A selection of Matisse paintings

Henri Matisse (1869-1954) was a prominent French artist whose career spanned from the 1800's into the 20th century. We studied him a lot in Fashion Illustration, due to his expressive line work and his use of shapes.

With that in mind, I thought I'd do a little Sims homage with a small sample of his paintings from various decades. There are NINE paintings in total.

If these paintings look a little dim, it's because I stupidly took the pics during "daytime" and therefore, there wasn't much artificial lighting going on. When properly lighted, they are true to hue. =)

Download them HERE

Jane Lane in the Membrane: Jane Lane Quotes on Tees

I know what's wrong with the world today. It's a lack of 90's cynicism and bizarre horror pop art.

For those who don't know, Jane Lane was the artsy sidekick of Daria Morgendorffer, the titular character from MTV's classic 90's hit, Daria. Jane often provided the darkly humorous counterbalance to Daria's altruistic and/or sarcastic deadpan observations regarding the fictional town of Lawndale and its quirky caricatures denizens.

Jane saw the humor in things. And that's why I'm starting with three of her quotes. I'll eventually get to many of the other characters, but, in the meantime, you'll have to contend with Jane's wisdom.

Details


The shirts are both male and female and teen-Y/A. There's one male shirt with three quotes. And there are TWO female shirts -- the crew tee and the layered long sleeve -- with the same three quotes. Both shirt styles come in the aforementioned female ages. Savvy?

Below, I will detail the quotes. (Keep in mind that each quote comes with ALL the different ages and genders I explained.)

Quote 1: "I like having low self-esteem; it makes me feel special."


Katya is modeling the female teen crew neck example.

Quote 2: "Gee, you may join the human race after all." 

This would be the YAF long, layered tee.

Quote 3: "Darn. And it came so close to being semi-decent."

And here is an in-game example:

DOWNLOAD:


HERE is the link to the mediafire folder. Just take which files you want.

Two More Lipglosses

I'm back again with even MORE lipgloss, because -- because, why not? My Sims like to keep their lips moist. It's an obsession perfectly normal.

Glossy Lips


Here, Jillian is wearing the new Glossy Lips. These have more of a shine than the ones that I've released before, so if that's your bag, then you'll probably like them.

And here is a screen shot in game. As you can see, shininess is somewhat dependent upon environmental luminosity. So, at night, when the lights are dim, it's just not going to be as shiny -- but that adds realism, so yeah.

Heart Lips


Yuki is wearing Heart lips, so named because -- well, her lips are kinda heart-shaped and, well, yeah.

This gloss is more matte. In fact, one might call it a lipstick rather than a lipgloss. But I was craving something really matte -- but with texture -- in my game, so this was the result.

I chose this deep red color to show them off here, but they also look pretty neat in exotic colors like purple and blue.

And here is an in-game shot. As you can see, when the lips have a matte finish, there's less of a difference between CAS and the game.

Download:


The Glossy is HERE

The Heart is HERE



CC List (for the stuff I didn't create):


Both models are wearing Lady Frontbum's Naughty Skin. They are wearing Romance eye shadow and Cheeky V 2 blush (set to low opacity). Get it all at Lady Frontbum. I pretty much exclusively use Lady Frontbum's Naughty skins (male, female, all ages), so I'm gonna make a post with the defaults replacements I use.


The eyebrows for Jillian come from XM Sims, created by in789. (Yuki is wearing base game eye brows.) 


I don't really remember who the clothes are by. I'm gonna have to get back to you on that. (I suck at keeping track of other creator's CC, which wasn't really a problem until I started creating myself, SO...I'mma try to do better in the future. And offer these creators my most humble apologies in the meantime.) 

Shabby Update

I decided my blog was in desperate need of a new layout, so I strolled (yes, strolled) over to Shabby Blogs to snag some free shabby blog things, like this nifty background. The header is theirs too. I just did a crappy edit to put my crappy blog name on their shabby header. =D

So, yeah. I've made some more lipglosses. I need to test those out. I'm also thinking about doing some paintings. I learned how to do custom paintings, but I think I need to work on it a bit before I actually post one (the last one came off slightly off center from the original, which was a Matisse).

Anyway, I'm just telling you things. But I might even post a REAL UPDATE later today even. You just never know.

Until then my hobos,
kissesdahling

Two new lipglosses

The title is extraordinarily direct, and it's not a liar. Today, after a long hiatus, I bring you two new lipglosses. Yes, you read that right. Not one, not four, not twenty five, but two new lipglosses.

Why two you ask? Well, one would just be lonely.

About the Lipgloss


First of all, I want to say that I couldn't have done this without Shyne's tutorial. She made it idiot-proof, which is great, because -- well...you know. It's an awesome tutorial. I highly recommend it.

In fact, the tutorial was so awesome that my first lipgloss came out good enough to be shared with the general public.

So, without further ado, here it is:

The Sparkly Gloss


Named because it looked very Sparkly in CTU (and still kinda does in-game), this my first-born lipgloss. Treat it kindly.

As you can see, my model, Lacy, is wearing red. To get this deep, true red, you literally need to make it more of a true red which looks like this. That's the only thing that really needs to be mentioned. In the future, I'll improve and release lipsticks where you can input the color you want and the outcome will be that color.

The Dewy Gloss


So named because, initially, I thought it had a dew-like quality. (I think that less-so now, but couldn't be arsed with changing the name.)

And, seeing how Venetia is darker complected than Lacy, I thought I would experiment with hue. And here, she is sporting (what I think) is a rather lovely pink.

Tips about these two here lip glosses:


As I mentioned above, they look best when you use them with bright colors. These bright colors turn out darker and more muted then the colors you pick. I don't know if it's the method I used to do the lipstick, or if it's something I did wrong -- but whatever. It's not a big problem to me, and, chances are, it's not a biggie for you if you don't mind playing around with the nifty little color wheel and sliders.

Download:

The Sparkly Lips HERE

The Dewy Lips HERE

I've Got Stripes: Color Block Skirts for Teens

Teens definitely need more custom clothing service. And now that teenagers actually have stuff to do in-game (thanks to Generations), that's all the more true. So, I come bearing skirts for teen females.

Our first model, Brigitte is wearing a bold color block miniskirt with button details. The preset is an electric blue, as pictured, but there are three recolourable channels.

This buttons on this skirt have a sort of pearlescent quality to them. To give them a more matte look, color them darker. If you don't like the buttons at all, they pretty much disappear if you coordinate the color to match with the stripes.

Download the first skirt here.

Our second model, Siran, is wearing the second skirt set, which features thick horizontal stripes. The second skirt comes with two design presets, which are slightly different from one another.

The first skirt has less stripes, but thicker ones. The top stripe, which is thicker than the others, acts like a waistband. The preset is pictured, an electric purple and black combo.

The second preset is a dark, dark dusky pink. This preset differs from the first in that all the stripes are the same size, and that there are more of them. Download the second skirt (including both presets) here.

Misc. Unimportant Details

I'm a fashion design student. One of the first things you learn about how fabric lays on the body is stripes. I wanted to avoid the fake look of a photoskinned color block skirt that's just pasted on the body with no regard for the way the fabric actually lays on the body, and warps according to the body's natural curves. So, I made the color block print the way a real fabric designer would. When the fabric is laid flat, the stripes are perfectly even, flat, rigid, etc. The warping you see is the way it is actually laying on the Sim's body, which makes it look more natural.

Custom Content Credits
(Where to get the pictured CC that IS NOT mine.)


*Tops: Brigitte's top is from All About Style. Siran's is by hasel.
*Both are wearing skin and blush by the talented Lady Frontbum. (Siran's eye shadow is also by the same -- a personal fave of mine.)
*Both are wearing lipgloss by daluved1
*Brigitte's hair is by Anubis360.
*And a special thank you to whoever made Brigitte's tights/socks combo. I don't remember who the artist is, but I'll credit if/when I figure it out!

Strappy Shoes -- New Mesh!

So, I've finally made a mesh -- my first, in fact. I decided to try shoes. Somehow, that seemed to be the way to go at the time.

They are fully recolourable with TWO channels and have silver buckles on the outer side (which are non-recolourable). The preset is a dark (nearly pure black) suede. In CTU, it looked all texturized, but not so much in CAS. I didn't go back and change it because A) the lupus monster makes me very tired and B) I trust in your ability to recolor in CASt. (Be proud.)

Here is a fully body screen cap of the preset:

And here is a side closeup of the preset, so you can see the height of the heel and platform: 

And here is what they look like with a different pattern (and with some color):

I think they look better recoloured now that I look at them some more.

Important Info


There are TWO issues I see with these. Most of you will not think they're a big deal. These are superficial issues and do not effect the way the shoes work -- just the way they look. But, I am going to go ahead and put this out there, so nobody can say I didn't warn them. 


Issue #1

When you rotate the shoes to this *exact* angle, you can see that there is a little fleshy area. It's only in that spot, and it's only on that particular shoe. I've tried changing the mesh, I've tried changing the texture. I honestly can't figure that spot out. At other angles, and particularly *while you're playing the game*, it's not noticeable.

Issue #2

I can't get the encircled seems to be flush; no matter what, they won't line up. I suspect it's something to do with the texture. Maybe there needs to be more curvature in the way the foot curves? I'm not sure. I tried to fix it, but it looked goofier. BUT, unless you're going to be staring an inordinate amount of time at the inner sides of your Sim's feet, then you're probably not gonna notice.

AND ANOTHER THING....

I had to change the specular image to get the thicker straps to look right. However, I made it a bit matte. They will look very monochromatic with the preset. You can make them to look less flat by playing around with color to your liking. (See my recoloured image.) But, keep in mind, that I did intend these heels be one color (or one pattern) even though they've got two recolourable channels.

ALL THAT SAID...

Download them HERE


(P.S. The dress my model is wearing is by Rusty Nail.)