Sometimes I see an Alpha skin based on a celebrity and it looks shockingly realistic (I'm talking like Hauthaus). I see other creators who do Alpha celebrity skins and they look good, but not as wildly accurate, even when they aren't trying to go for a MM-esque look like your skins. Can you describe what goes into doing a hyper realistic skin and what separates it from a standard type of Alpha skin?
Greetings. Very interesting question. I have never heard if Hauthaus, it's good to see their content. They make very accurate sims.
On the left, is a skin from Hauthaus. A "hyper realistic" skin.
I would say that a hyper realistic skin like Hauthaus, the process is more straightforward in regards to using a very high quality image(or images) which are projected directly onto the sim. This also uses minimal editing of the image to retain the skin blemishes such as wrinkles, pores etc. Their main job would be having to place the projections of the images in the perfect place, otherwise it would look off. The sims facial structure also has to be exactly the same as the reference, otherwise it would look weird.
In the middle, A "standard alpha" skin, I would consider much more beautified. It is more so an instagram filter rather than what skin is supposed to look like. The images people use as reference are projected at a lower opacity so that it provides that softer, less realistic and more blurry look. These tend to removes pores, increase colour vibrancy and adjust the eyebrows to look more perfect. Because it's less realistic, it leaves more room for "error" or stylisation without it looking bizarre.
On the right is the more extreme end where it turns more maxis mixy. Eyebrows filled out to be blocky, eyelashes completely removed. Face blurred and a more painter style is added to the whole skin. Even more detail is removed and simplified.
It is a spectrum in some sense. The difference between a hyper realistic skin and a standard alpha skin would be the act of abstraction, removing details.