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Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#1 Old 7th Jan 2009 at 1:07 PM
Default Editing the Plantsim default hair
Hello.

Recently I got my first in-game Plantsim. He looked rather awful, but when I'd changed his skin, eyes, makeup, facial hair, etc, he improved a lot.

That just left his hair, so I downloaded treeag's extracted plant-hair and edited it in Bodyshop. Soon I had a lovely hair I was very pleased with, but then I discovered there was no way I could get the Sim to wear it! Does anyone know how to edit the default Plantsim hair, or, failing that, a mod that will let the Plantsim change his hairstyle?

Thanks,

Cheryl
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Field Researcher
#2 Old 7th Jan 2009 at 5:11 PM
A new texture can be set to replace the defaults, but the GUIDs would have to be set in SimPE to override the Maxis hairstyle.
This thread, specifically Morague's post 5 down, explains the process of overriding defaults (except for eyes). The process would be similar for hair.
Depending on how many alphas the hair has, more than one texture would probably have to be overidden.

There's probably something in the plantsim code that could be changed to allow them to alter their hairstyles, but until some enterprizing modder unlocks it, changing the default seems like the only option.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#3 Old 7th Jan 2009 at 8:42 PM
Thank you for your assistance, Neder.

I've got Sausage's default replacement hair, and I figured out how to replace the textures, but I'm afraid I need to edit the alphas as well Is there any way to do that from SimPE?
Field Researcher
#4 Old 8th Jan 2009 at 1:34 AM Last edited by Neder : 8th Jan 2009 at 1:53 AM. Reason: Additional information
Quote: Originally posted by Cheryl Mason
Thank you for your assistance, Neder.

I've got Sausage's default replacement hair, and I figured out how to replace the textures, but I'm afraid I need to edit the alphas as well Is there any way to do that from SimPE?


Edit the alpha in your image editor as you normally would for a Bodyshop project, except save it as a .png as well.
When you have a texture open in SimPE, right click on it and you can "import alpha." You can browse to where you have your alpha .png saved, click "open" and SimPE will import it into the texture. The texture will now show in the plug-in view with un-alphaed (that's not a word!) parts transparent. Commit and save. Open resource window, compress, force commit, and save.

EDIT: I just opened the Seasons files in SimPE and saw that the textures use a LIFO reference. That's a bit more problematic. From my experience (with the witch stuff from AL), you can't import an alpha into a LIFO the same way you can into a texture.
What I did was create a layered .png, with one of the layers being my alpha. Make sure that transparency is locked and you have an empty layer as the background. Select the black area of the alpha with the "magic wand" tool or its equivalent, then switch to the texture layer and delete that area. Saving as a .png should then leave the transparent areas intact. This .png is what you have to import as the LIFO.
You need to change these LIFO GUIDs to match the defaults as well and include them in your default override package with the textures, otherwise your texture resolution will be lousy.
In your texture file, select the largest sized images (256X256 and 512X512) and enter auhairleafy-greens0_lifo and auhairleafy-greens1_lifo respectively.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#5 Old 8th Jan 2009 at 3:38 PM
HURRAH!!! IT WORKED!!!! *Dances around the room with glee* Thank you, thank you!!

...Although, as you say, the textures are lousy. XD Please could you explain the last sentence in more detail? "In your texture file..." What, is that in SimPE, or do I just change the filename or something?
Field Researcher
#6 Old 8th Jan 2009 at 6:33 PM
*joins dance*

When you have the texture file open in SimPE - that is, you've selected one of the files labelled TXTR - in the plug-in view, you see the actual picture and to the left of that should be a list of images. These range in size from 512 X 512 down to 1 X 1 (in powers of 2, skins have 1024 x 1024 as the largest). For an image with a LIFO, the 2 biggest images are replaced by references to LIFOs - large image files stored separately- in those sizes.
If you only have one image (probably 512 X 512) in the left side of the plug-in when you select your texture then you probably need to check out this thread and this one, as they explain the process of building a DXT better than I could. As far as I know, that is essential if you're using textures that employ a LIFO.

Don't you just love how quickly these things get complicated?
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#7 Old 9th Jan 2009 at 12:36 AM
Yes, there are texture files from 1x1 to 512. No 1024.

*Peers about in SimPE * Ah! There's a box at the bottom here that says "Lifo Reference:". Do I enter "auhairleafy-greens0_lifo" and "auhairleafy-greens1_lifo" there? *Tries it*

...Now I'm just getting a blank alpha, and the hair looks terrible. Is the lifo reference like an address that tells the program where to find this external large file? It doesn't seem to be working... Should I rename the two biggest alpha files "auhairleafy-greens0_lifo.png" and "auhairleafy-greens1_lifo .png"? *Tries it* No, it still doesn't work... Should I put them in a special file so the program can find them?

Quote:
Don't you just love how quickly these things get complicated?


You said it - I'm completely in the dark XD You seem to know what you're doing, though!
Field Researcher
#8 Old 9th Jan 2009 at 1:31 AM Last edited by Neder : 9th Jan 2009 at 1:40 AM. Reason: Because there's always more
Quote: Originally posted by Cheryl Mason
Is the lifo reference like an address that tells the program where to find this external large file?...Should I put them in a special file so the program can find them?

Yes!
You actually have to create these files, the same way you did the regular texture, except that each size, the 512x and 256x, has to be its own file (and your TXTR contains 128x down to 1x). You can't import alphas into these though, so you have to build them from an alpha-merged .png the way I outlined in post 5.
They can go in the same package with your texture.

If you want to see an example (where I learned to do all this), grab one of my red witch or red warlock default replacements (not the stand-alones) and open them in SimPE.
Each package has 3 files- a TXTR, and the 2 LIFOs it references. All 3 of these are assigned a GUID to overwrite the ones in Sims07 and Sims08 packages for AL. (Even though you don't have AL, the packages should open)

Actually, I just realized I packaged 6 files in those, but they are in clear groups of 3.

Quote: Originally posted by Cheryl Mason
I'm completely in the dark

Not at all. When you get to the point where it looks terrible, that means you can see it. I call that "almost done!"

EDIT: I forgot to say that I created the LIFOs by just extracting the originals from Sims08.package and importing them into my new package then swapping the image with my .pngs - no GUID adjustments necessary since they're defaults carrying the original numbers. You'll want to save 2 versions of your .png, a 512 and a 256 to import.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#9 Old 9th Jan 2009 at 2:24 AM
*Peers into your red hat default* Ah! I see. The LIFO file lives in the Resource List window along with the textures... but how do I put it there? When I right-click it gives me options to "Add" or "Create Resource", but it just creates a generic file, not a LIFO... *Clicks about some more* Oh, you can change it into a LIFO using Resource Information.

...And now it's asking me if I want to commit changes and I don't think I do at all in case I've done something horribly wrong. Please could you tell me exactly how to create the LIFO?
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#10 Old 9th Jan 2009 at 5:21 PM
Right, I nicked a 256 and 512 LIFO from your red hat default, imported them to the plantsim hair package, and used DXT3 to import my own alpha-ised (yes, not a word, I know :P) PNG textures instead of yours. I renamed them "auhairleafy-greens1_lifo" and "auhairleafy-greens0_lifo". Then I went the the texture files and replaced the 256 and 512 image files with LIFO references. w00t.

...Problem is, the hair still doesn't work at all - it's sort of flickering with transparent bits in all the wrong places, and the bits of texture you CAN see appear to be Maxis's and not mine. Have I done something wrong?
Field Researcher
#11 Old 9th Jan 2009 at 5:46 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Cheryl Mason
Right, I nicked a 256 and 512 LIFO from your red hat default, imported them to the plantsim hair package, and used DXT3 to import my own alpha-ised (yes, not a word, I know :P) PNG textures instead of yours. I renamed them "auhairleafy-greens1_lifo" and "auhairleafy-greens0_lifo". Then I went the the texture files and replaced the 256 and 512 image files with LIFO references. w00t.

...Problem is, the hair still doesn't work at all - it's sort of flickering with transparent bits in all the wrong places, and the bits of texture you CAN see appear to be Maxis's and not mine. Have I done something wrong?


That's because your LIFOs are carrying the GUID of the witch hats.

If you open Programs>EAGames>TheSims2 Seasons>TSData>Res>3D>Sims08 (actually SimPE has an "Open in..." option that lets you jump to a specific EP's Res folder) find the LIFOs in question (auhairleafy-greens1_lifo and auhairleafy-greens0_lifo).
In the "Window" option on the SimPE toolbar, choose "Resource information." You'll see Type, Group, Instance(high) and Instance numbers. Either copy these on paper or take a screenshot. *
Open your own LIFOs (you can have 2 instances of SimPE open at once, but it's a bit of a memory hog), select the resource view again and enter the copied numbers into the corresponding spaces. Commit and save.
If you've done it right, when the game opens and is looking for those LIFOs, it finds the real ones first, then when it finds yours with the same GUID, it thinks, "OH, these must be the ones I really use."
Right now, it thinks your LIFOs should override the witch hats (the numbers I used), which you don't even have in your game.
The flickering is because it's using your smaller textures, but still drawing on the original large image files.

*Since you have to dig around in Sims08 anyway, it might be easier to extract the original LIFOs from here (it won't hurt anything) and import those into your package (you can just delete the first ones you made from the package). You'll have to build DXT again, but you won't have to do any number switching.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#12 Old 10th Jan 2009 at 12:05 PM
IT WORKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OYEZ, OYEZ, IT WORKS. LET THE FLAGS FLY AND THE TRUMPETS SOUND.

AND THANK YOU, NEDER. Note how I twiddled through all your instructions to the finished product, even though I had no idea what half of the concepts were! So they must have been good. XD Hurrah!!!
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