Page Three

Next: Now we go to the back view of the canister set. Grab the copy that you made earlier before the shading and merging. First we must get rid of the writing and design on the front of the canisters. So make sure your base layer is selected in your layer palette and using the same method as you did earlier to get rid of the design when we made the side, fix up the backs.

Next: Using the same method as the previous page to give shading to the side layer of your canisters, do the side piece. You can do the same thing for the backs also that you did for the fronts, your choice. This is how mine look:

Next: You now need to mirror the back view so that they are in the right position when it comes time to copy and paste onto the sprite. Go to Image/mirror.

Next: Starting with the front of the canisters, now it is time to resize the canisters so that we can use them in the game realistically simwise. With something like this, it is hard to tell a good size. So you must compare it with something similar. So I open the food-processor_large_front_p.bmp sprite and change it to 24 bit colors right away. Now our canisters are going to be a bit larger than the food processor but not too much bigger.

Next: Select the yellow around the food processor and invert. Now copy the food processor and paste as a new image and then look in the right hand corner of PSP and look at the dimensions. It shoudl be about 47 x 47 but that is too small for the canisters. So I am going to fool around with numbers. But before I do this, I select the canvas part of the canister set, invert and the press alt R, that will get rid of the excess canvas so we can resize only the canisters.

Next: I fool around with resizing it, ratio checked and unchecked and I am going to go with 60 x 49. After I resize it I go to Effect/Accent one time. Like this:

Next: Now we must paste the canisters onto the sprite. If the food processor still has marching ants around it, deselect now. Copy your canisters and paste as a new layer onto the food processor. Line up as you want, it doesn't matter that much because we must realign them in tmog anyway. Like this:

Next: Now go to your layer palette and click on the base layer, grab your color picker tool and pick the yellow off the sprite. Now grab your floodfill tool, with the base layer selected in your layer palette and flood fill the sprite. Now you should only have your canisters there and the food processor is gone. Go to your layer palette and merge. Like this:

Next: Do the exact same thing for your back view but on the back view sprite. Of course you resize the canister the same size as you did the front view.

Next: Now we have to clean up our sprites. Since we resized the canister we will have some stray pixels that will cause yellow to show around edge of the canister in the game if we don't get rid of them. Now zoom in as close as you need to to view the stray and opaque pixels the will cause the dreaded yellow halos. They look like this:

Next: Using the finger tool, push option set at size 1, carefully and slowly, either push the color pink onto the opaque pixels or the color yellow. It all depends on your own judgement here since you are the only one close enough to see what needs pinked and what needs yellowed. Make sure you go the whole way around the canisters so you have a clean image.

Next: Do this for the back view also. Once the image is all cleaned up and you are satisfied with it, reduce colors to 256 and save.

Next: Now time to open tmog back up and import your canisters/food processor you just made. We now have to fix the position.

Next: Move your x and y arrows till you have the postiion you desire for each rotation in each zoom, meaning you will move this canister 12 times.

Next: Now go into your game and check if tmog made the buffers to your satisfaction and if the positioning is right.

To fix problems, make sure you take a pic of each zoom/rotation that there is a problem with the canisters! That way you can look at them while you are fixing the problems.

Note: If buffers need fixed you must export your canisters by UNCHECKING Just Change Colors and checking One Zoom All Channels. Adjust the areas that need darkened or lightened. They need darkened if they sink into things such as the counter or the wall. They need lightened if they bleed onto things, like they bleed through the wall (you can see the canisters through the wall). Check your a buffers also to make sure they are completely white and don't have a gray edge around them. If they have a gray edge, you need to whiten that.

Note: If the position is wrong, move the x and y again in tmog, no exporting is required to fix postioning.

Note: If the canisters are too big you must export as you did in the beginning with Just change colors unchecked. Using your original canister images, redo the whole resizing and copying onto sprites process and remember to clean them up again.

Sometimes you can get it on the first try, other times you must redo it. Normally I do not let tmog make my z's, but with something this small it doesn't do too bad of a job. To learn more about z buffers, check out the tutorial at 7 Deadly Sims.

This is what my canisters looked like in the game, not too shabby and rather cute.

If you would like this set of canisters, click image to download the object. When Simfully Yours is open again, you can grab even more canisters from Lorrilee.

If you see any mistakes in this tutorial or don't understand something, don't hesitate to email me! I have been known to make stupid mistakes, lol.

The images used in this tutorial are all copyrighted by STPCarly and this site. They may not be used without prior permission.

This tutorial cannot be posted on another website, group, forum , cd or newsletter without prior permissin from me. You are more than welcome to save this tutorial for your own use offline or print it out and to link to it.