How to ACTUALLY Make Attractive Female Characters (Complete Guide)

[MayoChiki]

 

 

Forget about all the sh*tty Hannahface videos on YouT*be all the sh*tty guides that have been posted here, this is the real deal. This thread contains an unhealthy amount of autism, but trust me, it's for the best. Here, I will elaborate on all the important aspects that come into play when creating a new character and what truly matters to get a unique build since the Character Creator and the overall mechanic is an unnecessary mess. Everything from the technical aspects that are key to the tricks I've learned over the years will be poured while also addressing the most common problems people find while using the Creator, the most likely reasons that cause them and how to fix them using science and probably math or aesthetic theory. Despite its title, many of these tips and resources can be applied to male characters aswell, so let's get on with it.

 

"Why should I listen to you?"

Sadly I've been playing this game since Day 1 and a good chunk of that time has gone into making and remaking characters, so I kinda know how this works. Plus, there's practically no one else to listen to.

 

 

 

0: Frequently used terms

 

These are some words I'll be using quite often, which might sound off without context, so here's the context:

 

Base: Head models chosen from the "Heritage" menu

Build: The character you're creating or "building".

CC: Character Creator.

Hannahface: Sameface character who uses Hannah as its base and since it's an easy way to make an attractive character, you'll be seeing them a lot in this game. Also, YouT*be's favorite.

Head model: A purely technical way to call the "Mom" and "Dad" options in the Heritage menu of the Character Creator.

ROF: Rule of Four, it's a term I made up and I'll explain later.

 

 

 

1: A Brief Summary

 

GTA Online has a character creation system that is probably the stupidest thing you'll ever see, but hey, it's what we're using here. Essentially, you pick two head models (each with their own facial features and skin color) and create a blend with them. Then you manipulate two sliders to define how much resemblance this blend will have to each of the former two models in order to create something that resembles a human being. From there you'll be able to tweak the facial features of your new build and then you will add cosmetic overlays such as make-up, blusher, hairstyles or other skin details to get a more unique build.

 

The reason to explain this is to get an idea of the sections we'll be working on and the order, a step that I deem important so we can optimize time and avoiding last minute changes that usually snowball into starting all over again. While it might seem like the cosmetic options play a more important role to get a unique look since many head models are simply unattractive, the initial head blend is the most crucial step and it shouldn't be overlooked by any means, which is why it's going to be the heaviest, most elaborate part of the guide in comparison. It's also where many observations will be made regarding the choices one is better off avoiding. We'll go deep here so you can learn how to make a Hannahface with purple eyes and white hair.

 

 

 

2: Before starting

 

With that premise being established, it's time to address an important question:

 

"Can I make real life replicas?"

Of course not haha what kind of question is that? Can't you see the CC sucks?

No, but seriously, if you're aiming to make a character that looks like your favorite nun at the local church or your favorite STEM researcher, just don't get your hopes up. I don't suggest going with this route since you'll be limiting yourself and the result is almost guaranteed to be unsatisfying. Keep in mind that the Online characters have horrible facial animations and the cosmetic options are limited.

 

It's important to keep in mind that while Online characters can be very good looking, they are attractive in their own setting, and we're better off keeping things within what the CC can offer. The only cases where I'd say go forward it's the rare instance where you can find a resemblance between your real model and the head models the game offers, but those are going to be very special cases. In other words, try to not use real models to make a build unless you see a face and your head goes "hey, that looks like..."

 

The following section contains an extensive but complete catalogue of all the head models that are available in the CC, but just as a warm up exercise to get familiar on the faces you can get, try pressing X/Square/Space Bar to generate random characters. At least 90% will look like trash, but it's useful to get a scope of the possible range, so this sense of familiarity will keep your expectations right where they have to be.

 

 

 

3: Heritage

 

By now I assume you have been seeing all the menus on the Creator UI and have been toying with the Randomize function, but now we have to start for real. If you're lucky, you probably got a nice pre-made build that can be improved upon. Even if that's the case we still have work to do. As we established before, the Heritage section is dedicated to create a build based on two Head models, a "Mom" and a "Dad". Just so we can understand this better, we need to see the head models in a more natural way free of all those overlays such as makeup or skin features. For now, we need to start from zero, so those overlays are in our way. What I suggest here is removing hair, remove all make-up options and skin features but keep the eyebrows. It might sound weird, but the eyebrows will be a good way to get a sense of dimension on your build's forehead. This is what we'll call a "blank slate", so for now your character has to look like this:

 

 

Now we're ready to start our build, and even if I said that replicas are off the table for the most part, it's important to have an idea of what we're going to be making here. A certain race for our character, a game style, a fashion choice, this will be helpful so you can start filtering options, which brings me to the next point. If you've scrolled through the Heritage options you probably have noticed that many of them are horrible, and you're right; however, consider the fact that many head models are meant to be used on male characters (who fortunately don't suffer from "too feminine" heads) and the fact that the CC screen has limited angles (only three) and the lighting on the mugshot room can be more harmful than intented. What this means is that you shouldn't trust the CC. Great, huh?

 

Most players experiment the same thing after using the CC, and that is how the character they made looks different to the one on the Creator screen, many times for the worse. This happens because our character builds are done in a very restricted angle and therefore, it's hard to make tweaks for the most used in-game angles. In order to assist you in choosing a good two options, I've made a list of all head models from different angles as they look in-game. All facial features are at their neutral point while any other possible cosmetic options have been removed; the pictures were taken in a completely closed room with "neutral" time and weather in order to avoid any possible mislead on the actual appearance of the models and showcase them in its most vanilla state possible. Graphic settings are at their highest and these pictures were taken in a 1920x1080 resolution with no resizing done on any of the cropped angles just to keep it as natural as it can possibly be. The amount of autism that was poured into these is absurd, so I really hope it's helpful.

 

I sorted them by Mom and Dad sections in alphabetic order and starting by skin color as they appear on the game files. This order was chosen since the CC will always randomize the order of the head models for whatever reason, so this is an attempt to have some order. On the right you will see a "Race" category and an ID number. The first one is how each model is labeled in the game files, so if one of them doesn't fit or doesn't make any sense it's not something I decided. The reason why I included it is because this will affect the body skin color, which is not a big deal but still decided to include in case you worry about that. As for the ID number, this is for PC players only who use Single Player trainers as the models won't have a name, so the ID is just for them. (They will also have an easier time in general as they can make characters in-game and use free cam utilities... which might be more than a few in here.)

 

Mom

 

 

 

 

 

Dad

 

 

 

 

(If you wanna watch the full gallery, here's the Imgur album)

 

I could go on a tangent and filter options as which ones are the best, but I trust you can see that for yourself.

 

Just a quick look and a few things come to attention, right? Anyway, with this I hope I can help you start filtering the options that work best for you, which luckily will be a few. As for how to blend the head models, ideally you'd be setting the Resemblance slider in the middle so you can get a fair blend that has more chances to look unique, but many times this won't be possible as many Dad options have facial features that are too rough or masculine. If that's your case, then the Resemblance slider will be better off in your Mom's side. As you can see in the pictures, many Dad options have soft facial features that can work with a 50/50 Resemblance. Whatever is the case, what you don't want to do is go past 50% as the Dad model will override your Mom's model. You will notice this happens when your build's face has a sudden change and the Adam's apple appears, so pay attention and avoid this. On the same note, what you want to avoid is to have Resemblance all the way to the Mom's side or more than 80%.

 

(in some cases the Resemblance can go up to 50% but in general you want to avoid the neck on right)

 

There's a trick there. Higher Mom Resemblance will often lead to a more attractive face since the soft, feminine facial features take over, but this will also take the uniqueness out of your build and the final result while easier to the eye, will become unsatisfying very quick. There might be cases where this is the best option, like a Dad with really strong features (such as Claude) that makes a difference even when the Resemblance is low, but that will mostly depend on who you chose as your Mom, which brings us to the next point.

 

"How to blend both models properly?"

Now, I don't want to scare you, but if you f*ck this up you're not gonna make it. The pair you choose will make the biggest impact here. While you can tweak facial features later on, you need to know that this is going to be limited, and how much you can hide unwanted features might not be enough as some sliders won't have enough room for tweaking, so it's in your best interest that you pick the best options for your build. Same applies to the cosmetics, while you can do some cool effects to get around some issues (which we'll be exploring), the truth is that the base is about 50% of your build.

 

Now, you probably found a few that looked good enough, but maybe you didn't, and then the question becomes "how can I choose?" In order to avoid the Hannahface issue, there's a few criteria that might help you decide, but once again, it's important to keep your expectations within the limits of the CC, so where to start? Well, in my opinion, it would be wise to give priority to the facial features that cannot be tweaked, and that would be the eyes or the mouth. Since we can't adjust size, curvature or distance of the eyes, focusing on them can be a good start, and same applies to the mouth. Considering lips have almost no customization, you could also try to make it the defining feature of your build.

 

However, there are other two criteria that you might want to consider: face shape and side profile.

 

The face shape is the form the face resembles, that being round, oval, squared... I'm talking about this:

 

 

Usually the attention goes to individual features, but facial shape can illustrate a personality better than you think, and since we're building a mute character, we need the face to speak for itself as much as possible. There's an entire theory on how certain hairstyles work better depending on the shape of your head and you've probably heard about it already, so you can try to go with that angle as that principle holds some truth in real IRL. Building with this in mind can also take you to open up new possibilities. Looking back at our in-game head models, some of them can be used if we decide to give priority to facial shape. Then we have the other option, the side profile.

 

(I'm talking about this, and the images I chose speak for themselves. The line is just a way to measure)

 

As the name suggests, the side profile is another important part of the build that we often leave out. Since only certain features have a "depth" option, the overall head shape can't be tweaked enough to let us choose a side profile suited for our personal needs, and you might be wondering why can that be so important. Well, for one, the side profile can change how certain facial features look or which get a stronger presence. That is, a more pronounced forehead will give a more aggressive look or the illussion of bigger eyes, while a more neutral one will obviously give a more aesthetic and soft look as you can keep facial features soft and small. The basic logic is that depth can make a certain facial feature look bigger and more prominent, so it's also something you can try to use to get around a weak facial feature.

 

And all this might seem nice, but the biggest problem shows up: you only have two head models to make a blend and it's almost guaranteed that not all criteria will be met since we also have to worry about the skin color, so that adds a new handicap to how much freedom we have. As much as we want, we really can't get around this and unless you're extremely lucky and find two head models that meet the four criteria you want, you'll be faced with deciding what's more important. In order to illustrate this a bit better I present you the Rule of Four:

 

(Not the best representation, but bear with me)

 

Think of your build as a point or a coordinate in this XY plane, where each of its extremes represents one of the four criteria we established before. To state the obvious, placing our dot more to the left or up will mean its opposite is going to get far less priority, and that's sadly how are we doing this whole thing. The reason to have four criteria is to avoid being clueless when we can't find a starting point, but that doesn't mean we are going to be able to get the four fulfilled at the same time, which is why our expectations have to be kept within the limits of this graph. Not 100% precise, but it's a way to represent this dilemma: if you focus on head shape then facial features will have to be a consequence of that, therefore you won't be able to focus on one without breaking the another. The side profile is attached to the skin color for obvious reasons, so if you want to focus on that you'll be cutting your freedom with the skin colors at your disposal, but if skin color is a must then your side profile will be more of a consequence. In some cases you'll be able to avoid choosing one or the other as you can use the skin color of the other head model, however this will also result in a more vanilla look, so it's not exactly a win-win situation.

 

See what I'm trying to say here? This ROF is a nice little way to find where are we standing on our ideal build to choose our Heritage options with the right priorities instead of just going "this looks pretty so it's the best option". That line of thinking ends in Hannahface, and trust me when I say you want to avoid this in the long run. Out of four main criteria, two will have the priority, so take some time and choose wisely.

 

Assuming you've done that, I take that one of the two criteria you chose is going to be more important than the other. Your main criteria has to be in your Mom option, while your secondary feature will obviously be in your Dad option. If you decided to leave skin color out then you will find a new issue while dealing with the Resemblance slider, and that is going to be your two options clashing and sometimes one undoing the other. For these cases sadly your only options are going for an alternative on your Dad option, setting the slider more to the Mom side or just go for a different criteria in the ROF. As much as it sucks, discarding options is better than going in blind.

 

Another way to look at this is that while the Heritage options are just a base and we'll be adding/changing facial features later, the truth is that every head model is a package on its own. The pictures already showed this, but head models with the same skin color sometimes show different variations, and some will have more wrinkles while others have a natural eye shadow attached. Going for the silkiest skin might seem like the ideal scenario, but this will also limit your options, and I mean a lot. No one really likes those forehead or mouth wrinkles, but sacrifices will have to be done, I'm afraid.

 

DON'T FALL FOR THE RACE MEME

This is something you'll figure out over time, but I'll save some time for newcomers. If, for example, you're making an asian character you'll be thinking of Ava or Elizabeth as your main base as they both are labeled as "Chinese" characters and share some distinctive traits. While this is true and a good start, it really isn't necessary to go this way. Skin color might be misleading, so refering to the in-game models gallery and looking for the desired facial features (the most important being eye shape, mouth and side profile) is a way to find a more suitable option. If that doesn't help, try adding the skin color you want (you can also refer to the gallery to see what Dad options have the skin color you want) and re-browsing the Mom options in the CC with this skin attached.

 

Oh, and on the same note...

 

DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF SKIN COLOR

Textures can be deceitful as hell. Games have used them to make flat surfaces look like they have depth and this is not an exception. So far it seems like I've thrown skin color under the bus as something secondary, but assuming many build their chracters with a race in mind, I think it's important to demonstrate just how big of an impact skin alone can make, just look:

 

(Yeah, Hannahfaces, bite me)

 

The skin alone can change the model's expression and facial features, so don't underestimate the difference this simple change can make.. At a first glance, they really don't look so same-ish, but that's only to show the point of how skin color can impact some features (like the eye size, despite being the same).

 

 

 

3.1: Making the final blend

 

With all this talk and negativity about what can't be done and how limited you are, there is another thing to discuss that I think will be vital in choosing your final two bases for your build: "tweaking range". As I said before, facial features can be adjusted and tweaked through several sliders in the CC, but as all faces have different features and all have the same range, then the implication here is that a big nose will stay big even with the sliders adjusted to get the tiniest result available. Before moving on and avoiding having to start all over again, you might want to take a look at just how tweakable are your selected parents in the Heritage menu. In order to showcase this, I made two presets for each vanilla model we saw previously: one has all the sliders set to its minimum size and the other is the opposite with every slider being intentionally set to its highest point. With this I hope to give you a range of just how much you can do with every head model, just in case you thought that certain ugly nose was possible to get rid of.

 

While the sliders shown here are pretty self-explanatory, these are the presets used for the following images:

 

 

 


 

 

 

Everything in-between these can be done. Same order and format as last time, so feel free to save the ones you need.

 

Mom (MIN/MAX FEATURES)

 

 

 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 




 

 

 

Dad (MIN/MAX FEATURES)

 

 

 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 





 




 

 

(The Imgur galleries can be found here: MIN // MAX)

 

With any luck, these images might give you more options to consider, since some head models have a good shaping range while some others really suffer from customization. Another important detail that I find interesting is how these images show asymmetry in some of the models, while others remain more even. While there's a debate on whether or not symmetric faces are more attractive, the thing I find most interesting about the asymmetric faces is how the CC screen seems to not show them due to the front angle being slightly to the left and not really a front angle. This might not seem important, but these details are often the reason why sometimes our builds look ok and at the last second something doesn't look right. In other words, if you have an asymmetrical face and adjust facial features, then those changes will affect both sides differently, as you're applying the same values to two different sides. Of course, this will only make an impact if you use some of the most asymmetrical face models, so the only possible advice I can give here is to just focus on a "good" side. We all have a side of our face that looks better, and it's usually the side we prefer to put on pictures and such, in this case that would be the right side of the face, since it's the most prominent one in the "Selfie" mode on Snapmatic and the default direction characters look while looking back (they look left but you get the idea). Also the side that is shown better in the CC...

 

From this point, what head models you select is entirely on you. While I could go on posting presets and combinations that work, I prefer to show a more complete and technical side of this part of the CC hoping that you can grasp the concept and play with any amount of combinations while knowing what can be achieved. Don't go after a result that will look perfect, not only you won't achieve that but we still have some menus to go and keep playing with. For now your desired result is a face that has at least two or three defining facial features, the rest of the guide will elaborate on how to highlight them, tweak other features in order to get a better result and adding the final steps to get a better looking character.

 

 

REGARDING BODY SKIN COLOR

Body skin color is something that sadly doesn't have any customization and there's only six skin colors, listed on the game files as White, Black, Latino, Chinese, Pakistani and Arabian.

 

 

Every head model is assigned one of those six categories, and while the faces have different skins, the bodies do not have any variations. Since I doubt you'd care for that detail (as you should), the only thing you need to know is that the body skin color will be a combination of the two head models you choose and how the Skin Tone slider is set on the Heritage section. Nothing more, nothing less, it's not like there's much body to show-off anyway.

 

 

 

4. Facial features and permanent overlays

 

I put these two sections together as there isn't much to talk about the Features menu in general now that I've posted the MIN/MAX of every head model and because these two will be customization options that can't be changed in-game.

 

Every head model will react differently so there's no safe set of sliders, and I don't think you're f*cking stupid to tell you that moving the brow down will give a more serious look or that making the lips bigger makes the mouth look bigger. The previous sets of images speak for themselves about how the sliders affect, but one important thing we need to discuss is the alienface that usually comes from going full Hannahface and a general misconception about jaw shape.

 

You see, a common mistake to make is thinking that a big chin or a wide jawline makes for a masculine look, and there's some truth in that, but that doesn't mean one has to turn the jaw and chin sliders to its lowest point to reach a more feminine look. It is true that averageness and small facial features can be deemed as more attractive due to their easiness to the eye, but in this game this often ends in a face that is too pointy and therefore looks like an alien. This is one of those things that don't look that bad on the CC but once you're in-game and you can use more angles you realize something's wrong. Which reminds me of something else.

 

 

THE CHARACTER CREATOR IS LYING

The position in which our characters are during the CC screen make for a misleading angle, making jaws look bigger than what they really are. Refer to the MIN/MAX images and you'll notice some of the MAX'd head models don't look as big as the CC would suggest, and you can do the test for yourself and decide if this is true. Based on that, you can then customize the lower half of the face after comparing the actual in-game model and what the CC says. To me, there's a difference, but maybe you can't see it. In any case, it's important to see for yourself.

 

(You be the judge, but I'm objectively right anyway)

 

Regardless of that, a wider jaw won't instantly make your build look bad and in some cases it benefits your character's appearance. In reality, the camera will hardly be at an angles where it looks bad, and if real IRL has taught us something is that angles are everything.

 

(Olivia Wilde is a perfect example of this)

 

With that out of the way we can talk about just how much can be tweaked. I mentioned this briefly before, but there are certain features that can't be customized as we want, and some of them can't be customized at all. The eyes are an important facial feature and all we can customize is how open or close they are going to be, which won't matter if certain in-game facial animations play, and that's why I suggest giving the eyes a priority when choosing a Heritage combo, as that's your biggest chance to customize the eyes. The lips can be adjusted, but only how thin or fat they are, no curvature or width allowed, so once again you need to have taken care of that before coming to this menu.

 

Another part you need to pay attention to are the cheekbones, since there's no fixed 3/4 angle. In the CC your only way to know if it's the right size is by spamming your bumpers and get a glimpse every time, but overall you don't need them to be too big. While in reality pronounced cheekbones are an attractive facial feature, in GTA Online that can easily be compared to anal pleasure since you never know how much is enough, but the second you go too far it's going to be disgusting. In other words, the cheekbone width slider doesn't move in an uniform way, so try to keep it slightly pronounced and in comparison to the cheek size and the head shape to get a more symmetrical form. As you can notice, "fat" cheeks aren't really fat and in many cases they will look normal at best, making you go all the way.

 

There is a way to manipulate the head shape but is dependant on three sliders working side-by-side: jaw, cheeks and cheekbones. By having puffed cheeks, cheekbones pronounced as far as the cheeks allow and adjusting the jaw width to keep in line with the former two, you can try and aim for a more rounded or squared head shape; and the same applies if you want a more oval head shape, just adjust the sliders. The reason why I say this is that the CC won't show these adjustments very well, but refering once again to the MIN/MAX images, we can see that some of them do look more oval or round when the sliders change, although that's for certain head models only.

 

Things like the brow or nose shape are entirely on you, and it goes without saying that the chosen forms can give different looks to our characters, such as brow depth giving our characters a more somber look to the eyes or small noses making for softer looking faces, but a small detail that will help us define the head shape is the Chin Shape slider. While going for the Rounded look can benefit you in getting softer looking faces, adjusting it to Bum can make for a squared looking chin, a little detail I thought was worth mentioning.

 

(Might seem like a minor detail, but it can make a difference)

 

And now we're with done with the main facial features. From this point, we're going to be focusing on the skin overlays that won't be possible to change unless we go back to the CC by paying 100k gtabux.

 

 

 

4.1: Permanent Overlays

 

If you went for the silky smooth supermodel route then you will probably avoid this part as it deals with wrinkles, sun damage and the overall facial details we all have anyway, so for more realisitc looks this is something we need to pay attention as it gives a more grounded look that can still look good.

 

 

THAT'S A LIE!

Welcome to another chapter of "Things that look different in the CC", this time featuring overlays. A problem in general is that the CC will show these with a lot more detail than what we see in-game, and that applies to make-up options aswell, which we're going to see in due time. I'm talking about this:

 

(No one uses these options, but just in case)

 

Needless to say, the more detail the sh*ttier it will look in-game, so if you get disgusted by having low resolution textures then you only need to pay attention to details like wrinkles, eye overlay (such as Junkie) or Pale/Ghost options, as those have a bigger impact than acne options.

 

These options are self-explanatory and there's no need to go over each one and make another encyclopedia with them since they impact every head model differently as they use an individual skin color. The general advice here is to simply browse them and see which one works for your build, also to keep the transparency sliders in-line and not go 100% since the idea is to make them blend with the rest of the face and not look like permanent make-up (plus, the actual make-up will be on top of that, and if we're using the latter to hide imperfections then you might as well not need them). A little technical detail you might wanna consider is to never go below 1/10 of the slider with overlays, since anything below that will treat said overlay as a null value. The reason for that is unknown, but it's how it goes, so you've been warned. You can see for yourself with the make-up options, while the skin details will be so low they won't make a difference.

 

Skin Blemishes, Skin Aging, Moles & Freckles and Skin Damage are options that for the most part don't need any explanation as they will work or not depending on your build. As for the sunburn options, they go more natural with brown skins as long as they're on a 30 to 70 percent, that way they will blend better and look less like damage and more as a natural texture. From the Skin Aging section you might want to take a look at the Junkie option, especially if you're focusing on the eyes as a defining trait. As long as you keep it to a level where the red part isn't noticeable, you can use it in combination with Eye Makeup to get a stronger eyeliner/eye shadow effect. Considering Eye Makeup options look clearer and red-ish in-game (again, don't trust the CC), this is a good way to complete the look while also allowing to diminish certain make up options that cover the entire eye area and look worse than their last-gen counterpart (Aqua Dream).

 

(To state the obvious, these overlays work different depending on how dark the skin is)

 

Another option that you will find interesting if you're not 100% happy with the resulted skin are both Pale and Ghost under Skin Complexion. Being a white overlay, this could be your knight in shining armor if you need moles to look more prominent but also helpful to try to hide natural wrinkles that might come with your Heritage options.

 

(Exact same heritage options and sliders)

 

In this example I used Pale and a High blusher to hide wrinkles as much as possible. It's not perfect, of course, but nothing will be in cases like these and your best shot is to try and hide it.

 

Another case where the pale overlays work is ironically in black skins. If you use a Dad for black skin you'll notice there aren't any smooth skins to choose, but playing with the Pale/Ghost overlay and blusher can get you a better result, which is why the overlays shouldn't be overlooked either.

 

(I threw lipstick there aswell, but don't pay attention to that for now)

 

The logic applied here is the same as painting on a white canvas over a black one. If you look at the second image, some of the wrinkles and eyebags look more pronounced when I throw the Pale effect with nothing else, and that's also something you can use if you feel the need to make wrinkles to be more highlighted. The blusher here is to get the impression of a silkier skin, which is why the color has to blend well with the natural skin color (could have done better in that case but it was a quick example). Needless to say, skin overlays have a stronger effect on white skins. Stuff like texture will be your choice, although I prefer to use one between 20 and 50 percent for the sake of realism, but in most cases that won't be necessary as the skin will already include that skin damage in any form and if they don't then you weren't looking to add imperfections in the first place.

 

With this we've gone over all the permanent options in the CC. By now we could technically go in-game and do the rest in the Barber shop as the result will be reflected in-game and you'll have more angles, which I suggest using to see if our build turned out the way we wanted and start taking notes before coming back to the CC. But just in case you want to save some gtabux, it's time to talk about the "temporary" overlays, otherwise known as make-up options.

 

 

 

5. Make-up and final touches

 

A bunch of sh*tty guides and videos and there's never any talk about this and I could make an encyclopedia with people who throw bright red make-up and call it a day. If you want that, sure, go for it, but there's a bit more that can be done as we already saw. The eyebrows are like some options we've seen so far, meaning that they're up to you. The curvature of some might suit better your character's expression, while others have a natural look in case you're aiming for a less girly look. The hairstyles don't really need much talk as the vast majority suck anyway, so the talk here will be about Blusher, Lipstick and to a lesser extent Eye Makeup.

 

Despite the popular belief in this game, blush is more than a way to get Pikachu's cheek sacs. In reality, blush is a way to mimic our face's natural skin color to get a smoother effect, and that should interest us more here since we talk about attractive characters. As we saw before, we can use it to hide wrinkles, at least partially (just like in real IRL), but here we can get creative and use it as a way to complement eye make-up. Same way we can use the Junkie overlay to complete make-up options that only cover the upper side of the eye (like Cat Eyes), we can combine the High blush to (once again) diminish effects and aim for a more customized look. Kinda like this:

 

(Not that I'd use this make-up, but it gets the point across)

 

As you can see, the lower part of the eye make-up is partially overriden by the blush and has a nicer effect since it works with the natural contrast the skin has, making it more even as it works as a middle point between the clearer and darker tones. However, we can do better if we play with the Junkie effect, and play around with a well-known but infamous make-up.

 

(No reason to add the hair, but whatever...)

 

As you can notice, left image has only the eye make-uo on, while the right has more play with the overlays, such as Pale, Junkie and the High blush, which work together to get rid of the tear while keeping the rest intact and with a more natural foundation. The point of these images is to show that blush can be applied in different ways and doesn't have to be treated as its own thing if it can work with other facial features and overlays. To show the impact of the High blush, here's another example:

 

 

Overall foundation, complement for eye make-up, but there's a third use that is the trickiest to pull off but also can make for "genetic" mistakes made at the beggining. As we have established, texture can make or break a build, and part of the texture is how we play with lights and shadows, particularly those that come from gaunt cheeks and/or pronounced cheekbones, as overdoing them lead to the popular skeleton face from attempting to make a slim face but failing. If we use blush properly, we can trick our character's appearance to hide this shadow and make the gaunt face more appealing. It goes like this:

 

 

We start with a regular face (1), but then we adjust the cheeks to be gaunt, the cheekbones to be in and the jaw width to be more rounded, this so we can get a more oval head (2), but as we can see, that shadow on the cheeks makes the build look a bit skeletal. This part now has two colors that contrast each other, which is why we can take the clearer one, find a color that matches it and apply the Eighties or Angled blush. If done correctly, then the skeleton face will be less noticeable (3). Following the same logic, we can double down and take the darker tone and match it with the blusher to get an even more gaunt looking face. This could be applied if we can't reduce cheeks enough. Now, same example in white skin:

 

 

We start with the gaunt face already (1), and here the foundation is easier to apply (2), while highlighting the gaunt face can have a soft effect (3a) or a more aggressive one (3b). But of course, I've been sh*tting on the CC the entire guide saying how unreliable it is, so here's the same thing in-game:

 

 

After having elaborated on these three aspects of blush and how impactful it can be, it's time to wrap up by talking about lipstick, but this will be brief since the same principles from the blush apply here, and even then we can be more flexible with vibrantt colors such as red. If we've chosen the mouth as a defining trait, then it's not necessary to explain why a vibrant color is in order, although we can talk about the opposite case or in general terms, how to make the lips less prominent and get a natural looking effect. If you go by using None, you will notice that suddenly the game has HD textures, and that vanilla effect sometimes doesn't look right, especially for head models that include red lips, such as Ashley. Since the lips have their own color, what we need to do is match them with a more saturated tone and then lower the transparency to blend both to the point of creating a neutral color.

 

 

In this case we can see that not having a lipstick gives this shiny textured color, but if we apply a red matte and then lower its transparency we can get a more natural looking tone, although in this case I went for a natural red, which might not have been the best idea. For a truly natural impression we have the right one, in which I used a beige tone that combined well and made for a better natural effect. And of course, the same applies to different skin colors, depending on the tone we want, how much we want it to stand out and so on.

 

(Vanilla on the left and lipstick tones on the right)

 

Heritage makes for a good 50% of the entire build, but cosmetic options can easily make up for 30% as it has enough room to polish what the Features menu started. In the end, depending on how you play with this part you can even take a Hannahface and make it look slightly different.

 

(You still won't fool me, though)

 

And with this we have touched all important aspects. Things like hairstyle and clothing options don't really have much to talk about. I could go on how to combine base color and highlights, but not all hairstyles operate with the same shades, I'm afraid, and this thing has gone on for too long. I trust this will be enough to finally put this topic to rest as it should have been five years ago when it could have mattered. As of now, not so much, I just needed to get this off my chest once and for all, but hopefully new players and even some regulars here can find something useful.

 

 

 

6: Final Notes

 

I hate to say this, but success isn't guaranteed. To me it works because I know this sh*t, but if you're a newcomer then some of this might sound weird, so if you're not experienced making characters in this game, then the first couple of times you'll be frustrated. All I hope is to avoid you several hours of trial and error, which is why I tried to explain things as concise and clear as I could, also expecting you're not stupid and can put two and two together. Still, as much as I want to say this guide is perfect as I've gone back and forth making sure I didn't miss anything, I'm sure there's something I missed, so while I wish to never come back to this guide as it has been a pain in my ass for literal years, I guess I can come back and talk about some parts that need more detail or elaborate on things you want to know or contribute. It was always the idea, anyway.

 

All in all, I hope this can be helpful. A sh*tty guide I made years ago was helpful to some people, so this might be aswell. As negative as it sounds, I hope you have fun playing with this tool, I sure have had enough time to love it and also hate it.

 

(Keep chasing that rainbow, everybody)

Edited May 27, 2020 by Mayochiki

[Sanches]

Thank you, i look beautiful now!

[superen23]

Looks amazing. It would be much better if we had something like transferring real life photo faces to the game.

[MayoChiki]

[redacted]

Edited May 27, 2020 by Mayochiki

[Swift_Emperor]

One thing to consider is your toon in looking slightly up in the creator, and is much more detailed in that close up shot. But, if you zoom out to the confirm screen, it's a more accurate representation of what they'll look like in game. You can quickly get them to look left and right whilst zoomed out to get side profile shots. 

 

Making a decent toon can take a long time, but it can work out in the end.

 

This is a Zoe and Diego. It took me a f*ck ton of time, but I got there in the end.

[Wynne85]

Redacted

Edited August 31, 2020 by Wynne85

[MayoChiki]

20 hours ago, Wynne85 said:

Not expecting perfect replica obvisouly just something that is similar .Hi all I don't know where I put this request I'm trying to make emilia clarke. I've tried a few times to make her. But every time it come out looking terrible. Is there anyone on here that can do it or do they know anyone that can. Or do you have any parent suggestions that can help guide me. If you have any questions feel free to ask. Also where on the forums can i put requests.

Your best shot is looking at Emilia Clarke pictures with no makeup as much as possible. Found this:

 

 

Focus on the eye shape and try to keep the face oval. Just a quick look at the pictures and seems like Misty or Natalie fit the eye shape better (also try to keep the side profile in the same shape as the second picture since you'll get more results that way). Considering that's a white skin then a brownish one could be useful to get a white, but not pale look. Andrew, Kevin/Isaac or Anthony could get a good blend, but I can't say for sure since you need to check those for yourself in the CC. The rest of her features can be seen easily: brow in a middle point, average nose, round chin, jaw a bit squared and low...

 

I seriously doubt you can get something that resembles her enough, but it's quite literally one of the first things I said: replicas are often hard to pull off. Even if you could model her face 1:1, the cosmetic options and facial expressions will take that away.

[Wynne85]

Redacted

Edited August 31, 2020 by Wynne85

[Wynne85]

Redacted

Edited August 31, 2020 by Wynne85

[Airwolf359]

Excellent guide! I appreciate the effort you put into it. I also spend too much time on character customization (new appearance at least once a week), tried some replicas and failed all of them, so here's my Hannahface (presets below):

 

 

 

 

pictures taken in rockstar editor, "free" camera, 4.5x zoom

Presets (slightly out of order):

Spoiler

 

edit: Here's Sophiaface (presets below):

 

 

 

 

Presets:

Spoiler

 

Edited June 5, 2020 by AirWolf359

[Swift_Emperor]

I cant make a Hanna. Can't get the nose and lower face to my liking, same thing with Misty. Charlotte comes with this weird double chin and I gotta put all my chips on a dad to get rid of it.

[Airwolf359]

@HamwithCheese agreed, I wish you could swap features like noses, eyes and mouths between faces, I also struggle to get Hannah's face right. Feel free to give my presets a try, it looks way different in game than in the editor.

Edited June 1, 2020 by AirWolf359

[Swift_Emperor]

Ay that's not a bad Sophia lol I use a Sophia and Louis as my main character. Sophia has an odd nose and wide jaw, but it's not that bid a deal if I'm honest. Generic, but solid.

Edited June 1, 2020 by HamwithCheese

[Wynne85]

How do you post pictures on here?

[Wynne85]

Redacted

@Mayochiki

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by Wynne85

[Swift_Emperor]

My advice? Play a game with a half decent creator. Actually, maybe not because you'll find yourself staring at pictures of Ms Clarke and people will know you're obsessed.

[MayoChiki]

...anyway, I decided to give it a shot to this Emilia Clarke thing just to see how impossible it really is. @Wynne85 that actually isn't a bad build, but just like I said, there really isn't much hope if you aim at real life celebs. The reason why this isn't possible is that none of the head models even resemble Emilia Clarke enough to even try, otherwise she'd be Hannahfaced to death, her face is simply too child-like, and the few head models that look child-like-ish come with other features that just look bad in my opinion, especially Misty's mouth.

 

I did a few quick attempts using different combinations trying to replicate her eyes and face shape, which wasn't possible since I was limited to at least one head model being white to get the skin color (and when you're making a child-like face that's just shooting yourself in the foot). Some were more experimental and others had the mouth and dark eye problem (which are almost impossible to get rid of). I'll just post them in case you feel one of them can be improved upon, but they're not good looking.

 

 

 

 

 

Then I kinda got sick of it and decided to use a PC trainer, which allows you to use two "Mom" head models (something that should have been an option from Day 1, but anyway). Results were drastically better, and that was just one attempt done in five minutes, I'm sure I could have improved a lot more if I gave it more time

 

(NOTE: from this point is impossible to get these builds in Online and can only be done in single player)

 

 

 

 

 

And then I just added single player mods, which make a galaxy of difference

 

 

The point of all this is that it can't be done with the CC we have in Online and that's why you should limit to it and just work with what you've been given. What you practically want is a set of facial features, a skin color and head shape that work together, and like I said in the OP, this CC limits you to focus on two at most. It wasn't just a meme chart I made for fun, it's actually how this works.

 

While making these I saw several potentially good builds (just not white as you want), and the pictures posted so far show that while the CC is a piece of sh*t at least can be used to make something good, just not magic. And even if you pull off the facial structure right, the cosmetic options will just f*ck you up, making all that almost pointless. If you're on PC and can mess with offline mods then yeah, I'd say you can do it, but only in that particular case. Otherwise just don't bother, the Creator is stupidly limited, even by itself

 

How did I do?

 

Edited June 3, 2020 by Mayochiki

[Wynne85]

Redacted

Edited August 31, 2020 by Wynne85
Redacted

[MayoChiki]

Well, one last shot. Not saying it looks like anyone or anything, but for what it's worth I think it looks decent.

 

(looks blurry because I had textures at low)

 

Charlotte + John at 50% Resemblance and Skin at 80% on Dad's side

Looks good with most hairstyles, so that's a plus. Went for a "no makeup" look, so a stronger one might change its appearance.

[suicidal_banana]

Made my first female char a few days ago and been trying to get a decent look that at the same time doesn't look like every other female (nice guide btw!!) but i honestly its difficult and even after reading all of this topic i dont really know what im doing lol.

It started with Claude & Sophie and some randomization, then just made some tweaks, play a few jobs/freemode sessions, look at other female chars, decide i look too much like the rest (or went to far into masculine looks) & made more tweaks, repeating that compare-and-tweak step for several days now i currently have this, would love to hear opinions and/or suggestions:

 

 

Some ppl with experience making characters please pitch in, am i actually getting a sorta unique 'easy on the eyes' character or am i just making a 'hannahface' with a different mom now?
 

[Airwolf359]

On 11/12/2020 at 6:48 PM, suicidal_banana said:

Made my first female char a few days ago and been trying to get a decent look that at the same time doesn't look like every other female (nice guide btw!!) but i honestly its difficult and even after reading all of this topic i dont really know what im doing lol.

It started with Claude & Sophie and some randomization, then just made some tweaks, play a few jobs/freemode sessions, look at other female chars, decide i look too much like the rest (or went to far into masculine looks) & made more tweaks, repeating that compare-and-tweak step for several days now i currently have this, would love to hear opinions and/or suggestions:

 

Some ppl with experience making characters please pitch in, am i actually getting a sorta unique 'easy on the eyes' character or am i just making a 'hannahface' with a different mom now?
 

If you mean by 'hannah-face' that she looks like a Sophia clone, I wouldn't worry about it, she is pretty. It's just GTA:O's very basic character creation system, where most female characters either look like their mom, or they look too masculine when you move the resemblance slider too far right.

To make your character more unique, use the makeup, give her freckles, or use Dad's skin tone. I usually go for 50/50 on the skin, and 10-25% on resemblance slider.
I really like freckles:

Spoiler

Sophia + Alex, skin slider 50%, resemblance 25%, moles&freckles: Pixie 100%

a bit of blusher (horizontal, color 1) and a lot of eye makeup (natural look)

 

I still use the actual hannahface on my main character, because of a bug. Sometimes the game loads hannah's mesh because it is the lowest ID, but then it uses the features of your character and you see the worst hannahface ever. (eg. under a ski mask, or with Scuba gear during Bogdan finale)

Edited November 14, 2020 by AirWolf359

[suicidal_banana]

@AirWolf359 Thanks for the input! okay i guess ill just accept that i will keep running into other Sophia variants  

I'll play a bit with freckles and make-up, what you post looks great, thanks for the idea!

[Swift_Emperor]

4 hours ago, suicidal_banana said:

decent look that at the same time doesn't look like every other female

Pick one, you can't have both.

 

Considering half the roster of moms look like grandma's or druggies, only a few are easy to work with. Some require more effort and time with the creator

[Zeores]

Spoiler

 

Ever since my account got reseted, I choose to play Female Character as fresh start. I love to tinkering around face customization on every game but
I can say the CC is horrible in GTA Online and very very lack of long hair option to clothing. This is by far my best-est and my ability to make hot character, I prefer light makeup, only use eyeliners, no lipstick, no blusher and such, keeping natural beauty as possible. Say hello to Heather, my little Anarchist, MC President of 587 Nachthexen

Edited November 18, 2020 by Zeores
Reupload image to Imgur

[MayoChiki]

wtf didn't know this thread was bumped?

 

Sorry, @suicidal_banana, I forgot to turn on notifications for this thread.

 

I feel like the trick to uniqueness is going with a different skin color from the base Mom, that being black Hannah/Misty (although that's one of the most common faces) or brown Ava/Elizabeth (I've used this one for hawaiian characters). The problem is that it works better for clear skin to darker ones and not the other way around.

 

I think you noticed this with Sophie, who despite having a very good facial structure comes with some wrinkles around the mouth that are hard to work around. The alternative for not changing the skin color is using the Dad model and Features to counter some of the most defining traits of each base (Misty's lips, Ava's nose...), which is what you did with your character.

 

The way you rounded Sophie's usually long and oval face makes for a very good look. This is just my opinion but you could try going for a bit rounder face, that being puffing the cheeks if possible and pulling the cheekbones in a little. If that's not possible maybe widening the jaw a little could help. I'm not sure how that would turn out, but usually exaggerating features to see what works is a good step. If you have the 100k to spare, I'd say it's worth a shot.

 

The cosmetics are what should really make the difference if you're ok with the face. I don't know if your skin color allows for it, but you could try using face paint as blusher to help reduce the eye shadow and then use either a natural makeup or a light cat eyes. The face paint is very tricky to blend properly and might need some skin readjustment, but since it's a trick I don't see anyone else using it can make for a more original look.

 

Heavy eyeliner without the eye shadow. Almost unnoticeable during gameplay

 

 

 

Maybe some less stylized eyebrows but preferably curved since Sophie's natural smirk can turn the neutral face into a mischievous one, which I personally don't like. If you miss the blusher, then some light skin damage like sunburn can very well make up for it since you're using the same tone the sunburn has, so that and some texture can help you hide the mouth wrinkles while keeping a natural, yet attractive look.

 

As @AirWolf359said, your character looks very good and definetly not a Hannahface. The thing with YouTube guide videos and many other players is that they always go for the same features: long narrow nose, big lips, high and pronounced cheekbones with almost no cheeks, no jaw and pointed chin (plus heavy red makeup and white eyes), which Hannah offers right out the gate. That's why many characters look so same-ish, but even then I'd say you're ready to get invites to garages spammed and friend requests asking for your snapchat

Edited November 21, 2020 by MayoChiki

[suicidal_banana]

Thanks for the advice, ill play around with the cheeks & cheekbones a bit more based on what you said, i was trying to go for a more rounded face  and yea im already noticing boys following me around in freemode and giving me surprisingly high cuts in heists (last week was like twice as profitable for my female as my male, even tho i played twice as much as the male..?!) and then sending friend requests, pretty funny development tbh  also a bunch of my existing friends outted themselves as teen boys, asking if i was a girl etc

I tried to go with the freckles @AirWolf359 suggested but it didn't really work out, so instead i went full opacity on the rosy cheeks it already had and then used 'full' blusher with something close to skin color and some opacity to kinda mix the two into a sorta 'healthy glow' and that worked out well i think but at the cost of some 'skin smoothness', currently i keep changing the eye make-up, i find that it really differs per outfit what actually looks nice, but in general i just use different (low) opacity's of smoldering ruby or what its called, the dark+red one.

 

 

I feel like i messed up the chin somewhere, but keep forgetting to change it..
Thanks again for the guide and additional suggestions!

[EJTheSnail]

Thanks for the info, I appreciated it and found it really helpful.  Here's something interesting I found while messing with the face creator (TL;DR at bottom):

 

It looks like the skin textures exhibit overly strong bump mapping when in specific lighting environments.  Specifically, and unfortunately, bright top-down lighting at a slight-to-moderate angle to the front/side of the face, which is very common in this game.  The sun around noon is a good example and seems to cause it the worst.  It may just be the mom I chose, but I don't think that's the case because I see it going on in pictures of other characters.

 

Under this bright top-down lighting, no matter how much I stretch or bend my character's face to try to correct this, she appears to have a really strong brow and sharp cheek shadows.  I've tried going so far as making my character's brow so shallow that it's concave, so that it should be physically impossible for it to cast a shadow, and under this type of lighting, the strong brow look is still there.  Same goes for the cheeks; no amount of puffiness or blush can really help the gauntness when the lighting and bump mapping combine like this.  The skin is programmed to look like it has sharp shadows there when it encounters that specific kind of lighting.

 

It can look so different that it makes the character look like an entirely different person.  I spent a bit of time and GTA$ wrestling with it before I noticed what was going on.  Others are free to test this out and see it in action.

 

EDIT: With E&E out now, I took a look to see if this is still a thing.  Unfortunately, it still is, in all three modes (Fidelity, Performance RT, and Performance).  It looks like bump maps in the face are still used even with raytraced shadows.  I guess that should be expected; the raytracing isn't so reliably accurate that it can be depended upon to shade faces entirely, and the faces would be too low-poly for super-accurate raytracing to work anyway.  I do think the effect is a little less severe in next-gen though, if only because shadow quality is higher.  So, this quirk has inched toward resolving at least.

 

TL;DR: If you notice that your girl character tends to look more masculine than you had intended, even though you followed OP's guide and put a lot of effort into making the face feminine, it's probably just because of the game's graphics style.

Edited April 2, 2022 by EJTheSnail
E&E, formatting

[Setzaroth]

Here's hoping the next GTA has a creator that isn't based off random RNG of uncanny valley pre-sets and doesn't have overwhelmingly hideous options 

Edited December 10, 2020 by Setzaroth

[Mutsor Tima]

Hate to go off-topic but, in the original PS3 and Xbox 360 versions only, you could define your character's heritage even further by choosing what their grandparents are.

Can you imagine what a female character would look like if they were of four different races?

[ChrisinLiberty]

On 12/10/2020 at 2:32 PM, Setzaroth said:

Here's hoping the next GTA has a creator that isn't based off random RNG of uncanny valley pre-sets and doesn't have overwhelmingly hideous options 

Me too. I’m especially hoping they add new heritage options. Because the last gen started with 14 per sex, and added 7 more in the next gen, including the collector’s edition specials. I do get your point; hopefully the character creator is more flexible and more diverse. Perhaps it should take notes on Red Dead Online’s creator?

and speaking of Red Dead Online, I do wish the heritages from that game are “copied” to GTA Online heritages (as in reusing the heritages from RDO to use as heritage options for GTAO, with the sprites having the face with a name and appearance), along with head models from the casino and cayo perico updates because they have GTA Online player textures in them. And keep the blending of the heads together, because that is something Red Dead Online lacks, but the freedom of customizing the face entirely, like changing the eye height, should be taken into account for GTA Online’s creator for the PS5 and Xbox Series X.

 

Edited April 9, 2021 by ChrisinLiberty