How do I create a facemask of eyes, nose & mouth..

[Sof_m9]

..for my child Sim version of Sachi MacLaine when there are only four costume makeups for the face? The tiger costume makeup doesn't have the mouth with makeup. The clown would be perfect expect it doesn't have the entire nose tip covered and the others only cover a bit of the cheeks. Please help with this.

Anyway, would my sim look like this with Sachi's eyes/nose and mouth cloned?

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a295/sofia_123/facemask-2.jpg

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a295/sofia_123/vidwmv_snapshot5.jpg

[HystericalParoxysm]

What the original makeups have is irrelevant - you edit them to add/remove what you need, and feather edges and so forth.

Your sim isn't going to look like your picture, though. Face masks for TS3 are an almighty pain in the ass, and rarely blend well with the skintone. I think I've seen all of one that didn't just look like dirty mud. Best solution I've found is to do highlighting/shadows/details like freckles separately, with no underlying "skin" part to the makeup. This usually means handpainting the details on, with a whole lot of trial and error to get the placement/colouring/etc. correct.

[Sof_m9]

What the original makeups have is irrelevant - you edit them to add/remove what you need, and feather edges and so forth.

Your sim isn't going to look like your picture, though. Face masks for TS3 are an almighty pain in the ass, and rarely blend well with the skintone. I think I've seen all of one that didn't just look like dirty mud. Best solution I've found is to do highlighting/shadows/details like freckles separately, with no underlying "skin" part to the makeup. This usually means handpainting the details on, with a whole lot of trial and error to get the placement/colouring/etc. correct.

Hi HP,
A member of this forum linked me to a sim version of Robert Downey Jr. created with a face mask and I think it looks really good. What do you think? http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=422543

[Sof_m9]

What the original makeups have is irrelevant - you edit them to add/remove what you need, and feather edges and so forth.


Thank you, I didn't know!

[HystericalParoxysm]

A good likeness, but I don't like the style (overly-realistic just looks -weird- on sims and clashes with any that aren't hyper-realistic), and the face looks a bit blotchy/dirty (which can be a problem even just in making skins, not face masks - adding the slightest bit of irregular texturing so the skin doesn't look perfectly smooth makes sims look like they got caught out in a dust storm). I much prefer sims that look like, y'know, sims - a sim version of that person, not a painted mask of a celebrity on a sim.

[Sof_m9]

A good likeness, but I don't like the style (overly-realistic just looks -weird- on sims and clashes with any that aren't hyper-realistic), and the face looks a bit blotchy/dirty (which can be a problem even just in making skins, not face masks - adding the slightest bit of irregular texturing so the skin doesn't look perfectly smooth makes sims look like they got caught out in a dust storm). I much prefer sims that look like, y'know, sims - a sim version of that person, not a painted mask of a celebrity on a sim.

I see but in my case what I really want is a hyper-realistic Sachi Sim. :) Do you think you could help me with the face mask?

[HystericalParoxysm]

If you want to make something hyper-realistic like that, best to open up the face mask files on it and any other hyper-realistic sims you like the look of, and start examining how they've gotten that end result - how do their textures look, how does their alpha channel look, etc., and then try to emulate it. There's no real science to it - it's more art, which means a LOT of time, effort, and just trial-and-error, tweaking and fiddling until it's right.

[Sof_m9]

If you want to make something hyper-realistic like that, best to open up the face mask files on it and any other hyper-realistic sims you like the look of, and start examining how they've gotten that end result - how do their textures look, how does their alpha channel look, etc., and then try to emulate it. There's no real science to it - it's more art, which means a LOT of time, effort, and just trial-and-error, tweaking and fiddling until it's right.

All right, I'll do that! Thanks for the help!

[Sof_m9]

Is there an actual Face mask tutorial? All I can find is Creating A New Base Texture http://simswiki.info/Sims_3:Creating_A_New_Base_Texture but that doesn't help me with the face mask, really. I never worked on Gimp before either, only Photo Express, so this is confusing!!

[Sof_m9]

Is it possible to have the nose and mouth masks as accessories like you can in Sims 2? That way I wouldn't have to create a face mask of the whole face.

[whiterider]

You wouldn't have to create a mask of the whole face anyway - you just black out the alpha for the bits you don't want your mask to cover, just like with any makeup.

[Sof_m9]

You wouldn't have to create a mask of the whole face anyway - you just black out the alpha for the bits you don't want your mask to cover, just like with any makeup.

And will she still have the same skintone on the face?

Would anyone be kind enough to make a mask of Sachi's nose and mouth?

I'm sending the nose picture attached (it's from a high quality pic). One is in BMP file and the other in PNG. I painted it a bit to match the cc skintone my sim has and cloned the right nostril to the left nostril so it looks like a front profile of the nose.

[whiterider]

Why not do all the hard work in your normal graphics program, then save as gif or png (for the transparency), and just use GIMP to open the finished image, and save it as a DDS?

[Sof_m9]

Why not do all the hard work in your normal graphics program, then save as gif or png (for the transparency), and just use GIMP to open the finished image, and save it as a DDS?

How can I do that? I can't open the costume makeup textures that are in DDS format to Photo Express.

[whiterider]

Do the same thing in reverse - open them in GIMP, then use GIMP to save them as PNG or GIF.

[Sof_m9]

Do the same thing in reverse - open them in GIMP, then use GIMP to save them as PNG or GIF.

Oh Yeah!! lol, I never thought of that! Thank you!!

I'm cloning the nose first and test how it looks like in CAS.

Am I doing this right? I guess it's the same procedure as editing images in Sims 2.

[Sof_m9]

So now I have to open Gimp again and save the png images to dds?
Creating a new Base Texture tutorial says this:

"Step 2

Go to File → Save As. Pick D3D/DDS as your save format from the drop down list.

Make sure that the Alpha Channels box is ticked. Give the file a name, then click save. When you do the DDS plug-in box should come up.
Step 3

In the long drop box, pick DXT5 ARGB 8bpp | interpolated alpha, then press save.

GIMP Users: Pick the BC3/DXT5 format and tick Generate Mipmaps , then press okay. "

But, I don't see any Alpha Channels box or a long box and I don't know what DXT5 ARGB means! :blink:

[Sof_m9]

Oh now I see it but the BC3/DXT5 is in Compression not Format! Is it supposed to be in Format?