Body Shop Created Clothes Have Weird Lightning Issues

"Nindl;d-932222" wrote:
Help! I did some very basic recolours of base game tops in Body Shop and they look perfectly fine with some bottoms (see first pic), but with others they don't (see second pic). As you can see on the second picture, the lightning is just not right. It's too bright and there are weird shadowy parts on her neck and shoulders.

https://i.imgur.com/AUcdADQ.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/rC83QOn.jpg

I have no idea why that is. All I did was open them in paint.net and change the colour hue, which should normaly work, right? I also tried editing a top in paint with the same weird buggy result.

I would be very glad if someone could help me!

You can't change the hue and or saturation on the sweaters that have that glow effect in the MatBaseAlphaTexture. If you look some sweaters have a default (extra) mesh for the actual Texture, too. Those have to be overwritten if you want to get rid of that, but I won't go into that unless you are aware of how to write over Maxis Meshes and Texture Alpha files. It is risky. So, I would suggest instead of you trying to change hue or saturation on those paste over the Matbase Texture (make sure it isn't an alpha file mesh) with a color of swatch you want to use instead of just trying to change hue. They will all glow like that since Maxis has put that sheen on the MatTextureAlphas (different from the Alpha Mesh).

ETA: When you open meshes in Paint if they have three...one is MatTexture you can paste on or change color, and then MatAlpha is the actual black and white actual mesh, there is sometimes a third...that contains that glow. It's the MatTextureAlpha, and it's not advised to ever tough it, even by cc creators who use a MatAlphaTexture for an outfit to have a particular cut, style etc. Only try to change colors which don't have three, but only two. Because as I said if it has three then Maxis has put the sheen on it.

ETA: If you need an example of what I'm talking about anyone can look at the sweater that is open and has a shirt under it (red sweater) this mesh has three things, An Alpha Mesh (the actual mesh) The MatBaseTexture (the color and texture) and a third A MatBaseTextureAlpha (it contains a default sheen). Trying to change hue and saturation on that sweater outfit (layerd look) will always be bad with different bottoms, it will always glow if you tried to change the hue.

"Nindl;c-16234521" wrote:
@Cinebar
Thank you a lot for trying to help, but I am afraid I think that is not the solution to the issue. I tried creating a top in bodyshop without changing the hue or saturation, just pasted a heart onto it, and I still got that same problem with the weird lightning. :/

I have recolored that sweather but I pasted over the MatbaseTexture instead of hue because I found out that sweater has a hidden sheen Alpha texture somewhere. lol I agree it is a weird sweater to try to paste on or change color. I didn't take time one day to try to go through all it's colors to see if I could find the hidden default MatbaseTexture Alpha, but it sure has one somewhere. I notice some things won't work well together and others will or they may glow, because a bottom will have a Maxis default TextureAlpha and then you don't know it, and you try to mix them in CAS and they glow, you might have to just wear it with one particular bottom to keep it from glowing.

Try to stay away from hue and saturation, brighness etc. They are set for a particular reason, most of Maxis clothes in TS2 and TS3 have that sheen and yes, it's a headache to some of us. (by that they will look great in BodyShop but then you go to CAS and they will be glowing like a big orb from outer space, lol).

Relooking at your pics, it seems the problem with that Sim is her skin tone. Some skins will not work with all custom content. Notice she has a very tanned face but when you put her in that pink skirt she has white legs and white body. What happened there? Maybe it's the skirt and not your shirt. ETA: I have not heard of removing normal bump mapping from a mesh, as that has to do with textures and if your machine can see them or not without having to fiddle with Config files (low end pcs). Are you sure it was about bump mapping or did you mean something else? I can't be here much today but maybe the problem is the skirt. Does that skirt change her skin color when paired with a shirt that has not been altered?

Did you post your issue at MTS besides looking at that thread? Someone who may have experienced this before might be able to help you with your problem.

"Nindl;c-16240818" wrote:
@Cinebar
Thanks for helping again! Her skin is the normal Maxis skin from the game. It seems like everything from her neck down turns weirdly bright whenever I equip her any top (with bump maps) that I imported with Body Shop - I even tried it with tops where I didn't even change anything.

Yes, I did mean bump map, I read here that they cause such issues - but deleting them did not work for me. :/

The skirt works perfectly fine with other tops that are not imported from Body Shop AND with tops that are imported from Body Shop but have no bump maps, which makes me again think that they are connected to the problem. :o

O.K. I'm not as savvy as I would like to believe, lol, however that discussion you linked leads to a better one, and is basically what I told you from the beginning. In this case that particular sweater (almost all of Maxis sweaters in game) have a third file which I have seen named MatTextureAlpha, they have a glow built into them or in this case will call it bumpmapping. Sometimes, this third file has a particular design to an outfit (contained in the links which I explained earlier) which though you may alter them with new texture say to get rid of some buttons etc., the MatTextureAlpha will still have those buttons once you get over into CAS. Does that make sense? However, with some of Maxis sweaters I have been unable to locate the original file they have used to clone all those sweaters which may be where the 'bumpmapping' or MatTextureAlpha is located. So, rule of thumb don't use Paint.Net, Retail Paint or Gimp to change Hue or Brightness or Saturation on Maxis Sweaters. It will never turn out good. Your first statement says you changed the hue. Get rid of your cc sweater and try again. :) Don't mess with Hue.

ETA: This link you provided (linked from MTS) is a good article and I should study it more, but until you are better at what you do, stick with texturing, and stay away from Hue.

This explains what you are talking about if you go by this then follow the detail to the T. ETA: If you are using SimPE then make sure you follow her instructions to the very last detail. No skipping around.

http://skellington7d.livejournal.com/89327.html?style=mine#comments

And last thought, keep trying, that article should help you. If you enjoy creating cc, then go for it! I like to try my hand at it too, no matter how much is out there I enjoy trying and sometimes, I make something good, and so keep going!

Happy Simming!

ETA: Corrections I opened body shop and simple paint to have a look at the sweater in question. Indeed it has a third file Named: top_stdMatNormalTexture.

Notice it says Normal Texture...this third file is what makes it have the sheen they added to most of the sweaters. If you alter the one you should alter ( topstdMatBaseTexture) and did everything right it will still have that sheen. The article linked explains how to get rid of those etc. files hidden and found in SimPE. What I do is get rid of the top_stdMatNormalTexture (without using SimPe) by pasting my new texture from top-stdMatBaseTexture, over it. But don't do that until you are willing to take more risk because you can mess up your game. But I have done it.

I found that Body Shop doesn't like layers any more. Even after they're together, it makes the clothes colors off- if I've changed the hues (iirc).

What I did (and I don't know if it does it to that shine layer from the other layers) was once the edits were done in Gimp with the layers, I'd copy the work from Gimp then open it Micsoft Paint and paste the work over it and Save. M-Paint doesn't do layers so BodyShop* seems to copy it well.

I want to open that up and see what's going on but I'm only a recolor/cut-paste in Body Shop so I don't have much experience to help. :(

I understand that... I'm just giving all I know. I haven't edited that top or bottom so ... :)

"Nindl;c-16241983" wrote:
@Rflong7
Thank you for that info! However, the issue doesn't seem to be connected to layers as it happens also when I don't use layers.


I discovered that the lightning issue only arises with bottoms that have bump (normal) maps. As you can see in the picture I posted at the beginning, it works with one skirt whereas with the other skirt it looks buggy. The skirt where it works doesn't have a bump (normal) map, the other one does.

So an imported top without normal maps works with bottoms both with and without normal maps.
But an imported top with normal maps only works with a bottom without normal maps but not with a bottom with normal maps.

https://i.imgur.com/8wXnmq8.png
Here, the first row shows the files of a skirt that works, the second row the files of a skirt that doesn't work.

So it seems the root of the problem are those normal maps and that they somehow conflict. I wish there was a way to just delete or disable all of them. :/

Isn't that basically what we all said? We said some tops will not work with some bottoms. We don't know why, a top without bump mapping will not work well with a bottom with bump mapping. I know the NormalMatTexture will override everything you do unless you change it, but I don't know if it changes the default outfit and would replace it as a default, I don't clone from SimPE, I just do as Rflong does and use transparency and layers stuff to make my new outfits from Maxis meshes.

The article says you have to replace the bumpmapping with the writer's bumpmapping. Maybe try that but make sure to follow those instructions without skipping any steps. Remove what you did install and try again, that is the only advise I can do. As for me, I have a long way to grow before I start cloning and using SimPE. I have found layers and transparancy (even in MS Paint) can do a lot I thought wasn't possible and I learned the hard way that sheen is on all Maxis tops. The NormalMat Texture is the key but ask over on MTS if it would be o.k. to copy over it, unless you want to wind up with default replacements. The writer over the article you supplied is supplying default replacement files for download so maybe follow those instructions carefully. I'm not savvy enough to tell you if her textures work or not.

ETA: Many archived sites offer meshes (without textures) and ready to download, for you to recolor or texture etc. Just because something looks like a sweater doesn't have to remain one when you use an outfit to cut and paste over and change it to something else, like a coat. Good luck, and keep researching it will help you and I appreciate the article, too, it will help me learn more I need to know later.

@Cinebar
Well, you didn't clearly say that they don't work with bottoms due to them having bump maps as well, I wouldn't have written a post about it if it wasn't new to me. As I said, I already followed skellington's instructions multiple times and they unfortunately didn't work. :/
Where exactly did you find those default replacement files from that author? I would be interested in checking those out. :)

"Nindl;c-16242370" wrote:
@Cinebar
Well, you didn't clearly say that they don't work with bottoms due to them having bump maps as well, I wouldn't have written a post about it if it wasn't new to me. As I said, I already followed skellington's instructions multiple times and they unfortunately didn't work. :/
Where exactly did you find those default replacement files from that author? I would be interested in checking those out. :)

Did you scroll down to where it says Download TXMTs? They have provided everything you need to replace or remove the bumpmaps. I have not read all of their instructions, because I like bumpmaps. Some people don't. I stay away from Maxis sweaters to recolor as I stated you shouldn't use hue on them. If you want meshes to texture try the old site of Milano and Liana they have quite a few I have been working with lately and you might find something there you would enjoy texturing for your own use. They are free to share with your own textures and on your own site if you have one.

ETA: You can download any of these meshes to texture, enjoy!


http://lianasims2.net/meshes.php?cat=all