As some of you know..I am a texture maker. Not one of the greats, but I get by :) Something I think you all outta know that is NOT common knowledge is this....highlights on textures are NOT necessary. You can make all the fancy additions you want....and it may enhance a texture, but it's not a necessity. Poser lighting...ANY Poser lighting, provides all the highlights you need. So I guess what I am saying is this...don't judge a texture by it's cover...it may look plain and uninteresting on the surface, but it will render every bit as good as all them fancy ones :)

Yep .. Lot of times it ruins it by having a highlight, that when you actually light the scene, is in the wrong place or the wrong shape.

granted Destiny a lot of what a texture looks like is based onthe lighting setup.. I"ve seen textures in free stuff etc.. that looked gorgeous.. but under my "no place to hide" light set up..they were ermmm... not that good... and under the default lighting.. downright hideous.. now.. if the person with the amazing lighting talents provided the light set used 8 ) but I'm just ranting a little... I've seen many of your textures.. and you've always played faire.. thank ye and quite lovely too

OK, here's one for you... details on skin textures... I'm particularly having trouble with lips... any advice there? Thanks for the tip, BTW.S

As far as detail goes, your best bet is to find a high res photo in a magazine and scan that, applying it to a bump map. I've created most of my bump maps for eyes and lips this way. Skin can be done in a couple of different ways depending on what you want from it. For medium distance adding "noise" to the image in your graphics app will give the skin a texture, for close images again a high res Close photo of the section you want detailed should be sufficient. With judicious scaling, positioning and some brush work to spread and clone the texture you can create some interesting bump maps. I've recently been using medical photo's of wounds and surgery to create scars and while it takes a bit of work they come out quite nicely, it just takes a strong stomach and not doing it while dinner is being made. :) Blemishes like moles, freckles and beauty spots can be added to the initial skin texture itself by using a soft edged or feathered brush with the opacity/density turned down. There are all sorts of little things like that. It's a matter really of looking at something you want to do, then analysing how it looks on the skin and trying to replicate that. I've found it surprisingly helpful to lurk around some of the online medical advice and encyclopeadia sites as they will occassionally have pictures at a higher resolution and closer to the subject matter than many fashion magazines.

I prefer the more simple textures myself too. I have a heck of a time with eyebrows though! Sometimes the posette's eyebrows show up, shift the light and it's gone.... Makes me crazy. (yes I do white out the posette first)

My newest creation is made using a piece of skin I cloned from a models face. Then I took that piece, and used it to clone the entire texture, both face and body. I painted the eyebrows on myself, but I used one of two standard lip files I have for her lips. I darkened the nostril area just a bit. On the body, all I did was clone the skin onto all the body parts, added pubic hair and nipples...and this was my end result. I've since changed the morphing of her face, but I didn't add any highlights anywhere.

You mean to tell me...that all the trouble I have gone to...trying to paint the right highlights on a texture....was for nothing?? ARRRRGGGGGGGHHHHH!! I thought they had to be on there! Damnit! Damnit! I have been driving myself nuts trying to paint the damn highlights on my first texture. I'm going to shoot myself now. Damnit.:o| All ranting aside.....Thank you for letting me know that Destiny. sigh