Hello! I am relatively new to this place, but I love it. One thing I noticed was that Enayla (brought it up once) mentioned that skin has a transparency, a translucency.
I was just wondering if anybody had any tips as to help bring out that effect? My skintones seem to always feel very flat…
Any help would be much much appreciated… I love you all! This is such a wonderful place 
Skin tone is greatly affected by many factors, which is why it is so hard to get right. You have to consider the light source, it’s angle, colour and strength, plus you also have to look at where the skin is on the body, if it is close to a bone or fatty tissue, if it is near masses of blood vessels and so forth.
For example, if you had a strong light source coming from behind someone’s head, you would most likely get warm red tinging coming though the ears of the character, as light diffuses through the translucent areas. Pretty much anywhere where a bone or mass of muscles gets in the way, you’ve got less translucent areas.
Translucency also has to do with light going through and hitting masses within the body, so you may get soft blue veins coming through on a very white or old skin.
Areas where there are protruding bone masses or skin prone to greasiness, such as the tip of the nose, the cheekbones and chin, will be far more shiny than the areas with more fat or muscle.
Then you’ve got the whole kettle of fish opening up with radiosity, and how the light of other objects affects the skin.
Here’s a few resources on this theory:
http://www.gfxartist.com/features/tutorials/14030
http://www.gfxartist.com/features/tutorials/14033
And a round table discussion:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4929
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