I want to create a Saturn-like neighborhood in TS3.

So, custom moons are possible. But can you also make the moon bigger and does it have to have a circular form? Because I want to add Saturn's rings to my neighborhood.
Oh, and can I also add Saturn's moons in the background. (Meaning Titan behind the rings, etc.)
I assume the sun is slightly smaller as well. So is it possible to make the sun smaller?

You can do the sizing of the sun and moon with the ini files. I'm not sure about doing rings, but you could play around with the IMG files. I remember Simsample did some testing with two moons once, that's probably buried somewhere in the Sea, Sky, & Lights Parameters thread.

I have never did that before. I once recolored moons but I didn't change the alpha texture of it. And even if I manage to do that, the rings would only appear at night... but it should be visible at daytime... systematically, I have to replace both (the sun and the moon) in order to have rings at night and at daytime.

And the rings would be too small...

ETA: I enlarged the radius of the sun and moon to 30000. The sun and the moon are now big enough so that they cover the horizon on both sides. It's possible to change the moon's texture but how about the sun's texture? Because the moons only appear at night... or is there a trick to make them appear at daytime?

Anyway, the moon in the picture is the default waning crescent moon. It looks like a ring but how can I add other small moons in the background?

It doesn't have to be round, no. In fact, I've made Saturn with rings. You'd just need to edit the alpha and figure out how you want to handle the moon phases.

I actually want to create a world on Saturn. Not a world based on one of Saturn's moons. That's why I'm trying to add Saturn's rings as a moon and Saturn's moons (e.g. Titan, Phoebe, Rhea, Enceladus,... )

You could add small moons in the background by editing the star field, I think.

How can I edit the star field?

There is some detail here from Pyronium3 about how you could create orbiting moons:
http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?p=4018989

Adding rings to the moon would be achieved by editing the alpha, too.


That seems to be achieved by editing the following resource:
S3_00B2D882_00000000_F42B79A7425E2F36_Sky_ConstellationMap%%+_IMG.dds

Can't remember exactly where in the game files I found this, maybe in the fullbuild files. You'll have to take a look with SimPE, and test it out!

Thank you! Maybe, it's easier for me to add Saturn's rings into the star field rather than as a moon.

Anyway, I assume Saturn's rings appear at daytime, so is it also possible to add those rings into the sky filed?

Not sure how you'd get rings to show in the daytime. Neither the moon nor the stars show then (in Sims 3), so I don't think you'd be able to achieve this by editing either of those. However, if our Earth was surrounded by a ring (as Saturn is) then it's possible that the ring would not be visible in daylight. It depends upon the albedo of the dust/rocks that constitute the ring, as well as the latitude of the observer in relation to the rings.

I think that the star field image is repeated or tiled to create the star pattern. So if you edited that to include a stripe, you'd end up with multiple lines in the sky. The moon image seems the most likely to succeed; you'd have to create an image with the ring in it and very tiny moons then enlarge it as you did in your screenshot.

I found some images that might show how the rings of Saturn would appear. First from the equator, then from a latitude above the equator.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Saturn_sunset.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Saturn_rings.jpg
If you added that to the moon phases such as Pyroneum did in this post:
http://www.modthesims.info/showpost...251&postcount=6
Then you'd have orbiting moons with a stationary ring. Only visible in daylight, I'm afraid.

You can make the sun and moon stationary in the sky by editing the Sundegreeoffset in S3_1F886EAD_00000000_5E20253AF53E517F%%+_INI.ini; editing the StarfieldDegreeOffset in the same file can give sideways moving stars. Not sure if that info is useful to you at all!

I recall there being some method to alter the sunrise and sunset times in such a manner that it's 24 hours of night, but that's certainly not to everyone's play style. I just realised that perhaps a custom distant terrain style thing would work well if you want a day/night cycle and rings etc., even if it's just a simple 2D mesh that hangs in the sky to represent a planet or two - the problem with this is that it would be static, but it's still an option if you want this effect primarily for screenshotting or if you just don't care for that sort of thing.

Yes, the sunset and sunrise times are in the ini file that I mentioned above- 'Tunable Parameters Related to Sky' (S3_1F886EAD_00000000_5E20253AF53E517F%%+_INI.ini). Jawusa is already familiar with that one I think, as the sun and moon radii are in there too.

That's an interesting idea with the distant terrain; I was remembering in Sims 2 where someone made an object that was a 'sky dome' with clouds on it, so that you could have different skies. Perhaps something like that for Sims 3 is what's needed to provide our planetary rings- just an object you can bury in the terrain that is a huge arc with the ring texture on it. Or maybe an effect- we have rainbows, although they are not on the scale we need.

I'm not sure... I heard the rings reflect a lot of sunshine so the rings are really bright and can be seen on clear days...

Anyway, thank you so much for the help. I think it's better if I add the rings into the star field. And add the tiny moons as actual moons. As for the moon phases, I assume the distance is too big, so the moon phases would only be visible using a telescope on Saturn. Meaning they would appear as bright white 'stars' in the night sky, similar to Venus's phases seen from the Earth...

Anyway, I don't think I can manage to do this complicated stuff that nobody has done before. Especially adding rings to a world.

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with, Jawusa!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extra...al_skies#Saturn

Seems that Titan, at half the apparent size of a full moon from Earth, would at least be big enough to see phases.

OK. I tried to add Saturn's rings as a moon but it looked quite blurry and the other moons appeared quite big, as well as blurry too.
So I decided to add Saturn's rings to the star field but it didn't work. The rings don't show up. Maybe it's better if I add Saturn's rings as a DT, then it would also appear at daytime.

But I can't mesh that.