Texturing

Skin Shading

Subsurface scattering and specular for skin

Also known as: Skin shader · Subsurface profile · Diffusion profile · Skin SSS · Realistic skin material · Skin material Unreal

Character Rendering Texturing

Definition

Skin shading is the set of techniques used to make skin look alive in a renderer. Light enters the skin, scatters below the surface and comes out nearby, which softens shadows and gives the red glow of thin areas such as ears and nostrils, and this is called subsurface scattering. A skin shader also has a soft, double-lobed specular for the oily layer, varied roughness, and detail maps for pores. Unreal Engine offers the Subsurface Profile shading model, and Unity's HDRP uses diffusion profiles.

In production

Start with a good base color without lighting baked in, add roughness variation by region, then tune the scattering color and radius with soft lighting. Keep the shader cost in mind: skin is expensive, so budgets matter for crowds. Stylized characters often skip scattering and paint soft color shifts and shading by hand, which suits hand-painted pipelines and costs less.