Skinning in Layers - advanced

**Louis Lux** · August 16, 2010, 12:08 PM

Since a lot of you have requested skinning tutorials I thought I would make a brief one about my method.

Main photoshop tools you'll be using:
- pen tool
- dodge tool
- burn tool
- layers
- layer styles

A good knowledge of these tools will give you something of an edge when learning to skin, so LEARN THE BASICS

I use a tablet for some small detailing but it's not really needed.

As example I'll be using Aragorn's bed roll.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

STEP1 - base texture

It's hard to believe but the first step when skinning is a simple grey texture. In this case it can be smooth but with metals it's better to have more scratches and noise. tip: if you set your foreground and background colors to slightly different shades of a color and go to Filter>Render>Clouds you can get a good base texture.

Step 2 - layers and effects

This is really mechanical, what I did here was use some reference pics to make the different shapes composing the object. First thing you do is duplicate your base texture and turn it into a brown color, now go to Layer Styles click in Drop Shadow but set the Distance to 0 px then click in Stroke and set the size to 1, blend mode to Overlay and Opacity to 35%. With the pen tool make a path outlining the shape you want and then right click (with the pen tool still selected) and choose Make Selection, set feather radius to 0,2 pixels and click OK, right click the selection and choose Layer via copy. The new layer should carry on the drop shadow and stroke. Do this with every shape and when finished make the brown base texture invisible.

STEP 3 - shadows and highlights

Now let's give some depth to these shapes starting with the bottom one. Go to Window>Brushes, this will open the brushes tab if it isn't already opened, I'll be setting up the basic shadows (burn tool) and highlights (dodge tool) so I use a big brush 30-50 px with 0% hardness and I select Shape Dynamics>Size Jitter/Angle jitter at around 30% and Scattering also at 30%, I also enable Noise. Both the burn and dodge tool are set to Midtones and again at 30%, burn the areas that have something in front of them and highlight a few areas. When you use smaller brushes it's better to disable scattering and sometimes the shape dynamics I normally leave noise enabled.

STEP 4 - depth and color

When you add color into the equation you'll have to deal with saturation when using dodge and burn, these are the setting I normally use to keep it in check:

Dodge tool
-Highlights 5-15% increases the saturation a lot
-Midtones 15%-30% increases the saturation a bit
-Shadows depends decreases the saturation a lot
Burn tool
-Shadows 5-15% increases the saturation a lot
-Midtones 15%-30% increases the saturation a bit
-Highlights depends decreases the saturation a lot

90% of the time I only use midtones but if I want something very bright I use dodge with highlights selected or if I want something very dark I use burn with shadows selected, the inverse settings I use to decrease the saturation in some areas, you can also use the sponge tool.

In this case I used dodge in the middle with a big brush 90px and used burn in the areas closer to the edges. With a smaller brush I burned the area beneath the straps and dodged the edge close to the center I also burned the area between the two highlighted areas.

STEP 5 - straps

Now you'll be dealing with every strap separately (I'll get to the cloth beneath later). For the strap I use dodge with a medium brush at midtones in the edges and then a very small brush 1-5px with 100% hardness set at highlights and highlight the edge even more, close to the edges use the burn tool with a small brush as to kind of outline the highlighted areas. Set some general highlights and shadows in the same way you did the layer beneath.

STEP 6 - Cloth

Do the same thing with the rest of the straps, if you have some drawing experience it will be easier for you to set the shadows and highlights correctly, it comes down to feel and having some good references. For the cloth I pasted one of Marcel's fabric patterns (13 I think) but any cloth pattern will do, resized it and set the layer to overlay and opacity to 40 %. You can now merge the cloth layers (ctrl+E) or stamp the layers, select the layers and type ctrl+alt+E, and dodge/burn some areas you think need it you can also sharpen some key areas a bit.

STEP 7 - leather

What I do now is select every layer that will be made of leather, stamp it (ctrl+alt+e), in the new layer with a 1px dodge brush I go crazy with the mouse which will add some scratches. Now I will paste a leather pattern and set it to overlay 40%, this will also affect the cloth layer which I don't want so I click the thumbnail of the stamped layer, this will make a selection around it and right click with the select tool and press select inverse and in the leather layer press delete. I also did some brightness and contrast adjustments but you don't have to.

**Killerbee** · August 16, 2010, 12:34 PM

Nice ! Too bad GIMP is a bit limited in it's burn/dodge features

**~~AgentGB~~** · August 16, 2010, 02:24 PM

awesome tutorial dude!

**Louis Lux** · August 16, 2010, 03:14 PM

Since I didn't go into much detail in the tutorial about the pen tool and brushes go here for more detailed instructions
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...95#post7143095