New Benchmark (June): Au Ra Feedback

I'm not saying anything new since I'm pretty sure I've already seen similar said, but I want to add my impressions from the new benchmark in as another notch on the feedback log.

https://i.imgur.com/mjb8ON5.png

I currently feel like the shadows are simply too overbearing. This is a screencap with the Gridania background which is where, in my opinion, the shadows are the heaviest in the benchmark character creator right now. On this face, especially, you already have the shadows from the horns THEN you have shadows from the hair too. It's too much. If the shadows could be toned down, I feel like it would be a significant improvement.

https://i.imgur.com/ZPJ4Zlr.png

That said, I do feel like there's been improvement since the original benchmark. She actually looks closer to what she looks like in game again so there is that.

It will be interesting to see how divergent the release models are from the benchmarks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tarath

The reason people are critiquing the eyebags in the benchmark is because they're actual changes to the face sculpt. There's now an indent for the lower eyelid, making it much more pronounced compared to the current version where they are practically nonexistent. It has nothing to do with texture maps.

...

This is probably happening to the majority of the faces, and albeit it being subtle, I can't "unsee" it now that I'm aware of it.
The reason I'm bringing this up again is to highlight that different face types are affected by this, and because I worry this will also impact other facial expression involving eyelids.

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It has definitely happened across a number of faces.

It's one of the reasons why male Au Ra face 3 looks so different now - I made this image from the previous benchmark, but the shape hasn't changed since then even though the makeup has been somewhat fixed. You can see that the face has changed from being quite flat around the eyes to being very curved around the eyeball.

https://lds-img.finalfantasyxiv.com/...cfa5fc8476.jpg


And I've also noticed it on my male Duskwight (again from the first benchmark but it hasn't been changed since), made obvious by the changed curve of the tattoo line:

https://lds-img.finalfantasyxiv.com/...438a52c36c.jpg


It feels like the update has been done by someone going for technical realism with little understanding of how the pieces go together to create an appealing character.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

It has definitely happened across a number of faces.

It's one of the reasons why male Au Ra face 3 looks so different now - I made this image from the previous benchmark, but the shape hasn't changed since then even though the makeup has been somewhat fixed. You can see that the face has changed from being quite flat around the eyes to being very curved around the eyeball.



And I've also noticed it on my male Duskwight (again from the first benchmark but it hasn't been changed since), made obvious by the changed curve of the tattoo line:




It feels like the update has been done by someone going for technical realism with little understanding of how the pieces go together to create an appealing character.

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Also they have no regard for actually preserving what we have now while upping the fidelity. They butchered a ton of faces in ways that's significant enough to say they aren't even close to the same person.

If this was posted already, apologies - I haven't come across it.
So, I'm still trying to make this work (still not happy, but trying) and came across horn 'issues'

1) For face 4, the horns now look even less like they are attached. (EW on left, New Bench on right)
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

1a) DT v11 with same angle as the EW one:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

1b: Same angle as 1a, but with light setting two - the shadow is just... looks like her horns are burnt:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

As you can see it was there in EW, but in DT it just looks even less like they are something that grew out of her head.

2) From the side. EW feels more blended and DT feels like it was just stuck on with the color and text vastly mis-matched. (Not saying EW was perfect, just saying it stood out less to me)
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

3) Xaela suffers from this as well, though far less obvious and very hard to see form the front side view:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

4) Adding face 3 since their horns also sit on preexisting scales. Though they still look like they were an added afterthought, they don't have a really obvious ridge where they connect to her head.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

5) There is also a very noticeable seam with the optional scales on the chin. It was there in EW, but I'm guessing the lower poly count actually helped it blend in a little better. Now it is a very distinct seam at the chin line.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-gm?authuser=0

I know this texture is vastly different (and harder to make seamless), but this is the equivalent of their ear, I feel like it shouldn't look pasted on and the optional scales should be seamless with the default ones.

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Originally Posted by Turethir

As someone who uses Face 2 / Eye Shape 3 - I'd recommend if you can trying Eye Shape 4 on the benchmark and seeing if it might work better for you - in my opinion, Eye Shape 4 on the benchmark actually looks like the current Eye Shape 3!

I still have issues with the lips and I've raised these in the JP thread - I want our frog mouths back! Here is what I would like to see:

https://i.imgur.com/j0QRgsz.png

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I just wanna say your edit would fix 90% of my issue with face 2 in dawntrail and would make me so excited to play. Sadly the lips we are getting change the entire feeling around it. As someone pointed out they are too puckered :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Soteira

I just wanna say your edit would fix 90% of my issue with face 2 in dawntrail and would make me so excited to play. Sadly the lips we are getting change the entire feeling around it. As someone pointed out they are too puckered :(

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Thank you so much! I've seen a few people say this in the thread and it's really meant a lot to me - so glad you liked it and that other Face 2 Au Ra feel the same! We'll see if any changes are made, but it's nice to know I'm not alone.

Reporting from Pre-Release Launch to state that Face 1's mouth looks much different than it did in the updated benchmark - and unfortunately, it's not even close to resembling the mouth I had in Endwalker. Here is a comparison:

https://i.imgur.com/tv08PXV.png

As you can see, the corners of the mouth are completely different, giving a different feeling for the face and expressions. Her smiles in particular look very unusual to me, like she's faking them now, where before her smiles were some of the most beautiful faces she could make because of how warm she looked.

I am very disheartened by this. I was hoping Au Ra would have gotten more love.

My reaction to seeing my character with the updated face 4.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...c2b5e9ee64d78&

Face 4 was absolutely butchered.

They really really messed up F Au Ra bad, face 4 especially looks so jarringly different its kind of mind-boggling.