I'm using the wall decals (the tree) to create some Garlands. I increased the size of the texture to 1024 (it used to be 512) to improve the quality. But when you zoom a little out of the garlands it pixelates and blurs a little. The 512 does it too. Is there a way to modify this? so it doesn't fade or the quality reduced?

Those are the mipmaps. Try fiddling with your export settings -- most editors have options for how exactly to generate them.

Thanks for replying!. I attach the current exporting options i use. I've always used this.. and i haven't seen the problem before, that's why i thought it was the item's coding or something. What conf do you recommend? Thanks!

EDIT: I removed the mipmaps and the texture looks perfect now. I wonder if did ok or is it going to lag the game or something. i await your replying before posting the final item. Thanks

I used the tree decal to make some recolors and haven't noticed the problem you were having in game. If anything, zooming in too CLOSE makes them look worse- pretty much like any other object. I checked my DDS settings and they're exactly the same as yours. The only real difference I noticed is that I left the texture as 512x512.

Removing the mipmaps -might- be fine. I've done that in TS2 for some recolors of some of the meshes I've made- glass recolors in particular- and have never had any problems. But that's TS2 and I'm not sure how different things are in TS4.

Uh, mipmaps serve a rather important purpose. Removing them just so that stuff looks a little nicer is a bit like making everything a five billion poly mesh just so that it looks better .. it's probably OK as you only have a handful of such items in game, but if everyone starts doing that, using CC in general will result in a huge performance hit except for those with really great computers.

So, not recommended .. at all. Except if it's only for your own personal use, of course.

Just wondering if the problem could be her alpha or one of the other channels? (Because.. like I said, I used that decal with the same export settings and don't have that problem with my recolors in game...)

And: *makes note of the mipmap thing*. I only did that once (I think) and the actual mesh is a whopping 12 polys so I don't feel too bad about it.

Well it depends on how large the texture is to begin with .. with a tiny one it won’t matter all that much (and “glass” sounds like it would be tiny), but when one is already using 1024x1024, no mipmaps is really not a good idea I think.

I dunno about those settings; I aways use Paint.net or Aorta, they have different export options.

Maybe @Bakie would have an idea about the blurring then? He's been making wall stickers for quite a while now and uses PhotoShop.

Looking at this thread http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=548711 I suspect you might have better hardware than that .. of course, stuff looks nicer when you can use higher settings =).

Oh okey! then i won't do that. But that fixed the blurriness.. might something in the middle fix it?

@plasticbox could you share your paint.net export conf and i'll download the program and test it out?

I tried doing the same textures in the original resolution at 512 but the problem is the same, plus they look very pixelated in comparisson to the 1024 of course.

edit: didn't get the thing about the hardware. i posted that too..

What in-game settings are you using? No offense but if your machine fails that spectacuarly even in Laptop mode, I assume you have everything on Low .. or what settings are you using? Have you tried using Medium or High just temporarily, to be able to see what your textures actually look like in game?

I only just saw that thread, otherwise I'd have mentioned it earlier.

My laptop isn't that good yes. but it can hanlde the non-laptop option. But not now because it's really hot and overheats. That is why i use the laptop mode. When taking pictures, i set everything on high to test my items.

Ah, Intel graphics. Once upon a time (3 computers ago) I used to need someone else to take my screenshots for me because they always looked terrible no matter what I did. And yes, that computer had Intel graphics.
So your textures are most likely fine as they are. If you can change your game settings like plasticbox suggested, do that. If your textures look better on a higher setting then the blurring would be because of your graphics card- and there really isn't anything you can do to the textures themselves to fix that.

edit because I type really, really slow sometimes: If you'd like, I could see how your recolors look in my game? If they're fine as they are (don't need any changes, etc.) I'd be willing to take screenshots for you for an upload. I'd hate to see your laptop damaged in some way just so you can take screenshots for upload.

Would anyone be interested in testing the file for me?

I'm going to load up the game on the highest and see what i get. Though i had never had this issue with any other of my items, even in laptop mode.. which is strange.

See my edit.

Jeez. Thanks! you're so kind I've linked you the file in a private. There's two black & white garlands. One is with the mipmap and the other don't. All the textures are 1024.

Ok, got them and my game is loading as I type. I'll edit this post after I look at them. (And you're welcome!)

Edit: Close up-

Zoomed out-

Zoomed out more-


I don't see any real pixelization there. The texture isn't as clear and sharp but I expected that- and put a painting on the wall (in the last screenshot) so you can see that it's not as clear and sharp as it would be closer up.
I left one of my recolors on the wall- it looks a bit clearer BUT it's bigger. So I'd say that with the smaller details on your texture, you're going to lose some clearness/sharpness when zoomed out and probably won't be able to "fix" that.

I think I'm done editing this post, lol. I forgot the middle screenshot the first time. My graphics card, while it's not Intel, isn't the greatest itself but I don't think your recolors look bad.

Cool! >.< i just closed mine to replace repeated texture and take the screenshots. I have everyting on high and i still see this little decaying texture problem. it's really odd.. because it should be the other way around.. when zoomed out good and when zoomed it crappy :P

Again, many thanks for testing them Guess i'm too detailed. I hope others will like them as much as i do. Hopefully

edit: Btw, can i see the middle one in full size?

I saved as the original screenshot, so I don't have the uncropped version. But your recolors wouldn't be any closer than they are in the cropped version. (Or would they? I don't even know anymore.. I had to go out and run some errands and I think I lost my mind somewhere along the way. *sigh*)

hah it's okey, thanks for helping me!