[Tutorial] Zen and the Art of Skin Making

[Alan 1815]

Darrian's Skin Competitions-

1st Skin Competition-

The first competition after writing this guide went very well. We had about 10 contestants, each showing promise and skill in skin making. Two of the contestants tied for first, each winning 4800 minas. If you want tips on skin making, or maybe a skin request if they are accepting, I recommend talking to either one of them.

The winners-

Elijah_Blu (MC name: Rob_west) (RP name: Punka_Lee)

Guyarcher23 (MC name: Shpoop) (RP name: Priest_Philip)

-Intro-

Hello everyone! If you are tired of waiting in a waiting line to get your skin made for you (like most people who ask for skins from me :|), then this is definitely the right place for you to be! Continue reading the following guide if you want to become a quality skin maker. If you don't want to become a quality skin maker, you might as well leave this thread right now.

-Background-

I first decided to do this when someone I made a skin for asked for help on making skins on her own, and my "quick guide" ended up being closer to a five paragraph essay. I then decided to expand on the ideas I had written down, and I realized there was a LOT to cover, so I am making an in depth guide to hold all of those ideas. In this guide, I will talk about the qualities that a skin maker NEEDS to have to be successful, different skin making programs (as well as the programs that I use myself), the best and most useful features in the programs, and the steps I personally use when making my own skins. Also, if you want to become a great skin maker, I HIGHLY recommend that you read the entire guide, not just certain parts of it.

-Qualities of a Skin Maker-

There are many qualities that a Skin Maker or any designer needs to have. Because of the great amount of them, I will only name the most important:

Patience-

Patience, for almost everything you do in life, is one of the most important qualities to have. If you don't have patience, you will become easily frustrated with your skins, and they will turn out sloppy and ugly 99.9% of the time. When making skins, it is important to keep calm when making mistakes over and over again, and not to freak out. For example: if you are designing the head of a skin and keep making the hair look really ugly, and all your attempts to fix it aren't working, you still need to keep a cool head and keep experimenting until you find a good design, whether it takes 30 seconds or 30 minutes. A great overall skin design that takes 3 hours is more worth it than an average skin that took 20 minutes.

Usage of Time-

Like mentioned above, it is possible for skins to take 3 hours to make. It is very important to know going in to the making of a new skin that you won't be done with it in 30 minutes to an hour, unless it is an edit or revision of a skin and you aren't starting from scratch. Most new skin makers, and even most skin makers with average talent, can not imagine making a single skin for longer than hour, because it is too tedious. The truth is that skin making is VERY tedious, and you will have to accept this is you want to make a quality skin. On average, it takes me about one and a half hours to make a good skin, but before I learned the shortcuts and tricks it took me between two and three hours. Knowing this, if it is a school or work night and you typically go to bed at around 10:30pm, don't start a skin at 10:00pm. You can save the skin and start later of course, but I have discovered that skins usually turn out better when made all at once.

Attention to Detail-

Although it is best to take every possible shortcut to save time, it isn't good when you leave out details of a skin, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant the details appear to be. NEVER leave out shading, no matter what. It adds definition to a skin and makes it seem a lot more realistic. It is better to shade with barely visible results than to not shade at all. Also, make sure that the skin looks good on the character itself, and not just on the template. Double check that you didn't make silly mistakes as well, such as forgetting to color a part of the head, forgetting to shade a part of the leg, etc.

Motivation-

One of the most obvious facts of skin making is that the skill required for it improves with practice and more practice. However, no one will want to practice skin making if they aren't motivated to do it. Before you begin making a skin, it is important to think of a good reason that would make you want to finish the skin no matter what. This includes wanting to sell completed skins for minas, or making quality skins to gain publicity and fame for yourself.

Knowing When to Take Breaks-

After hours of making skins, it is good to know when to take a break. It isn't good to make 3 skins back to back that take two hours each. It is very mentally tiring to make skins, and taking a break of any length is necessary in retaining your sanity. In fact, I often take multiple breaks in the middle of a single skin, and it definitely helps relieve the pressure for a while.

-Programs and Features-

There are various programs, some better than others, that are available for skin making. However, there are other programs that are equally important that aren't designed for skin making.

Notepad-

This may seem like a trivial program to use, but it is extremely useful. I mainly use it to brainstorm ideas for skins I am making, and I keep it in the corner of my screen so that I can glance at it every so often without it getting in the way. I typically use this format for my brainstorming:

Race-

Gender-

Hair Style-

Hair Color-

Clothing Style-

Clothing Color-

Eye Color-

Accessories-

Additional Info-

Notepad Website

Notepad++ Website

Miners Need Cool Shoes-

Miners Need Cool Shoes is the name of a commonly used website for skin making. In my opinion, there is nothing special or useful about this site other than the "brush" tool. This tool basically takes a color you have picked and when you draw with it, each pixel is a random shade darker than the color you have picked. For instance, if you have light blue selected, you have an equal chance of getting blue or dark blue for every pixel, although there are also shades in between those two colors. Overall, this tool isn't that great, because it is random and unreliable. I will say however that I used this website when I first started out skin making, and I would classify this site as a "beginner site", as it is easy to use and get used to. I don't recommend for experienced skin makers however.

Although this site isn't notable for skin making, there is a feature on the site that keeps bringing me back to it. This feature is the search bar below the main editor. When you search for a person's mc name, it brings the skin that they are currently using into the editor. This tool is great if this person asks you to edit your skin, because you can just type in their mc name and edit away, simple as that. It is also useful if you are a stalker and you want to know what skin someone is using every minute, but I don't recommend using this feature for this :grin:

Minershoes

SkinEdit-

SkinEdit is, put simply, THE skin editing software. If you are an experienced skin maker, SkinEdit is your best friend, your soulmate, and everything else that matters to you in your life, all in a few lines of program coding. This program is basically minershoes' matured, extremely manly older brother. SkinEdit has the same template and method of making the skins as minershoes, except it has many more features. Here are the important ones:

Pen/Pencil: Self explanatory. The tool used to draw and stuff.

Eraser: Erases.

Color Picker: When this tool is used on a color, it selects that color for the next time you use Pen/Pencil or Flood.

Flood: changes the color you just clicked, as well as all pixels around if of the same color, to the color you have currently selected.

Line: A writing tool like Pen/Pencil, but you select two different pixels, and it creates a line that connects them.

Shade: Ok. This tool is THE tool of SkinEdit if you are an experienced skin maker. It basically is like the "brush" tool of minershoes, except instead of randomly selecting different shades, this tool shades the pixel only one degree darker every time you right-click it. Also, when you left-click a pixel, it makes it a shade lighter. This tool allows you to shade sections of the skin with ease, and it adds a lot of definition to your skin, rather than just having it be solid colors and look unrealistic.

Tool Settings: Self explanatory. Allows you to configure the settings of the tool you are currently using.

Undo (AKA ctrl+z): Undoes. (p.s. this tool = <3)

Redo (AKA ctrl+y): Undoes the undo.

Save and Save As: Although some programs have this feature, others don't, so it is important to note that this feature is available on SkinEdit.

Other than these main features, SkinEdit also includes load, new, settings, and help. It also has the important ways of precise color picking, including HSB and RGB.

SkinEdit thread

Skin Viewer-

This is basically a simple program I use to preview my skins. It can also be used for looking at skins other people use by typing in their mc name, much like minershoes. I upload my skin to it, put it in a good looking position, then I print screen it for "later use".

Skin Viewer Thread

Only for Windows. Sorry Mac users!

Paint-

Used for a variety of things, mainly free drawing and doodling when you are bored. This program typically comes with Microsoft Windows, as it is a microsoft program. This is what I used for the "later use", although any image editing software will do. When I start up Paint, I immediately paste. Afterwards, I select and crop out the image of the skin and save it as an image into my library.

Only for Windows. Sorry Mac users!

Imageshack-

This is a website used for a variety of things in terms of photos and images. It is used by me to upload the picture I saved from paint. When I am done uploading my picture or pictures, I copy the embedded forum code given to use, and I paste it onto these forums into these forums. I only do this when I am showing someone a preview of the skin I made for them, or if I am just showing off a skin I made for myself.

Imageshack

Planet Minecraft-

This site is a big site well known to many minecraft players. The only real use for this site in terms of skins, is that this is where you'd want to upload your skin to if you were making a skin for somebody. You go to the home page, then go to the skins section, then click "upload skin", and then you upload your skin. You have to enter some info on the skin, select the skin you made from your computer library, then save the upload. It is pretty self explanatory once you are doing it.

Planet Minecraft

-My Personal Method to Making Skins-

I start the process of making a skin by pulling up notepad. I usually know what I want to do already, either because I am making a skin for someone else who already gave me their ideas or I already thought it through, so I just write down the info. I mentioned above what format I use to write down my info and/or brainstorm, so refer to that if you skipped to this section.

After notepad, I pull up SkinEdit. I then choose the color of the skin I am going to use, and color the ENTIRE skin that color. Afterwards, I outline the clothing on the skin (including gloves, boots, hats, etc.) with a color that stands out on the skin. This means don't use dark grey to outline the clothing on a black skin, use white or maybe light green instead. I then fill in the actual clothing with the color I want to use for it. I don't go into shading and darker versions of colors yet, I just color the clothing a basic color, such as blue. Next, I change the color of the original clothing outline to a darker version of the color used for the rest of the clothing. This means that if I filled the clothes with red, I will use a dark red for the outline.

After all this is done, I get into accessories. Accessories include quivers, tools on the back, helmets, necklaces, etc. I then begin shading the skin. Typically, I right-click three times with the shade tool on the pixels that are touching the outline (if the new shaded color become darker than the outline, make the outline even darker). I then right-click twice on the pixels touching the other shaded pixels. I right-click once on the ones touching those pixels. After shading the borders, I will randomly add right and left-clicks to areas I feel need shading and/or lightening, and I try to make it look as realistic as possible, as well as trying to give the skin definition.

After the clothing, accessories, and shading is over, I only then begin working on the head of the skin. I make the face reflect the gender of the skin, and I also make it reflect the occupation or work the skin is supposed to be doing. This means I give female skins big, wide eyes and smooth, barely shaded skin, while male skins have narrower eyes and rougher looking, more shaded skin. Also, if the occupation of the skin is working in a mine, for instance, I will add specks of brown and orange that don't stand out too much on the skin but are still visible. This gives the skin a "dirty" look, and adds personality to the skin.

For the hair, I give the skin a style that suits its personality best. I wouldn't give a wizard a buzz cut, but rather long flowing white hair and a beard. On the contrary, I wouldn't give a member of the army long flowing hair, but rather short hair and maybe the remnants of facial hair. I shade the hair when it is made and colored so that it looks like the hair is combed a certain way. For example, I will make vertical shading lines on the sides of the head to make it look like the skin has hair that is falling down naturally.

Once this is all done, the skin is more or less completed. At this point, I check that I didn't make any silly mistakes, such as forgetting to shade something or coloring something the wrong color. I do some last touch ups to make the skin blend together and look like everything goes well together. I make sure that the skin has a good design and there is variety in color, and it is pleasing to the eye. If all of this is so, then I save the skin, let out a sigh of relief, then leave!

-To Conclude-

Congratulations! Just by having read this guide, you are already better at skin making. Unless you are Notch or something. Then you probably got WORSE at skin making.

Oh Well.

Anyways, even though you now know how to make amazing skins, it doesn't mean you will be able to. Like everything in life, skill comes with practice, practice, and more practice. If you are inexperienced, you will most likely be frustrated at your inability to make your skin EXACTLY like you want it to look, which is just the reason to make simpler skins at first to develop your ability. It may be hard to see yourself as a great skin maker, but everyone starts somewhere, including me. This means that at some point or another, I was just another wannabe skin maker who didn't know his reds from his greens, his shades from his highlights, and his legs from his arms. I will also admit that it doesn't take a long time to get good at skin making. The whole idea of practice is that you make skins and learn how to do techniques that you can use for later skins, as well as good skin making habits.

In fact, this is how long the time span was between when I first started practicing skin making, and when I started my skin thread:

About 3 weeks.

For some people, that is a long time. For others, it is an incredibly short amount of time, considering the level I am currently at, and how I have already written an in depth guide on skin making. The point is, expertise in skin making is not only obtainable, but easily obtainable at that. The only thing that stands between you being good or not at making skins is a simple question:

Do I want to make skins?

[Robin Drake 731]

Very thorough guide and links to many different software/websites that you may need to use. Great job.

Though I am still number 1 te-he.

[Damien Glaft 18]

Awesome guide! Love all the work and detail you put in! Using it now!

[bpwoods1997 1]

nice guide man :) If it was me that you mentioned about asking how im a guy but idk if your talking about me sooo ya. Im going to try and make a good skin right now :)

[Alan 1815]

Thanks Robin. I am not very smart though, so I don't understand your big words :3 (cwatididthar?)

Glaft you are awesome :D

bpwoods1997 Thanks, and I was talking about a girl...

...unless you are talking about something else in the guide. Then I have no idea what you are talking about :)

[bpwoods1997 1]

haha Darrian i was talking about the part where you said something about a girl asked for a guide and i just thought you might be talking about me cause i mentioned something about if you have a youtube channel but i just finished making a skin ill post it in a few minutes.

EDIT:

preview: novaskin.me/yj619 | apply to minecraft now

Here it is. Personally, I think its the best skin ive made so far, thanks to this guide. :)

EDIT 2: To upload the picture to here i used a program for google chrome called Nova Skin. It is one of the apps for google chrome and is (in my opinion) better then skin viewer because it requires no cropping and you can put the person in any position you want, plus make them hold lots of things, for example, i made my guy hold a fishing rod, since hes a fisherman. :) I think you should check it out. You might like it.

[cometking123 113]

I love you. This guide will be essential for the creation of my new skin.

Plus 1000 internets to you <3

[no longer active 734]

Great guide and I hope I can start on a path to skin making because of this.

[Alan 1815]

Wow Robin, just now noticed the small text :P

And no, you will never be number one!!

[Schwaan 176]

Amazing tutorial. It helps a lot. Thanks Darrian. (:

[Alan 1815]

Just an announcement: I was given a great idea by Leland22 about this tutorial. I will be hosting a skin competition soon, and the top three best will get a certain amount of minas that I will decide on later. I am currently making minas off of skins, so depending on how much I make by the end of the weekend, is how much the prize pool will be. I am estimating that the top prize will be between 2 and 4 thousand minas, so I suggest reading every last bit of this guide, and then practicing your skin making abilities!

I will post the full details later this weekend, so stay tuned!

[bpwoods1997 1]

im gonna take part in this competition but im not actually part of the server so if i win i will donate my minas to someone else

[argonian 12844]

I find skincraft easier to use when I'm starting the skin but then I use skin-edit for tweaking and the tool "add noise" which shades the skin for you.

[bpwoods1997 1]

is it just me or is the minecraft forum not working right now?

[Alan 1815]

@James2k Skincraft I don't think is great for beginners. It is too complicated with all the options, such as picking premade parts and start off skins, while Minershoes is just a template and a color picker. When starting off, the more simple the better. I might agree that Skincraft could be used for somewhat experienced skin makers, but I never really liked it that much.

Also, the add noise tool in SkinEdit doesn't realistically shade the skin, it just adds random pixels everywhere.