Any Decent Custom Hair?

[Bangelnuts]

Well, one assumes that if the mesh is only for toddlers, then the game can do little else than substitute something when the toddler grows up, and it's safer if it chooses default meshes - you can always change them later!  (And for the short time kids are toddlers, I would never bother to give them custom hair, although I'd change their hair if they're bald!

I use custom hairstyles on my toddlers because unfortunately the face templates are limited in the toddler age group.the hairstyle helps the toddlers have different genetic appearances rather than all toddlers looking like Identical twins in the game.

[noname]

The problem is that not all custom hairstyles have all ages, or some of the ages don't match. Say, someone used a blond Maxis hair and then only changed the teen, adult and elder hair, making them black. If you make the whole hairstyle genetic, then toddlers and children will have blond hair and only get the correct black hair when turning into teenagers. Also, you're going to have a ton of identical toddler and child hairs, because these have not been edited in most cases, even if they match the color otherwise.

Although I haven't tested it in game, I would assume that as long as you set the genetic color to be correct for the custom hair, you won't have the mismatching problem if a generation is missing.

[Bangelnuts]

Although I haven't tested it in game, I would assume that as long as you set the genetic color to be correct for the custom hair, you won't have the mismatching problem if a generation is missing.

the color isnt where the game is having substitions it in the age brackets .ie if a custom hair mesh is only for teens and up . the game thinks it should be in all age brackets if its a maxis color. if its a custom color then the game automatically categorizes style and color appropriately.the game tends to judge based on color raather than style so a long toddler hair only in black will show up in other ages as the barrette  style. which means you have a boat load of deletion to do. the same is true with a short hair if its a maxis color but the mesh is only for a certain age group you end up with meg hair by the boatload in all the other age brackets.with males it is the close to the head style that is dfault for maxis

[ZephyrZodiac]

OH, if I'm creating toddlers in CAS, I might give them a custom hairstyle as long as I know it's part of a complete set, but with born-in-game infants, I just wait until they're kids.  Except for twins, I rarely have more than one toddler in a house, so knowing which one it is isn't hard!  And if I wait until they grow up to be kids, at least then I know which hair group they would have been in.

[Bangelnuts]

OH, if I'm creating toddlers in CAS, I might give them a custom hairstyle as long as I know it's part of a complete set, but with born-in-game infants, I just wait until they're kids.  Except for twins, I rarely have more than one toddler in a house, so knowing which one it is isn't hard!  And if I wait until they grow up to be kids, at least then I know which hair group they would have been in.

I change the hair in toddlerhood if the hairstyle I want is available to children and up. for a hair stylye thatis all ages I tend to give the parents the custom style in CAS that way when they have children its automatically in herited as custom hair is dominant in the DNA Pool. the default style that all toddlers get if they are female I cant stand because it becomes meg hair in childhood,I finally found a way to dress it up though I down loaded hair ribbons for it

[ZephyrZodiac]

The hair that reallt annoys me is the Maxis Nightlife one with the headphones!  The minute a sim takes a shower, changes into PE kit, or what have you, they have the awful lank pony tail that looks like they got up without brushing their hair and just stuck it in a band!

[nikita]

Exnem from The Sims Vault has some nice hair.  The one I have downloaded (the one he put up on MTS2) looks great in game.  I'm not sure what the poly count is, I've always suspected that his objects had high poly counts but never really bothered to check

The Compulsive D hair meshes (you can find them on Simpathetic.com) are high poly but all really nice and welcome breath of fresh hair in the "ethnic" hair department.

I tend to stay away from the long hair meshes because of, like everyone else said, animation issues.  Sunair also has nice hair.  Some are from Poser/Renderosity so they might be high in polygon count as well.

Someone uploaded a really cute ponytail w/ bangs mesh on MTS2 a week or so back.  The animation of the ponytail is pretty good and it looks great in game (works with all ages).

[yetyak]

I went through and checked the poly counts on all my hair meshes yesterday, and found one that had 19,959 faces.  Delete!  There were a few in the 12 to 13 thou range, too.  Naturally, those were my favorite styles.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Perhaps we need a list of ones people find, like Damage did a while back for SimFreaks with objects.  Hair-meshes, in a way, are more destructive and invasive, as you have no control over non-controllable sims turning up on lots with them!  Of course, you can zap them, but if you don't know who they are, it's difficult.

[Ness]

I'm rather interested in those hair ribbons...  spill the beans!

I've got to say that I would like some more hair styles, but I'm very fussy - I want them to show up in the normal colour bins, the sims that get them need to blend in with the others, and I want them to move naturally and not chop through bodies...  very hard to find anything like that at all!

[SaraMK]

The problem is that not all custom hairstyles have all ages, or some of the ages don't match. Say, someone used a blond Maxis hair and then only changed the teen, adult and elder hair, making them black. If you make the whole hairstyle genetic, then toddlers and children will have blond hair and only get the correct black hair when turning into teenagers. Also, you're going to have a ton of identical toddler and child hairs, because these have not been edited in most cases, even if they match the color otherwise.

the color isnt where the game is having substitions it in the age brackets .ie if a custom hair mesh is only for teens and up . the game thinks it should be in all age brackets if its a maxis color. if its a custom color then the game automatically categorizes style and color appropriately.the game tends to judge based on color raather than style so a long toddler hair only in black will show up in other ages as the barrette  style. which means you have a boat load of deletion to do. the same is true with a short hair if its a maxis color but the mesh is only for a certain age group you end up with meg hair by the boatload in all the other age brackets.with males it is the close to the head style that is dfault for maxis

This isn't a game problem, it's a Bodyshop problem. When people make a mesh, even if the mesh is only for adults, Bodyshop will create a complete package that includes all age groups.

I can tell you how to get rid of crappy default hair in the age groups that a custom mesh (or recolor, for that matter) did not alter.

1. Open the RECOLORS (not the mesh) in SimPE.

2. On the top-left select Property Set.

3. On the top-right select whatever age that the mesh did not cover (i.e. if your mesh if for teen-elder, then you want to edit the ones for toddler and child). The one that starts with "pu" is toddler, and "cf" or "cm" is child.

4. On the bottom-left select "age (dtUInteger) =". It will have a number in there like 0x00000001 for toddler and 0x00000002 for child. Just change that to 0x00000000.

5. Remember to click the Commit button after each change. Save the file.

The mesh will show up in teen-elder like it should, but absolutely nothing will show up in toddler or child. Now you can have the best of both worlds -- new meshes show up in the correct colorbins, but the unchanged age groups don't get spammed with nasty hairstyles.

This method will work any time you have hair in an age group that you don't want it in. This is how to get rid of it without affecting the other age groups. Note that if you do something like get rid of a teen hair for a mesh that is for child and adult (but left teen as a default nasty style) then when the child grows into a teen he will receive a completely random hair style. Hope that made sense.

[Motoki]

You can also safely delete them and their accompanying texture, the latter of which will save a good bit of space. As long as you know the # code for the age you are deleting and the codes used on the textures (am=adult male af=adult female tf=teen female cu=child unisex pu=toddler unisex etc) then you should be fine but of course back up your files first. Anyway, simpe also makes a backup eveytime you change a package file.

IMO it makes more sense to just delete them because all those texture files are large and take up a lot of space and really add to the time it takes to load the game.

[Bangelnuts]

You can also safely delete them and their accompanying texture, the latter of which will save a good bit of space. As long as you know the # code for the age you are deleting and the codes used on the textures (am=adult male af=adult female tf=teen female cu=child unisex pu=toddler unisex etc) then you should be fine but of course back up your files first. Anyway, simpe also makes a backup eveytime you change a package file.

IMO it makes more sense to just delete them because all those texture files are large and take up a lot of space and really add to the time it takes to load the game.

thats what I ended up doing. I did inadvertantly delete one mesh but it was no big deal as I save all meshes in a seperate file on my desktop. I simply went back and reinstalled it when I saw my sim running around bald. even though her picture  on her panel showed the correct hairstyle and color

[Issy]

There is also some nice recolours and meshes at:

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/SimmillionHomes3/

I like the Diva hairstyle, and the "That Girl" is fitting for some of my nerdy looking sims

You need to be a member to download but I thought it was worth it.  No idea how "high" the poly counts are for these.  Got Simpe just yesterday and I'm still playing around with it.

[Motoki]

IIRC correctly that Diva one was pretty high poly. That's the one Lola did right? If so, I saw the count and immediately deleted it.

[Issy]

I think it was Milla M, and the hairstyle is called Bombshell Diva.  There isn't any of Lola's on that site afaik.

[Motoki]

Sorry, I was thinking of her just meant Milla instead of Lola, can't keep 'em straight.

And I doubled checked it and yes this is the one I was thinking of.

The Diva hair mesh is 10,324 faces and 6,003 vertices. This is extremely high and I strongly reccomend people not to use this mesh. It's your game so do what you want, but I personally wouldn't use a bed with that high of a count let alone hair. It's not like it's some complex style with a lot of pieces either like dreads or something, it's basically plastic stiff one piece looking and could and should have been optimized down a lot more instead of just ripped straight off from Poser or whatever other high poly rendering program it came from.

Sorry, this is just a real sore point with me and I think it's very irresponsible of people to pass off these high poly meshes that were never intended for games on unspecting users. We have enough trouble with this game being buggy and slow as it is and then when people start having problems they likely won't have any clue what caused it. 

That Girl, by the way, is 3849 faces and 1943 vertices which isn't a wonderfully low count, but passable I guess.

[Darkstormyeve]

It should be a rule that creators display this type of information. I'm sure the likes of TSR etc don't because they would probably lose half their files that people upload.

[Issy]

I guess I really need to go through all my downloads and check the poly's (now that I have simpe).  I don't have that many downloads really but I've noticed my game is quite slow and I have noticible lag when my mouse hovers from one side of the screen to the other.

There was a thread where you mentioned how to check the poly counts Motoki, but I can't seem to remember which one it was.  Thanks for the heads up on that btw, I'm quite fussy about what goes into my game.

[Motoki]

The diva hair is actually up at TSR but the count is not posted for it there. Their policy is to make it optional and allow the decision whether or not to post the numbers up to the creator. The more responsible creators all do post their numbers. Even those who make objects with high counts will post them if they are responsible and there are a couple of people at TSR who fairly consistantly make mid to high poly stuff but still post their numbers.

Maybe Milla isn't even aware of the issue. A lot of people, ahem, 'borrow' meshes from other sources and so may not be true 3D modelers but just someone who learned how to use the tools enough to convert meshes from one another form to one that TS2 can use. If this is the case, they wouldn't have learned the basics of 3D modeling and may not even be aware of the counts or that they are an issue.

[Darkstormyeve]

Was just reading your Simpotence thread Motoki and I am so thankful that you hang here so much. You are VERY helpful. Thankyou.

[Motoki]

There was a thread where you mentioned how to check the poly counts Motoki, but I can't seem to remember which one it was.  Thanks for the heads up on that btw, I'm quite fussy about what goes into my game.

Oh it's not too hard to do. You open the package in question with the mesh. On the left hand side select the Geometric Data Container, then to the right of that window is another window that she then also list the Geometric Data Container. Select that as well. Then in the lower portion of the screen make sure you are in the plugin view. The new SimPE interface should default to this but with the old one you may have to select the plugin view tab. Now you want to find the tab that says 3D Mesh and select that. Once you do, you should see where it says Models (Faces= Vertices= ) those are your counts.

[Brynne]

I'm in tears, now (nooooooo not really), since I have to go and delete all of those Milla meshes I just put in the other day. And I think I even told you in my last PM, Motoki, that I was wondering why my game was suddenly loading so slowly. Jeez. All those damn hair meshes I just downloaded! And I haven't even used them, yet.

[Bangelnuts]

I'm in tears, now (nooooooo not really), since I have to go and delete all of those Milla meshes I just put in the other day. And I think I even told you in my last PM, Motoki, that I was wondering why my game was suddenly loading so slowly. Jeez. All those damn hair meshes I just downloaded! And I haven't even used them, yet.

Ideleted alot of stuff yesterday that SimPE flagged as have huge polygon counts and "oversized Geometric Meshes". thats how I accidently deleted a mesh from Lola which wasnt flagged by SimPE.I  have found that most of the meshes Ive gotten from TSR,Pronup, and MTS2 are on the lower end of Polygon counts and look better in game than the high PolyGon Count Hair and Meshes. SimPE does an awesome Job Flagging files that are potentially game slowing in Red. it flagged a few items that it wasnt sure were EP Ready that are EP ready and work fine . they were recolors of maxis items.Beware  everyone Maxis  apparently pays no heed to polygon counts in their objects such as cars and shrubbery. or in other objects such as the alienware computer. SimPE flagged those  Items as being extremely high in Poly gon counts. the downloadable roadster and the PUNTO were the two cars that got flagged in my game. I deleted the Roadster and the Punto and all shrubbery that was flagged as well as the alien ware computer. if you can live without those items in your game you are better off

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, unless you actually put them on a lot, they won't cause problems, and if your lot is low in polygon counts on other things, then you can put them in without raising the level too high.  But I remember from the discussion at the time the issue was raised, when it was pointed out that a lot depends on the number of tiles the object takes up, ie a bed which has 6 times the count of a chair may not be overly high, as it takes up 6 tiles to the chair's 1.

As to the Alienware computer, I very rarely use it, and I have a funny feeling it's useless in UNI.