How To Not Pudding Face

I hunted high and low and found a close up of a couple of kids from one of my current saves (I tend not to take close ups of kids) and it would seem that their noses are a little beakish :D Although I like to play big families the toddler and child stages really don't interest me and are used only to set up a skill base for the later stages. Because I don't play long life spans I don't mind that the kids aren't especially cute. I just slap on cute hair and clothes and they look fine from the distance I play my sims at.

I would never change a child's genetics for a cuter look. I already know what they will look like as YAs because I always peek when they become toddlers and, as long as I know that they will look better when they grow up, I can put up with the short time they will be kids.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48629329882_f49049ac0a_o.jpg
They are currently teens but this is how they will grow up.
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48550327486_0562073e9c_o.jpg
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48499856832_9dfebc3750_o.jpg

Generally in Sims 3 "pudding face" refers to all sliders set to zero. EA generated NPCs usually have pudding faces.

I think unless a player purposefully tries to make their sims different they will end up very similar to their other sims. As others have said to get a different look the slider values must be different. But even with different slider values and different facial structures each player often has a style they prefer that identifies a sim as theirs.

"cwaddell;c-17280373" wrote:
But even with different slider values and different facial structures each player often has a style they prefer that identifies a sim as theirs.

That is very much true, and I think it's the main reason why many of us get annoyed when we try our best to create a unique sim and tweak the features to our liking and end up with a sim that has similar features as the ones we've made before.

I think a good idea to try to create one's friends as sims, or downloading sims created by others. Or why not other simmers' selfsims? You can let them have their own families, and when their children have grown up they can be married into your own sim family. A little gene mixing. :smile:

"Mikezumi;c-17280302" wrote:
Although I like to play big families the toddler and child stages really don't interest me and are used only to set up a skill base for the later stages. Because I don't play long life spans I don't mind that the kids aren't especially cute. I just slap on cute hair and clothes and they look fine from the distance I play my sims at.

I didn't play much with the toddlers and children for the first couple of years, and aged them up quickly. But since I started using the "Children can, No stretch" mod and making my own poses, it's a lot more fun! I can't stand the annoying toddlers yet, though! :tongue:

https://i.imgur.com/R06kzKf.jpg

And don't forget the elderly!

https://i.imgur.com/JmG9J1P.jpg

@Cororon I also use the "Children can" mods but, even so, kids don't get much time as kids because I only play a slightly modified normal lifespan.
I always enjoy seeing your posed pics but it's not for me. I am not interested in posing my sims for pic purposes, preferring to just play my game and taking snapshots of game animations. Stopping to pose my sims would slow down my gameplay.

"Mikezumi;c-17280394" wrote:
@Cororon I also use the "Children can" mods but, even so, kids don't get much time as kids because I only play a slightly modified normal lifespan.
I always enjoy seeing your posed pics but it's not for me. I am not interested in posing my sims for pic purposes, preferring to just play my game and taking snapshots of game animations. Stopping to pose my sims would slow down my gameplay.

Yeah, and that's why Sims is so great. We can play it in so many different ways. :smiley: Many of my simming friends play challenges, and some write beautiful complicated stories. I simply can't do that. I play my sim-family and the sims can stay years in the same life stage. :smile:

"Mstybl95;c-17279963" wrote:
Thanks all. I've had a set of sims saved from ages ago and I thought they looked great, but I stopped playing for a while and got a new computer and ended up cleaning out a lot of my mods. So those same sims now look terrible and every time I try to make new sims, they still look terrible. I think it's the shadows or lighting that is throwing it off. There's no definition.

@Mstybl95 How much definition do you want? Some people use HQ mods, although I don't need them for playing so have never bothered but I guess it would be handy for those who like to model their sims. I often place an extra light or two when I want to take pics of my sims.
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/46837190245_bd27d0c905_o.jpg

@Mikezumi HQ mods aren't good for normal gameplay because they tend to cause memory related crashes.

Anyway, @Mstybl95 , I see from your new computer thread that you have an nvidia card. Personally, for more dynamic and interesting lighting beyond what I can do in game (with light placement like Mikezumi mentioned), I use Nvidia Freestyle. It's basically Nvidia's version of ReShade, but it doesn't require you to mess with any files and you can dynamically change settings while in-game.

You can enable it in Nvidia GeForce Experience. Under settings, enable "experimental" features and also make sure your in-game overlay is enabled as well. Then, in-game you can open Freestyle with alt+F3 and you can mix and match effects until the game looks how you want it to. They used to not save, but it seems they do now. So the settings should apply themselves whenever the game is open. Just make sure you take into account how the effects you add will mess with the game's UI. Too much bloom or depth of field settings might make it hard or impossible to read. :lol: So you'll have to play around with it. Also, the effects won't show up in normal screenshots (or FRAPS). So you'll have to take any screenshots with Nvidia. The keyboard shortcut is alt+F1 and the screenshots are saved under Videos>Sims 3. To note: It will also screenshot the UI, so make sure you hide the Sims 3 UI with the keyboard shortcut F10. Hitting F10 again will unhide the UI.

I'm about to go in-game, so I'll be sure to post my exact Freestyle settings if you're interested. Here's some unedited pics using Freestyle:
https://i.imgur.com/QxV4qf4.png

https://i.imgur.com/Z2sbCOa.png

https://i.imgur.com/PPoGGPU.jpg

@Mstybl95 Here are my Freestyle settings. :)

Added filters: depth of field, brightness/contrast, details, and color.

Depth of Field:
Focus depth: 100%
Far blur curve: 20%
Near blur curve: 100%
Blur radius: 100%
Invert Depth: On

Brightness/Contrast:
Exposure: 0%
Contrast: 30%
Highlights: 20%
Shadows: -4%
Gamma: 12%

Details:
Sharpen: 0%
Clarity: -34%
HDR Toning: 2%
Bloom: 30%

Color:
Tint color: 48%
Tint intensity: 14%
Temperature: 0
Vibrance: 26

To add, you can have 3 styles saved at a time. Just in case you want to change it up quickly. :)

"Cororon;c-17280392" wrote:


I think a good idea to try to create one's friends as sims, or downloading sims created by others. Or why not other simmers' selfsims? You can let them have their own families, and when their children have grown up they can be married into your own sim family. A little gene mixing. :smile:

Yep, one of the reasons to have other people's sims in your game, is for a change of pace and to mix the genes up a little bit. :)

@Emily4331 Beautiful sims and very nice effects! :)

@Cororon I love the way you pose your sims, they are so real! :)