This appears to be a bug to me but I thought I'd put this out there and see what others think.

I created a head in CT8 and exported and brought it into CC 2.x.  There is a separate line between the head and the body that cannot be removed even when adjusting the various skin materials -- in fact, it's there were I think there are bugs, because adjusting *only* the head skin, for example, adjusts the entire body (and vice versa) so there's never a way to blend that distinct line between the two (and shouldn't selecting only the skin for one NOT affect the other?  Either that or we should just have a "base skin" material that goes everywhere).

Anyone have a clue how to deal with this?  It's most likely that the head skin map doesn't match up color wise with the body map, but I have found no way to blend or adjust the two that works.

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Alienware Aurora R12, Win 10, i9-119000KF, 3.5GHz CPU, 128GB RAM, RTX 3090 (24GB), Samsung 960 Pro 4TB M-2 SSD, TB+ Disk space
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

I have GOT to stop posting things before I try all there is to try...  Sigh.

Okay, this was due to having an image in the light tone map of the Body Base substance (put there by.. CC?)  Removing it removed the problem, but begs the question as to when you might want to actually HAVE this map, since it doesn't match up to the head map in any way with no way to adjust it to blend.  Oh well, one more thing to ponder in the mystery that is all this software.

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Alienware Aurora R12, Win 10, i9-119000KF, 3.5GHz CPU, 128GB RAM, RTX 3090 (24GB), Samsung 960 Pro 4TB M-2 SSD, TB+ Disk space
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

The Light Tone map should not be a problem. It's where the Diffuse map goes if there is one. I have used heads from the 100 head pack and also a head I created myself in CT8 and I don't see the line in this case. I have seen it in other cases but I don't remember the details.

I assume you're using the Traditional shader option for the Appearance Editor? The PBR option currently doesn't work for skin textures.

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If you do need to do body and head separately, just un-check "synchronize substance adjustments" in the preferences.

As I said, it was when I removed the tone map that things then worked.  No other maps were in there (all generated by CC 2.x since *I* didn't do anything special here).

And they were all generated when I converted the entire character to PBR.  So I'm not sure why you are saying it's not available for skin unless you're saying it doesn't WORK for skin (which is a different thing).  When I look at the substance for skin it has an sbsar substance in it.

Thanks for letting me know where the syncing options can be turned off.  That at least explains why I couldn't change one without affecting the other.

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Alienware Aurora R12, Win 10, i9-119000KF, 3.5GHz CPU, 128GB RAM, RTX 3090 (24GB), Samsung 960 Pro 4TB M-2 SSD, TB+ Disk space
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

Just went back again to be sure -- and as I'm sure you know, I greatly respect you, Rampa, so when you say something I have to feel I'm wrong.  But the skin in the CC 2.x is definitely marked as a PBR shader.  Not only that, when I go to, for example, add a tan to the head, I get that same line back again, with or without that substance align checkmark thingee.  I can fix it by copying the color in the tan to the body mark, but this isn't exactly a "synchronous" sort of operation and one that should have been better thought out.

But I'm more concerned about my understanding here -- are you saying we don't have PBR on the skin?  So why am I seeing it look like we do?

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Alienware Aurora R12, Win 10, i9-119000KF, 3.5GHz CPU, 128GB RAM, RTX 3090 (24GB), Samsung 960 Pro 4TB M-2 SSD, TB+ Disk space
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

I'm sorry, it is confusing...

What I meant was the shading system when you engage the Appearance Editor, which can either by Traditional or use one of the new PBR settings (which turn out not to work for skin). In either case the textures can be converted to PBR.

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To explain the relationship between the various materials and textures a bit better, its easier to use some screen captures.

I created a head in CT8 and saved it as an RLHead, which will have head and body materials (despite the name).

If you apply this RLHead to a character in CC 2.0 (or CC 1.5 for that matter) and let it import both head an body materials, there will obviously be updated materials for both the head and the body.

If you then check the material for the head for example, it will have Diffuse, Normal, and Specular maps (for Shader Type "Traditional"):



If you were to convert this to PBR, the Specularity map would be converted into a Roughness map (which is more or less the inverse):



If you open the Appearance Editor for the Traditional shader type (which is equivalent to the shader type in CC 1.5), you will see this for the Head:



The Diffuse map is not used in the Diffuse channel but in the Light Tone channel. (Normal and Specular are used in their respective channels.)This works the same way in CC 1.5.

If you check the base characters in the Appearance Editor, you will notice there are no textures, everything is done procedural.

For an RLHead, there is a procedural component (you can add freckles and facial hear, for example), but the original textures are taken into account as well. Which is why you find a texture in the Light Tone channel.

To get back to your original query: I have found that if I apply an RLHead in IC7, there are no Specular and Bump maps for the body and that will cause a distinct mismatch. Do both head and body have Specular textures in your case?

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Let me go through this slowly and stupidly, because I'm getting more and more confused.

I'm trying to create the RLHead in CT8 and apply it in CC2.x (to ultimately bring in to iC7).  I want all textures to be PBR, so in CC 2.x I convert everything to this shader.  As you say, it does make normal, specular and tone maps.  I use a CC2.x PBR body and doing this I found that disconnect between the head and the body, which I could only "fix" by removing the tone map from the head.  If I follow you, you are saying that by moving the head into CT 2.x and converting to PBR it creates this tone map which, if I remove, also removes information I don't want to particularly remove.

I *think* I can match up the body to the head now that I know how to disconnect their adjustments (as Rampa shows), so I need to try this.  But it seems either like a bug or at the least very awkward for this workflow to behave like this.  I would assume the whole point of RL's workflow is to do exactly what I am doing, unless they are saying you should NOT be using CT8 if you want PBR on your stuff.  (Or perhaps they just haven't addressed, yet, the PBR element in CT -- my bet is the former, though).  It's a lot like there are different factions in RL that aren't talking to each other, making the workflow very difficult for those of us who haven't quite mastered it.

I'm off to go play some more and see if I can pin down this without going completely nuts.  Still, at the very least it seems to me there ought to be a "blend" channel where the imported head and neck textures can merge if one is to truly use custom heads with CC.

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Alienware Aurora R12, Win 10, i9-119000KF, 3.5GHz CPU, 128GB RAM, RTX 3090 (24GB), Samsung 960 Pro 4TB M-2 SSD, TB+ Disk space
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

CT8 will not initially create a PBR material. I would try a slightly different workflow. See if this works:

Create head in CT*8
Load the Non-PBR project in CC2.
Load your RL head.
Convert the project to PBR.
Convert the materials to PBR if they were not converted automatically when you set the project to PBR (in the project panel).