Natural Beauty: Idolatry of Flesh Skintones - UPDATED 03-Mar-07

Idolatry of Flesh:

At long last, I am extremely pleased to give you my "ultimate" skintone pack. Ranging from a rich, deep, dark chocolate to a pale, rosy light, this skintone is designed to look good on sims of all ethnicities and facial types - pretty on pretty sims, but not too pretty on ugly sims.

Updated 03-Mar-07: Please redownload the Skintones RAR. I have updated all of the textures on the toddler bodies so the hands are fixed and an error in the infant faces. I have left the filenames identical and they are the same files, just with textures updated in SimPE, so if you are already using these on your sims, you should be able to download the new ones, overwrite the existing files, and continue merrily without having to change skintones. See the "Defaults?" section for info on the new defaults.

(You may click any of the inline pics for a larger version.)


It features an extremely detailed texture, with lots of shading and highlight, but no gloss or shine. I have worked toward realisim with my texturing, to create a highly interesting skin that is not intended to be photorealistic or over-realistic... Distinctive, but still versatile enough to work as a default replacement, if you so choose.


Every part of the body is detailed, with nice feet, knees, hands (both backs and palms), elbows, arms, butts, backs, bellies, chests, and tummies. There is no push-up effect - these are natural boobies. The shading is highly appropriate for the default body shapes but will likely adapt to most interesting body shapes without looking too odd.


This skintone works for all ages, and changes for fat states - the version pictured is the normal/fit version.

There is no makeup used on any of the sims in the previews, and the brows are not part of the skintone, so you can add whatever eyebrows you like.


This skintone also works genetically - if a light and dark sim wearing these skins have children, their offspring can be medium or tan.

These are completely barbie, with the same anatomical features as Maxis skins (nipples on children and males, no other details on anyone). An anatomically-correct version is planned and will be posted on my personal site quite soon - within the next few days most likely, and I will do a default version of that (since I want it for myself) which will also be there. I will change this message to let you know when it's up.

My Texturing:

Almost all of the texturing for this skintone has been done starting with some great source pics, then painstakingly adjusted, manipulated, and blended, combined with a LOT of handpainting, to create the texture you see here - it has taken me well over 200 hours of work to create this skintone, so for those who might ask me "how'd you do it?" the answer is having great source pics to start with... but mainly TIME, TIME, AND MORE TIME!!!

Please do not nitpick my texturing. The choice of the shading and highlighting and the lack of shine is entirely intentional, and I have created the skin I have always wanted to create. I am not entirely happy with it, and I wish it were a bit more dazzling somehow, but if you don't like it or it's not your style, tough. Go download one of the 500 other skins that make your sims look like buttered hams if you like that kind of thing.

Yes, there are imperfections here and there, and there may be a slight seam or two, but I will hunt you down and eat your children if you nitpick and nag me about them. There are lots of shiny skins out there, and lots of matte ones, and lots of realistic ones - and all of them have a seam or imperfection here and there. I created the blend of styles that I have always wanted for my game. Your mileage may vary.

Credits:

• For a bit of the detailing on the male chest, I used the textures from Ren's beautiful Self Make-Up Skin as a base, with quite a bit of hand-painting overtop.
• The female navel/belly is from Oepu's Skin Realistic Ages.
• The hips are based on texturing by Navetsea (used with special permission), from his F-IN evo2 skinset.
• The eyes, which you probably will never see unless you delete custom eyes a sim wearing one of my skins is using... are part of my Blasphemy eyeset, using Knightskykyte's sclera and Pinstruck's iris.

HUGE thanks to all of the above creators, not only for their beautiful original creations, but also for their policies/permission that allowed me to use bits of their textures.

The other texturing is based on high-quality source pics I own the rights to... and countless hours with my Wacom tablet, scribbling away in Photoshop.

Defaults?

Updated 03-Mar-07: I have re-added a default package to the thread. I know I said I wasn't gonna, but, well, I got Seasons and I wanted to play some of the default families, but with my skins. Jason Greenman is a total hottie with my skin and eye defaults, hehe.

These defaults are made with a mixed method: partial material definitions, partial image replacement as standard. I have tested them and aging works just fine - you shouldn't have any issues with these. They are also now one file rather than 4.

The original skins are REQUIRED to use the defaults! You must download both the Skintones and Defaults RARs if you want to use these as your defaults. Remember to remove any existing defaults (including my old busted 4-file defaults if you still have them) before using mine.

Known Issues:

If your sims have white scalps with writing, black bodies, but normal faces, then you downloaded the defaults only - you must also download the non-defaults and install all of them for the defaults to work. They are dependent defaults, meaning the default package references the non-defaults.

Just get the non-default normal skintones and your sims will show up properly with the defaults you already have.

Anatomically Correct?

These versions do not include any additional details on females - they are Barbie skins the same as Maxis. I have provided these to offer a "safe" skin that anyone can use. However, for my own use, I prefer a more anatomically correct skintone. Therefore, I have made a version that includes the right details on the females.

You may download that version (and a default replacement package for it) here:
Anatomically correct skintones
Anatomically correct defaults (dependent defaults, you need the regular anatomically correct skintones too).

Recolours/Edits/Usage/Etc.?

You may edit for tattoos, scars, recolours, celebrity skins, or using parts as a base for your own skintone, and share your edits with sim uploads or on their own - as long as you provide a little link and credit to me for what you've used, as I have done for those who have contributed to this skin.

If you would like to edit this skin... PLEASE use my original bmp files! I have uploaded them as a modder's resource here. They are big files but totally worth it!! If you make a new project from the ones already compressed by Body Shop, your textures will degrade even further. You will get much better results much easier by using my originals.

Use on your sim uploads with a little link and credit. Use however in pics, movies, stories, etc., with no credit needed. Please don't reupload otherwise or claim as your own. Also, paysites are bad. No paysite anything for my skin, kthx.

Picture Credits:

Hair (all free!):

• Dark: Male, Female
• Medium: Male, Female
• Tan: Male, Female
• Light: Male, Female
• Pale: Male, Female

Eyes (by me):

• Blasphemy
• Precious Jewels

Brows:

• Helaene
• RenSim
• Sussi
• Me (unreleased)

Models:

• Dark Male is Corvus
• Medium Female is Claudia
• Light Female is Rebecca (not yet released).
• Pale Female is linuslover30's Selar Stareck with some slight tweaking.
• All others are nameless random sims I don't feel like sharing, some heavily modified from other peoples' sims.

Plants:

• I am a total plant addict and download every one I can see. Here's a BIG list of plants, with most of what I have used: http://www.sims2wiki.info/wiki.php?...truction#Plants ... please see there if you are looking for the plants used in the garden.

If there are any other items shown that you are wondering about, please PM me to ask about them and I will check for you and add the links to this thread. Please do not comment just to ask where I got something - that's rude.