Awww OM... *hugs*

I confirm what HL said about the image files, sometimes they have that "s", "m" or "ma" in their names, but even if not they can be easily recognized, the bright one is the specular image.
I guess the specular image's purpose is to finetune/overwrite/tweak the shininess of parts of the object. Most of the time it seems to be unused, because the black alpha makes it invisible. Objects will take the specularity of the cast patterns we apply to them in game.

I noticed that if I make a new plant and it has the black-alpha specular, then if you recolor the planter in game with the cast tool to a metallic pattern, the leaves will take on the metal shine as well. Therefore I usually make white parts for the leaves in the specular alpha to avoid that (and make the image itself a lot darker).

PS. Maybe you should edit the thread title a bit to reflect the conversation here, so later it's easier to find if needed.

Thanks for the information LC...and the hugs

Your solution is a great one but leaves me with two problems. First, if you put alphas that means the portion of the map lying over it isn't recolorable anymore...which works great for leaves but perhaps isn't as desirable for a candle. Second, and more to the point, I *still* cannot make PSP perform any task remotely resembling alpha editing. So even if I wanted to try this I couldn't. I'm going to have to bite the bullet and just learn to do alphas but there are always other things I'm trying to do that take up my Sim-time.

I edited the title. I almost called it floor lamp: premature drop-down & specular but reconsidered that just in time...

OM

No no, editing the specular image has no influence over the recolorability (is there even a word like that) of the object, only the overlay image will influence that. (And I think you don't have one of those for the candle because it is a fully castable object.)

By the way I didn't say you should do what I did with the plants, I only mentioned that because specular images were discussed and I thought that might help someone understand them better. For your object the original specular image the clone had will do perfectly.

I think I understand what you mean now. Sorry to be a little slow...not enough coffee onboard yet.

No...I understood you weren't suggesting I do that with the candle. But I wasn't understanding entirely how the specular worked and wanted to get a better idea of it...which you then provided ...thanks! Plus I wanted to stomp my feet a little about PSP and the alpha issues it has and I got to do that too.

OM

edit : apparently I posted without realising there was more to read, so I apologize if i'm repeating things already said .
HL, you're right about all the objects not having that naming convention (s-m-mask). It's the same for windows, I thought I had found a naming convention for the wall-mask, but a lot of the other windows I cloned didn't have it. So there must be some kind of length restriction, like you said…
I usually visualize them to be sure of what is what ^^.

As for the specular and the multiplier in the dds being linked to the ones in the material files, I have no idea, but it doesn't seem far fetched to me…

The specular is problematic for me, the dds one, because now, I'm using Gimp (the dds pluggins refuse to work with photoshop for me), and whereas they look fine when I open them in s3pe, they always end up totally transparent in Gimp, and sometimes I end up not editing them... (and i just read and realised that's because of the black alpha, thanks, lemon ^^).
I did edit them for small objects: I usually filled the image with a solid grey. I'm not actually sure that's the right thing to do, but for those objects it worked fine. I guess one could also replace the image by a paler version of the custom multiplier.
Fo the transparent objects, I didn't change the specular, but it didn't sem to make any difference (… since they are transparent anyway).

By the way, just because the EA-created specular images are light gray, that doesn't mean you need to make yours similar. Maybe those pale object outlines are only there to help identify which part is which if anyone wanted to edit.
I found that even 50% gray filling will result in a very shiny object. If you are intending to make the alpha different from all black. (If it's black then it won't matter what you put in the specular image.)
Dark specular means no shine, white specular will cover the object almost completely in a foggy white highlight.

Well, I'm still trying to get this ridiculous candle to quit looking like glass and it keeps not cooperating. I'm about fresh out of ideas.

If I'm understanding the information in this thread so far the specular IMG doesn't need to be changed and isn't affecting my totally CAS-able object. The other greyscale IMG shouldn't be altering the candle since I didn't change the EA greyscale for their candle which I am borrowing for this object. (and it would be nice to move on from really simple meshes and EA pieces/parts to other things but until objects go into the game more easily why bother?...not meaning to sound bitter here but just stating a plain fact) What could be causing this problem?

What else is there to do to fix this thing? While not pushing things to fall-apart levels this *is* painfully frustrating. Sorry...venting over.

Edited to add: HT, I've found that using a greyscale gradient often looks better than just plain grey...especially for larger objects. Otherwise they end up looking sort of 2D in the game. Just an idea.

OM

Post the thingy so I can look at it?

Thanks so much LC. I still have to fix the shadow on the top portion of the base also. And something is wrong so that the pole part of the lamp won't darken all the way with the color slider thing. Oh, and I have to fix the shading on the bottom portion of the base.

So don't be appalled by the badness goin' on there.

Those things I think I have some clue about. It's the glass issue that I don't get.

http://jaue.com/om/orangemittens_Li...ndlePillars.rar

OM

edited to fix link...I forgot to type the file extension. Sorry about that.

No glass.



Okay I just opened your package and exported the pics, the one that looked like the specular had white alpha instead of black so changed that and tested in game. Seems you edited that image afterall

Sorry for late response. I had RL thingy that needed taking care of.

Thanks so much for looking at this. I should have checked this myself but I was so sure I had made no changes to that thing that I didn't bother to look at it. I really wish this forum had a blushie emotie. I could use it now.

When I look at the pic you posted it seems that your fix took care of some of the other shading issues with this object too. So thank you double for that

OM