#25
21st Feb 2023 at 3:15 AM
Last edited by AndrewGloria : 21st Feb 2023 at
3:25 AM.
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The last time I did one of these, there were several things for individual Sims that I wanted to do. But now most of my Sims are more or less where I want them to be (and I hope where they want to be too!), so about the only thing I can think of is to let Fay Briggs have her baby in Monopolis. While on the subject of babies, I might even return to Pleasantview, and let Brandi have her baby. I mean she's only been pregnant for nine years now! (Arguably even longer -- since 2004, since Maxis made her pregnant before Skip was drowned! It's about nine years since I briefly played her in Pleasantview though.)
But what I really hope to achieve is to learn a lot more about Body Shop meshing and recolouring. At the moment, I'm tinkering on the edges of Milkshape adding comments to some CC meshes, which somehow fix the "Bright CAS" problem, but in reality I have no idea what the comments I add mean, or how and why they work. I would love to be able to do Body Shop meshing properly, probably starting with shoe changes and age conversions. When I look at the Body Shop Meshing tutorials here, they say thorough competence in Body Shop
recolouring is an essential before attempting
meshing. Now I've been messing around in Body Shop for years. I made my first basic recolour and alpha edit even before I made Andrew and Gloria (and Andrew's still got the resulting underpants in his wardrobe though he rarely wears them now). And I've got a lot of clothes that I've made myself in my game; my Sims frequently wear my creations. But, apart from one tutorial that I worked through several years ago, I've never done any "proper" Body Shop recolouring. It's all been "quick and dirty": alpha edits to make outfits topless or briefer, taking bits of full body outfits (especially ones using the nude mesh) and making them into separates, combining bits of full body outfits to make new combinations, doing teen to adult and adult to teen conversions if I could find matching meshes. I even did a little actual recolouring by changing the colour mix of the whole outfit, using Microsoft Office 97 Photo Viewer, which I used to have on an old computer, and varying the Red/Green/Blue mix or Hue, Saturation and Gamma (whatever they are). But I've never properly learned to use the more comprehensive graphics editing programs like Photoshop or GIMP. I think I have to learn if I'm going to get anywhere. The ability to work with layers is probably essential if I'm ever going to make alpha and bump map files that match up with the main recolour file. I have both Photoshop Elements and latterly also GIMP on my old computer, but so far nothing comparable on my new (2020) gaming laptop. To make a start, I've just downloaded GIMP, and I'll install it tomorrow after doing a computer backup.
As if that wasn't enough, I'd also like to learn more about Simantics scripting. If I could do Body Shop meshing and recolouring properly, and a bit of Simantics modding, I feel I might be on my way to being a "proper" Simmer. And there's also my long standing issue with exorbitant bills for Dorm residents. My uni Sims really need me to write and "Affordable Bills at Uni" mod, especially as I play semesters much longer than the game's 3 days.
All Sims are beautiful -- even the ugly ones.
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Sims' lives matter!
The Veronaville kids are alright.