Categorizing all my downloaded hair... Any advice on how to keep my sanity?

[Baa]

Aww... But I hate using SimPE! It's so slow for me and confusing. I guess a tutorial would be nice. I'll look around this thread for one. Edit: Saw plenty of people needing one, but nobody supplying. I'll wait patiently then.

[Swiftgold]

This thread explained it for me, and so far I've had no problems whatsoever categorizing away:

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php?topic=2119.0

[BlueSoup]

There's a couple of threads that are current right now about categorizing hair with SimPE.  Dewshine gave us this one, so that's a possibility.  Also, do a search for categorizing hair, there are a couple more out there for it as well.

[Baa]

Whoo!

It worked. Call me crazy but that was actually fun. Then again, I only had a few dozen. Totally worth it.

Just a tip though, sometimes the filename will SAY "brown" in it, but don't use filenames, view the texture first and you be the judge. I guess some artists clone the base color (which is usually brown I noticed from the filenames) and just change the color without altering the filename.

Now if only we could get everyone to do this before they upload their hair...

[BlueSoup]

I don't have all that many either, so I think I will eventually bite the bullet and give it a go.  A short while ago, I separated my hair files with meshes into a different subfolder (although I don't know if I got them all), so hopefully it won't be too much for me to handle.

[Baa]

It really wasn't too much work. Having my downloads folder completely organized by site and hair/clothes/gender made it a lot easier.

I say it took my about 30 minutes to an hour but I'm not so sure. I'll count my hair files.

Oh, no wonder it didn't take me so long. I only counted 19 or so hair files.  Then again, some took longer than others (but only by a few seconds) because they included the YA age group, or because I had to actually look at the texture to decide what color it was.

[Pegasys]

Am I the only one who is happy with the only the set of Maxis hair included with game and expansion packs? I have added a few ethnic styles since I think they were lacking in that department, but otherwise I haven't gone looking for hair.

It's probably just how I play the game, but I wonder if it's because I've been playing the game since only June, not for an entire year -- when did y'all start really going on download sprees, did you do this right away or was it after several months did you suddenly reach a point where you were sick of the Maxis hair/clothing/furniture ? This isn't really a question about hair persay, but about how you play the game and how custom content fits into it...

(Oh my gosh, I'm now a cretin! Wahoo!)

[BlueSoup]

I'm pretty much happy with the Maxis hair, although I do think the blond colour is a little too brassy.  I like the light ash blonde from Lyran.

I probably only have about 20 or so custom hairstyles, as I've been a lot pickier this time around than I used to be. 

Custom furniture and clothes though, is an entirely different matter.  I really hate most of the stuff that Maxis has to offer, and it wasn't long at all before I started on downloading sprees.  When I had only 256MB and a crapass video card, this made it pretty tough to take with the loading times, but I didn't care...I could have a shower or make a meal while it was loading!

[nectere]

It was probably about somewhere around the six month mark when I discovered custom content. I had a problem with the base game - big suprise - and went looking for answers, it was all downhill from there.

[yetyak]

Glad to know that someone else feels the catagorizing is worth it.  I did this with over 1000 files, and I still feel it was worth it.  And I put the file name into the text list on every one of them, VERY useful. 

I started downloading custom content as soon as it became available, long before I actually got the game.  I'm more careful now, only getting the items I want out of a set instead of the whole thing.  Download folder was getting way too big.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, I'm in the process of splitting my download, and having a complete victorian set with furniture, walls, floors, build stuff and clothes etc.  then I'll have to sets of game folders, TheSims2 Mod and TheSims2Vic!  But at least it's staving off the moment when I have to get rid of stuff I like!

[yetyak]

That sounds like a great idea, ZZ!!  Since I have 4 game folders, I think I might do that as well.  Too many new things downloaded to add to the "real" game, and so far no downloads in the "first alternate" game.  This could well be the best solution.

[ZephyrZodiac]

You'd need to check houses where you  know they have a lot of custom Victoriana and change it first, though, or you'll have loads of mismatched Maxis! (And bare walls and floors!  Enough to make a fortune sim wring their hands in despair!)

[yetyak]

I've never seen the fortune sim wring their hands in dispair!  Might be worth not fixing right away....  Very few of my sims are fortune, guess my die doesn't want to roll that way.  I should probably change the order once in a while to prevent that.  Or maybe keep a closer eye on the sim before they transition and pick one suited to their personality.  That might be too much work....

[ZephyrZodiac]

I didn't mean literally!   I've never seen it either, although it just might make them want to panhandle!

[Gwill]

Am I the only one who is happy with the only the set of Maxis hair included with game and expansion packs?

I'm a complete download whore.
I just love custom content.

You should be glad you're happy with the defaults.

[cwieberdink]

I'm a complete download whore.
I just love custom content.

You should be glad you're happy with the defaults.

  Gwill!  I am too.  Every single day.  I get up in the morning.  I start my email downloading.  I load up MATY and hit "show new messages since your last visit" and read the stuff that are responses to my messages or that look interesting.  Then I go to MTS2 and click downloads and go through the new stuff.  If someone mentions downloading cc, I usually rabbit-trail all over the internet downloading more crap I'll never use or that will make my game lag like crazy.  MY dl folder is 1.6g (!!) and contains just over 7000 items.  Wow.  I didn't realize it was that big!  LOL

C

[Gwill]

Oh, god.  I just checked...  My downloads folder is 3.27 GB.  Just the downloads folder.
I need help.

[Lythdan]

3.27 GB!?  I just have shy of 600 items in my downloads folder (200 MB), and even I don't want to think about categorizing my downloaded hair. I commend you for your bravery.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, I have nearly 2GB that I'm using at present, Plus probably another 1GB that I haven't even installed, plus stuff that's sitting in a folder since I installed NL and haven't put everything back yet, plus I have another folder of victorian stuff which is probably getting on for 1GB!  But I swear I won't go over 2GBs in one Game set.  But at present I have three - Sims2 play, Sims2 build and Sims2 test - next will be Sims2 vic!  I think I'm nearly set for the next quarter of a centruy!

[angelyne]

Am I the only one who is happy with the only the set of Maxis hair included with game and expansion packs? I have added a few ethnic styles since I think they were lacking in that department, but otherwise I haven't gone looking for hair.

I'm happy enough with the Maxis hair styles, but I don't like the texture very much.  The black is too gray, it should be a rick glossy black.  The red is too orangy, it lacks dept, and the blond is too yellow.  The brown I never use.  All the colors are flat and need to be glossier, like healthy hair.That's why I'm trying to find good recolors.  I've seen some gorgeous recolors out there, but they are all custom meshes.  Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be "in" for artists of talent to recolor Maxis hair.  I'm finding some older recolors from back in the days where there was no meshing possible, but techniques have evolved since then (or the talent tool) and new hair is much better textured now.  However I am picky and will not use static, plastic meshes.  So that makes my choices limited.  Which is good in a way, I won't end up with 1000+ hair I did include some updo's in my hair catalog, as I find that Maxis did not include anything very elegant.  Updo's don't bother me so much, as the hair isn't meant to move anyway.  (Ah the power of a good gel).

But I am a total download whore, might be worse than you gwill.  I spend more time downloading and cataloging and organizing than I do playing. 

[Lythdan]

Whoa, ZZ. That's a lot. I'm usually pretty fussy about the stuff I download, but that can sometimes lead to me looking for something, to only realise I didn't actually download it in the first place after about half an hour of debating whether I liked it or not!

[Gwill]

I guess I'm going to make it my new years resolution to be more picky. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, there's stuff I rarely use, and occasionally stuff I delete completely because it's crap, but since I have a 156GB second drive to store stuff on, it doesn't really matter how much I download!  Just takes time to sort everything, though!

[Pegasys]

I have to admit I did go on a little bit of a download spree when I started getting into building, but it's mostly for build-mode items, or recolors of existing items. I end up doing more "window shopping" - (including looking for windows to download)! And I have spent hours surfing sites just for a particular few things, or just looking at new items at MTS2...  but lately I think it may be faster to recolor oneself than to try to find a particular recolor! 

The Sims mirrors my everyday life; I hate shopping for clothes IRL and try to keep my hair simple; but my environment, well I'm always up for new furniture (not that we can always afford it though).