. Do HMVY are also extracted from .GTP files? Im still new at it but i managed to track down the file textures for male body tieflings and there's none of it in sight, have you encountered somehing similar or is it just me not knowing how to do stuff :p EDIT: no matter its fixed sry
im following along with your PDF and i'm in shaders, and trying to set it up, and i see things like shader:skin, and shader: atlas hub etc. but these arent options when i try to add shader nodes, so when i read these are easy to set up, i said "WHAT"
perhaps? It would depend on how you're trying to set it up. The shaders I have made aren't shader nodes themselves, they're groups, so you'll need to look in the 'groups' menu rather than the 'shader' menu to find them. Additionally, each one of the shaders is present in a relevant material (ie, you'll find the skin shader inside the 'head' material) so it shouldn't be too difficult to find the shaders you're looking for if you are working directly in the blend file I have provided.
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Do you know if I'm personally doing something wrong or if it just needs a different node setup in your toolbox?
I hope this question isn't a bother and I appreciate you so much for making this toolkit, since I struggled setting up the nodes myself for a bit now! Great work!
The issue with red skin tones is not any fault of yours, its because the skin shader that I made is not an exact replica. Human and blue skin tones work fine, yellow gets washed out, and red just doesn't work well at all. I didn't put more work into fixing back then because at the time most people where just using it to edit textures and tended to never used anything but the default skintone. (there's actually like 3 other skin tone presets in the file but almost never see anyone use them ;w;)
I am however almost done building a new version of the shader that is based off of more accurate information and should fix this issue (I've just been dragging my feet on getting it finished.), you can see a preview of it further down in the comments. In the mean time, I recommend going into the skin shared group and manually adjusting the colour by adding something like a hue/saturation node or a mix colour node into the node tree (right before it goes over into the 'mask + normal' section is a good spot). Additionally, if you use substance painter, I already have a much more accurate version of the skin shader for use in that program. I hope this comment helped, and I apologise for the inconvenience.
I have actually been having some issues with the addon I mentioned in the guide, and had been planing on removing it as a recommendation in future versions
So, here's another thing that's weird. I updated Blender- didn't realize I was a bit behind.
Your blend file was doing the same washed-out thing in Blender 3.6, but it looks correct in 4.1. My skin texture is still washed out in 4.1, but it's not as bad this time.
As an experiment, I reimported a head I already had customize, saved as a .gr2, etc, and the textures stick to that one just fine. Near as I can tell, it's something about the mesh itself. The same textures that look weird on my mesh look correct on the mesh in your blend file. Could the gr2 - dae conversion be the problem somehow?
Different file types don't seem to make much difference either :/
as an aside, I doubt that its your mesh that's causing the issue, your uvmaps appear to be coming in just fine and there's not much else that can really effect the textures/shader on the mesh side of things. Its going to be something with the shader/a setting in blender. My best advice for you is to start a fresh blend file in 4.1 and start again, reimporting everything from scratch (don't append things from the old file, work just with new versions). If you're still having this issue let me know, you might need to send me your blend file so I can have a hands on look through it.
Thank you to the author for the guide it saved my life
hope this helps!
(note to future readers: this may change in later version of the toolbox, always check the provided guide just to make sure)
Additionally, I would recommend updating blender to the latest version if you can as this shader was built in blender version 4.0 and may not work as best on older versions. it should be fine for the most part tho.
If anyone else is like me and looking for how in the world the freckles are applied, you're looking for two additional textures:
Face Freckles:
Green Channel of SKIN_Shared_Shading_MSKA.DDS
Body Freckles
Red Channel of SKIN_Shared_Shading_MSK.DDS
Both of these maps are found in *\UnpackedData\Textures\Generated\Public\Shared\Assets\Characters\_Models\_SharedAssets\SHARED_Skin\Resources.
You can plug these into the Atlas Hub shader like tattoos or makeup.
EDIT: no matter its fixed sry
did i skip over something?