News! Feb, 11

Hello everyone 😊

Here is the news post of the day where I'll show you how I do to create a CC for The Sims 4.

First of all, I'm using milanote, a desk app, to visually organize all the ideas, pictures and links I have on a specific subject. I'm spending 1 to 2 hours every morning with my coffee to collect everything I love on Instagram, Pinterest, Westwing, Etsy, your suggestions and many many many e-shops. If you want something IRL, most of the time I know where you can find it 😂 Then, depending on what I found, I'm planning my day and choose what is motivating me the most. 

Yesterday I received on my Tumblr some great suggestions and I took the picture you can see of the Library to start working. I wrote all the CC ideas this picture was given to me and then search on Milanote and on the web for all the shops, images, textures that can be used for them.

After that, I decided that the most important part of the picture used as a reference was the bookshelf as I don't have any to create my own Library and that it is interesting to create one where you can put books on both sides. I used books 6 from SSTS here you can see it in black and orange to know how high to place the shelves, the width and the depth of the bookshelf.

I started meshing with Shapr3D which is a CAD program very easy to use on Ipad. I am much more comfortable with the pen rather than the mouse on Blender and it is more precise. Also, I needed to find the right balance of details because the more polygons the bookshelf has, the bigger is the file and TSR doesn't accept new mesh objects that have more than 2k poly (and I really wish I can upload more objects there in the future 😛)

When the mesh is finished, I do the very minimum to make it compatible with The Sims 4 by using Blender and Sims4Studio. So, no texture, no map, no LOD, no slots, etc... 

I'm checking in-game if the object has the size I want and if it's working properly.

When everything is fine, I'm going on Substance Painter to do the baking and the first swatch of the object. It took me around 2 hours yesterday to find the wood and colour texture I had in mind 😂😅

Then, I'm going back to Sims4Studio to create the swatch and modify some information in the warehouse. 

When it's done, sometimes I make a mistake that can only be seen with a texture on it. So I'm looking closely and if I don't notice anything strange, I'm building something with it to be sure the swatch is matching the other CC I have and what other CC is missing to create what I have in mind.

For example here, all the desks I have are not working with my bookshelf, because of the size, the aesthetic or the texture so I'm planning to create a new one. Building these 2 examples also gave me the idea to create runners rugs.

I looked for a round rug that can match this runner to go under the globe but didn't find one and as it was already 9PM, I thought it was time to turn off the computer and go to dinner 😛

That's all for today!

I wish you all a happy day and thank you again for your everyday amazing support ❤❤❤