ok so how do you make your own buttons and lace etc.? I have tried with lace etc. from fabric samples/swatches but it just doesnt carry over in the game well I am in between, know something about recolors, but would like to move it up a notch so that I can actually feel comfortable enough to upload to the site. I am too particular about what I have made and what I know are its faults to put it here. It isnt worth downloading "yet". Some of it has turned out really well for "me" but not well enough yet to share. Funny thing is, a lot of my recolors for objects are really pretty. Clothes are just harder.

This is where layers come in handy. You need to find an image with a solid background in a contrasting color. Make sure the image is large and crisp. Use magic wand to select the background, copy and paste, creating a new layer, use that layer to create a mask. Flatten the image. Now you have something you can copy and paste into your texture file, resizing, distorting, rotating to fit where you want to put it on your texture. With lace this is especially good, since the open spaces in the lace will be preserved and your texture from underneath will show through.

ok you have inspired me. I have actually dug out my instruction manual that came with jasc psp 9 and am using it to figure out everything my program DOES do! I havent fully explored it. my mistake I had to go into it to fully figure out what the magic wand will do.

posted by Chazachiu:To give skins nice outlines, select the black area of the alpha channel, then drag the selection over to the texture, right click on your mouse, on the menu, select " Storke (outline) " and then checkbox Inside and keep the pixel(s) width from 1 to 3. that will give you a nice clothing outline.

I'm trying this now, but I learned Photoshop on my own, just clicking things.. so I don't know a whole lot. I got as far as "Stroke" and a red line appeared, I can't find what I do next. Where is it I check the box? Sorry for being a bit techno dumb...

It's not too hard. You take the alpha, "Select All" then copy, and paste into your texture file. It's now a layer in your texture file. Use the magic wand tool and select the black, pay attention that you do this on the right layer (the copy of the alpha) and select stroke from the edit menu. It'll pop up a box in which you can specify stroke size, color, and whether you want the line to be drawn inside, outside, or centered on the selection. If you've selected the black, then you want to stroke the outside. If it ends up drawing anyplace you don't want it, just cut that part of the line out (make sure you get rid of the selection dotted lines first, just click with any of the selection tools. Usually I switch to the rectangular marqee, because the lasso and magic wand want to make new selections.)

Faylen, thank you!! I did it, it looks great!
I did however find that using the inverse of the black alpha worked better for me. Maybe because the edge of the piece was softish (don't know the word, a very slightly blended edge from white to black). Using the black alpha, the line didn't show at all.
It looks wonderful now!
And I'd like to thank everyone for this tutorial and tips, it really helped me become a better skinner!

whenever I get a pic of a pretty dress or whatever, i copy and paste it into paint and streatch it. It then looks all pixilated. Anyone help me? please?

Go to the Skinning FAQs post for the link to fix that.

I pay attention to detail with this outfit and I made the fabric all by myself but, people seem to like photo skinning more because it looks realistic to them.



I used a fabric for this one. My clothes are not bump mapped in the pictures but, I bump map them. I just don't have it on in my game when I take pics because I'm scared that it would kill my neighborhood, LOL! I think people like photo Skinning that is bump mapped more. However I have downloaded some bump mapped photo skin that were not even. They used the front of the outfit for the back too and it looked all funky.

I myself am not too much of a fan of cut and pasting except in small cases, so I tend to do things by hand (not that I've had too much experience in this; I'm still learning myself). I've had a lot of experience with rendering cloth (hopeless aspiring illustrator here), so here's a few tips if you wanna make your clothing look more 'realistic' without copying and pasting a whole outfit:

1. Wrinkles! Clothing will always have wrinkles, no matter how tight. Think about how the clothing hangs on the person; is it tight around the bust line? Is that coat going to make the shirt underneath it wrinkle? Will the small of her back cause the white shirt to bunch up right at the end? There's a lot of nice tutorials on how to draw clothing that deals with wrinkles and how to make them, many of which can easily be modified to help with sim clothing. Don't feel like you have to account for every wrinkle there; just use your judgment on how much is enough for your skin.

2. Even if the Sims has built in lighting, you *do* have to do a bit of shading here and there, especially if there's something casting a shadow, like that denim coat over the top picture's shirt, or the soft shadow her bust may cast off. Also, something to keep in mind with party dresses and stuff that uses a variety of fabrics: different fabrics don't reflect light the same way! Satin or silk is going to look a lot different than cotton or linen. Don't feel daunted, however; Google Image is your friend! Type in the name of a fabric, and you'll get *lots* of examples to help you see how the clothing's going to reflect light. It takes practice, but it'll definitely make your clothing 'shine'.

3. When using photoshop or paintshop pro, beware the burning and bleaching tools! Overuse of them can make a skin look very strange; it's better, IMHO, to pick a darker and/or light color, make dots of them somewhere in the skin where it's not going to show ingame in case you need to switch back to those colors. Burning and bleaching (I can't remember what it's actually called) can be useful, especially for a quick touchup, to define areas, or to make certain areas just a tad darker, but don't get too dependent on them; it'll only make things harder to match up when you're repairing or changing areas around.

4. Put the shading on another layer if you have a pattern. That way, you can monkey around with it and not worry about messing up! If you need to check your progress, just flatten the skin, save, look, then go back and undo the flattening. :D

My advice may seem a little daunting, but don't feel scared; these tricks are there to help you, not hinder you. At least with skins you don't have to worry about spatial relationships and proportioning (oy, drawing still-lifes can be the pits)!

adrienne, I can see a lot of attention to detail went into the black and white outfit, but it looks... flat still. I don't see a shadow where the jacket comes over the white shirt at the neckline or below it. The white top stitching looks a bit too strong, top stitching just doesn't make such lines on a garment from a distance, you'd have to make it narrower and/or make it gray. And the black part is so dark that if there is any other shading on it, that shading isn't showing. There's a lot of shading and variation on the Maxis outfits. I'm not trying to be mean, just pointing out some little things that might make it seem more realistic.

LOL! Don't worry, I'm not the sensitive type. The Jean Suit was the Second outfit I've ever made with my own fabrics. I was experimenting. I'm not really into skinning as much as others. I just like to make clothing for my stories because it's really hard to find the right outfit for my characters. A lot of them are pretty gangsta, LOL, so I have to make the clothes for them because there are not many gangsta outfits or meshes (for males) on the internet. However, I enjoy every minute of it mainly because I like to design real clothes. I can't do much of the designs I make for the Sims because there are certain meshes I would need. For now I just do whatever I can and have fun with it. I make clothes for my friends on a website now but, I don't upload here because, I'm scared that people would hate them so, I just download stuff lke Warlokk's meshes, a few more meshes and a lot of hair that you guys create. I'm a hair/mesh downloading junkie



I learned how to cast some shadows not too long ago. I started using the layers in PhotoShop. I'm still new with photoshop. I just bought it for my birthday this year so, I'm still learning but, I think it's much easier than using Micro Soft Paint (That was Hell, LOL!). You might can't see it in this picture above though because it's so dark and I don't have bump mapping enabled when I play because I'm scared that it will slow my game play down, LOL! I'm a chicken.

Once you get the basics down, it *does* become easier IMO. Also, the pattern button is a godsend when you're doing a pattern on a shirt, but sometimes I've had to open a new file, construct whatever pattern I need, and then port it over. Edit>Define Pattern and Edit>Define Brush can be your friends.

This outfit looks a lot better! Bump-mapping isn't neccesary to create a good skin (this said as a person who likes to use them a little *too* much). If the skin is constructed well, it'll stand out on its own.

Thank you matildarose! You're a sweetheart I love the tips you all have given me. I will definitely use them the next time I make some outfits. That is why I love this website so much:D

Maybe the problem isn't a Bodyshop thing (a lot of people blame their work on that) but on a miss-use of Photoshop or other programs like that. These programs are professional things so it's not any idiot that can say that they know how to make them work!(it's now been 3 years that I work with photoshop and I still have a lot of stuff to learn!)

This thread is very important and should be maintained alive to share techniques on how to maintain high quality cloth skining. Here are some of my thoughts too:

1)References, references & more references photos from catalogs, online and clothing stores. Work with clear textures big, but not necessary. Even the maxis skins too!

2)UV map for skin is very important and should be used as described in HystericalParoxysm's thread: http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=144329

(Photoshop tip)
3)For me, I never use the lasso tool in Photoshop to obtain the outline of the clothing, instead I physically trace the outline of the clothing from the source using the Pen tool with low opacity. In this way you have more control of the contours of your clothing. In case it doesn't look right when imported into bodyshop, you can easily manipulate it. You can also scale the outline accordingly to the UV map. Another advantage with using pen tool is after tracing you can directly apply white overlaying clour without using the lasso tool when making you A-channel... very easy. "select shape-> Layers menu->layer Style ->Blending options and apply overlay colour"

4)With the clothing shape that you traced, you can apply a lot of other filters and blending options as mentioned above to make it realistic. The key emphasisis is having total controll of the contours and the effects you are applying on your clothing.

6)Clothing SEAMS!!! Make sure in bodyshop that the straps and seams of clothing are properly aligned and continous all around the Sim. It's very ugly and unprofessional seeing clothing broken straps and discountious seams when taking close up photos. So pay close attention to that too!! (change texture and A-channel accordingly)

5)Then apply all the effects in Vector shape mode, merge down with black layer and that's it. For additional rendering you can apply more filters from the top toolbar after the layers are merged too.

6)Finally, reference your work where necessary.

That's it all my 2 cents of technical advice when skinning in photoshop.. good luck and I hope this was useful. May it be another technique in your tool boxes of photoskining.

Any additional comments are welcome...

WM64

HEY GUYS. IM A NEWBIE TO SKINNING AND WOULD LOVE IT IF SOMEONE COULD CREATE A DECENT, EASY-TO-FOLLOW TUTORIAL ON HOW TO RECOLOUR JEANS REALISTICALLY. I UPLOADED ONE OF MY FAVOURITE OUTFITS TODAY, AND AS I AM NEW, I SAID IN THE DESCRIPTION THAT "IT WAS ONE OF MY VERY FIRST CREATIONS SO GO EASY WITH COMMENTING." BUT, WITHIN A FEW HOURS, ALOT OF PEOPLE WERE BEING EXTREMELY JUDGEMENTAL AND NASTY ABOUT IT. I DELETED THE THREAD THE SAME DAY. SO GUYS, DONT GO TO HARSH ON NEWBIES, WE ARE TRYING DESPERATELY TO LEARN THE TRICKS OF THE TRADE TOO. Padg952

Really? If it made it through moderation I'm surprised you got so many nasty comments -- also there is a 'report' button if there are problem comments.

At any rate there are good and bad apples out there, so don't let a couple of negative comments get you down. Currently there is no really good photoskinning tutorial on site and I'm in the middle of a bunch of meshing projects so I am not going to write it.

I remember somewhere on here (and I've been looking for 30 minutes) someone had a huge photobucket account filled with seamless textures for people to use when making CC. Is that still around? I know it was a big help for me since I'm not good at making textures very well.

4oh4error - sticky top of bodyshop skinning forum:

Premade Tiling Textures....
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=172456

That's probably where it is... if not, if you do find another link, please do post it there

hey guys!

do you have any tutorials about making buttons, stitches and other details? and how do you create your own textures? how can i make the pleats, ruching and other stuff "stand out" and not look like they're pasted on.

and thanks for the tip about the edges. i always thought i should burn the edges to make it seem like the clothes aren't painted on the skin. i never thought about "stroke".

Actualy, stroke is not the only way to do it. Burn is also a good solution, as is making and edge all around and then using blur. It all depends on the fabric and on the kind of seam you're doing.
I think nothing is written in stone when is comes to "painting", so you have to know as much tecniques as possible and try them out to see witch one is better for what you're doing.

I have read a lot of tuts where people tell you to use dodge and burn tools, and others that tell you never to use them. If you read tuts on digital painting you can see most artists don't like the smoothing tool, and yet we tend to use it a lot to make the pleats...

I think Sims2 will be long gone before we know how to make "perfect" clothes.. ;o)

Faylen, you said it. Definitely, the sloppy photskinny shady messy look is sooo uncool. For someone who just started skinning, okay. Get outta jail free card for them, but when they get featured or something and they're just like OOP I LIKE IT LETS SLAP IT ON MAH SIM thing bugs me. IT doesnt make sense that they get featured and dont even try to do better than before.

I wanted to thank everyone for their tips. I took everyone's advice and practiced. Last year, I entered the H&M Sims 2 Fashion Runway Contest and won.

I agree with you very much - people should pay a little bit more regard to the way they skin things. As I'm not much of a digital artist, I've got to rely heavily on images to get across what I want to skin.

The thing is, though, is that I try to do it with great regard to the quality. I, like so many people, am learning how to do skinning better and my work isn't always perfect. I don't have a magical ability to find images that are long enough or perfect enough. I copy and paste bits and pieces until I get what I want.

I think, though, after seeing so much great custom content, that it is important to be wary of what you do. For example, drop shadows on the ends of an alpha. In my skins, I take the time to edit the alpha, make sure things line up as best as I can get them to line up, and even add drop shadows to the edges so that there is visible separation between the shirt and the sims' skin.

I did admit that I copy and paste bits - but I try to do it so it's not obvious that I have. Some items this works better with. I'm seriously struggling with jeans, because it's so hard to find images.

I think that even new creators can find things that are in their "safe" zone and expand on these things until they can do better work. We are all at different skill levels and we all skin differently, but I think that as long as people put attention to detail and try to make nice textures, and if they C&P - make good, as realistic-as-possible repeats - their work will be better received.

And also, I hate it when people make objects and pay no attention to texture . Not naming any names but... TSR *cough*