Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[smitten_miquitten]

I think there's an easy path forward there though. If they make Keepers use the same brows info as Sunseekers have, that'd be a nice middle ground for most hair and skin colors imo. They all look pretty decent on Seekers, unless I'm missing something.

[Iscah]

I was so happy with 1st Benchmark....

The thing with the lighting in the first benchmark is that I suspect it was only the "broken" lighting in the old example zones that was making it look acceptable.

This was a comparison I had made during the initial benchmark:

The appearance in the aetherial sea lighting looks like what we got in the end; the appearance in the outdoor lighting (which the devs said was not indicative of the final product) looks closer to the original appearance in this instance, although for some other races it looked worse – or possibly to do with skintone, because my pale-skinned Midlander was basically translucent in anything besides the aetherial lighting.

Then they updated the lighting for the second benchmark, and the "corrected" appearance just looked the same as it already did in the first benchmark's aetherial lighting. It wasn't newly changed, but I suspect a lot of people skimmed over that initial backdrop to do their comparisons in the usually-better outdoor settings.


Edit to add: A particular thing with this face is that people started talking about the smile expression being added to the face between first and second benchmarks, but as the screenshots show, it was already a problem from the start.

The change of expression is the biggest sticking point for me on this particular character, though I'm also unhappy about the weakened shading on the eyebrows and that he has wrinkles under his eyes now – this is not the kind of detail I wanted and I don't know why the artists are doing this.

[Feathetaria]

/think, /alert, /ponder. Why did they have to do Feathetaria like that? I can't stand this. I wanna cry.

Not even the same character at all

Also on a sidenote, WHY ARE OUR EYEBALLS NOT WHITE? They are like skin colored after 7.0. It's kinda gross. xD

[ConantSivrha]

Also on a sidenote, WHY ARE OUR EYEBALLS NOT WHITE? They are like skin colored after 7.0. It's kinda gross. xD
(…)

I apologize if this comes across as rude, but could you be more specific? In what context do the eyeballs look skin-colored? To me, characters’ scleras (the whites of the eyes) have looked whiter than usual after the update. My two most played characters both have grey skin, however, so it’s possible that you’re noticing something that wouldn’t stand out to me, since I’m not seeing the eyeball color next to a “real” skin color on my own characters. But if the eyeballs do look skin-colored, I can’t see it in the picture you posted, perhaps because of the lighting.

[Rueby]

/think, /alert, /ponder. Why did they have to do Feathetaria like that? I can't stand this. I wanna cry.

Not even the same character at all

Also on a sidenote, WHY ARE OUR EYEBALLS NOT WHITE? They are like skin colored after 7.0. It's kinda gross. xD

I have a palest skin tone and my char's eyes are greyish white, they don't look skin toned to me.. I didn't test it often, do you have more pics with different lighting settings?

Something I observed and perhaps it's obvious, the lighting engine kills that 'constant' look that we had pre-DT, your char looks the same-ish in most lighting conditions unless it's extreme. We're way more affected by light/shadow now, so maybe in dimmer settings the grey-ish white eyes might start to look skin-toned? Then again when I zoom out on my char I feel like hmm there's this weird blur? I'm not sure how to explain it, perhaps it's something they plan to address.

Side note : They butchered your upper lip, my condolences

[Khryseis_Astra]

I apologize if this comes across as rude, but could you be more specific? In what context do the eyeballs look skin-colored? To me, characters’ scleras (the whites of the eyes) have looked whiter than usual after the update. My two most played characters both have grey skin, however, so it’s possible that you’re noticing something that wouldn’t stand out to me, since I’m not seeing the eyeball color next to a “real” skin color on my own characters. But if the eyeballs do look skin-colored, I can’t see it in the picture you posted, perhaps because of the lighting.

My Hyur’s don’t look so much “skin-colored” as gray. It’s very noticeable in portraits and gpose, but even in the now way-too-bright light of the Gridania inn. (I posted a side by side EW/DT comparison about 30 pages back lol) I thought at first that maybe the extra darkening added to the eyeshadow was just making it look that way, but lightening or even removing it didn’t help. Just really seems to make her eyes look like they’re sunk further back in her head than they should be. And I swear the changed the position of the irises themselves on some races!

[smitten_miquitten]

I think 'skin colored' probably isn't the best descriptor here as well, since there are a ton of skin colors. I'm assuming a pale peach color is meant, based on the screenshots. I personally haven't noticed my WoL's eyes being especially peach though.

[Cheapshot]

I also don’t see what you mean about skin colour from your photos. Maybe you could take some new ones? I’ve noticed a sort of grey hazy film over my eyes which looks awful. My eyes look really bad since the update and I’m shocked at everything that made it through QA in this graphic update.

My characters eyes have a sort of grey haze over them. The texture of it almost looks like certain kinds of shampoo if you know what I’m referring to? The haze is really sapping any life out of my eyes and light reflections in the eye also seem to be dimmed by both the grey overlay and the heavy shadow cast by the upper eyelid.

In this shot, there’s a bit of pink in the eyes from the lighting. Could that be what you saw?


My main concern is how blurry and dull and grey my eyes are now. They were so clear and sharp and bright before. Eye and skin colours have also been changed for some reason.

The grey film over eyes isn’t as visible in the CC but it does let me highlight something else going on.

The lightness if iris colour also has a stark impact on the pupil. This was always the case for miqo’te but it has a much stronger an effect now which combines with the in game greyness to make my eyes look like a dead fishes.

Edit:

No life in these eyes

[Rueby]

Snip

Almost looks like cataract now that I look at it..

[Feathetaria]

I have a palest skin tone and my char's eyes are greyish white, they don't look skin toned to me.. I didn't test it often, do you have more pics with different lighting settings?

Here are 2 shots that i found in a discord of someone else's modded character. They used /ponder to look to the right and they took a shot with vanilla eyes then they took a shot with their eye mod where they changed color temp of the white eyeball to lean towards blue and then they turned brightness up a lot.

1st image is DT eyeball color and 2nd image is someone's edit + eye mod.