Hi,
I've had the recurring problem with transparent parts of a mesh showing the skin at the edges of the transparent texture (see pictures below).



The GEOM parts of these transparent parts have been set to "CasSimHairSimple", and most of the mesh is invisible as should be. The skin really just appears at the edges of the black and white parts of the alpha channel.



In CAS the skin at the edges isn't that noticeable, but in game, especially if you zoom out a little bit from the sim, it's really noticeable.

Does the shader in TSRW have anything to do with it?

Honestly, from the pic in Blender, it looks easy enough to just cut out the mesh. Poly count shouldn't be an issue. Although very high counts on shoes will create problems with accessories that have morphs. Anyway...

Look closely at your alpha. Just that tiny bit of gray is enough to cause the problem you have... which is why I would cut the mesh, and make a buckle from a torus. A 3d buckle would need to be weight painted and most likely morph fixed though. But you could still cut the buckle into the mesh as well.

Also, I find that CasHairSimple has a glow to it, in outdoor night lighting... again, at least in my game, so I now use regular SimHair shader for most transparencies I do. You can also generate a transparency map in TSRW, if you want to go that route, but still need to use a transparency shader anyway, and the gray will still bbe an issue.

I see. In this case cutting/fitting the mesh into the shape is easy enough as a solution, however, once the texture gets more intricate, this isn't an option.

Are those tiny bit of grey pixels even avoidable, especially with lace-like textures? Looking at this example, at least from the pictures it looks like the skin showing at edges seems somehow avoidable. Unfortunately the download link is dead, but I can't imagine the alpha for the texture of this particular CC not having any grey pixels, which is why I'm wondering if the shader itself is the issue? or perhaps the texture size?

Thanks for your input!

So, for this project, I would just cut the mesh, as it's probably the easiest way... for THIS project. Never borrow trouble!

There are ways to sharpen the alpha, but that often causes jagged edges. Anything that's not perfectly square with horizontal or verticle edges will tend to do that. Lace is very different. Lace is often done using a transparncy map, and has a lot of varying gray tones. And as you mentioned skin, it is intended to show the skin behind it, just as that area of your boot is unintended to do. Fringe is similar.



An option might be for you to double the section of mesh and move it out from the boot by 0.0002. Allow the main boot texture on the boot, and move the UV and texture for the transparency. That way, the unwanted see thru will show the underlying boot.

Normal texture size is 1024 x 1024, with shoes/boots, squeezed in to the small area EA gave them. Of course, some exceptions. Boot texture can go into leg area, if the boots will cover that part of the legs. If symmetrical, UV can be placed over each other. This is ugly in CAS, but usually ok in game.

To me, this just suggests the alpha doesn't perfectly fit the UV so it's being cut out too far. The hair shader shouldn't be rendering skin, so I'm guessing that the entire leg is part of the Ada outfit and you're just seeing it through the boot? Though I've never seen that specific shader, maybe SimHair or 0xDC077A45 (unnamed transparency shader EA uses for hair accessories etc) would also help.

Scaling that part of the UV down slightly would likely fix it, or vice versa increasing the size of the alpha and painting in a desired colour to see on those edges on the multiplier.
Are you familiar with previewing transparency in Blender? It would help to see the effect rather than eyeballing it.