This was my submission for the July 2015 Monthly Around the World theme at MTS: a custom made Pagoda in the Shadows lot which is intended to be for use in a custom eastern vacation neighbourhood. It’s meant to be a prettier alternative to the standard EAxis Pagoda in the Shadows. In addition to the regular installation of this lot, there are a couple of steps to make to turn it into a proper vacation secret destination - please see the instructions given below.
The legendary Pagoda in the Shadows is said to be found far from the town of Takemizu on the edge of the mountains and forests, but is hidden in the mists. If your sims can find it, they will come into a small clearing amongst the lush vegetation where there is a tea house is set beside a beautiful pond. Your sims can perform a tea ceremony there and perhaps a mysterious Wise Old Man will join them as they sip their fragrant jasmine tea. Who knows, maybe he will reveal the secret of the Dragon Legend.
The lot is mostly CC free except for the lovely Japanese fences, columns and bench by TheJim07 (links below) and thanks must go to him for his liberal sharing policy and, not least, his lovely stuff!
Installation and Warning
The lot is currently just a regular community lot and can be installed in the usual way. I left it like this because I thought downloaders might like to edit the lot before it takes its final form in your game. There are a couple of extra steps to make this into a secret vacation lot which you need to follow (given below). Also a warning – please take heed. The lot was made in an otherwise empty AGS slot and is clean and healthy. You will require both BV (obviously) and OFB for the lot to appear as intended. OFB because the custom CC by TheJim07 was cloned from OFB originals so won’t appear unless you have OFB.
WARNING
This is intended to become a custom secret vacation lot – the Pagoda in the Shadows for the Eastern BV holiday destination. However, downloaders should remember that there can be only ONE secret vacation lot in each vacation destination. Thus, there is No Point trying to install this lot as a secret destination lot in the default Maxis Takemizu eastern vacation destination as Maxis destinations come preloaded with the original versions of the lots. So:
THIS LOT CAN ONLY BE USED IN A CUSTOM VACATION DESTINATION
Luckily, the game will not allow you to install it if you already have a Pagoda in the Shadows in your Eastern vacation location since you cannot have two lots with the same name. Thus, when you try to place the lot, the game will suggest a modified name to you (e.g. Pagoda in the Shadows 001).
INSTALLATION
To install this lot, follow these steps:
1. Install the lot normally:
Go to your custom Eastern Vacation neighbourhood (it doesn’t have to be called Takemizu village by the way) and find a place where you want to put the lot. Choose carefully and make sure you will remember where it is because the lot will become invisible at the end of the installation process. The lot looks better, btw, if surrounded by trees so you might want to place some neighbourhood trees (the ones that don’t disappear when you play) around the lot which will help you mark the spot where the lot is located. Most of the pictures here are without surrounding trees so you can see clearly what the lot is like.
2. At the moment, it is just a regular community lot (and you can use it like that if you want). If you want to change anything about the lot, this is the moment to do it. Go in, fiddle about as normal, save and then exit the lot. You might want to pack it at this stage so you have a copy for later. You might also want to delete the copy left behind in the lot bin from the installation because of what happens next. Skip this step if you don’t want to change anything
3. Go back into the lot once you are happy, get the cheat box up (press Ctrl-Shift-C together). In the box, type:
changelotzoning secretvacationlot
just like that.
DO NOT SAVE AT THIS POINT - the save option should be greyed out now but even if it isn’t DON’T press it.
4. Exit the lot and return to neighbourhood view
5. Pick up the lot and put it into the lot bin using the lot-binning tool
6. Replace the lot in the spot you have chosen once again – it should disappear once you have placed it (if it doesn’t, you missed something or spelt the cheat wrong). Or if you can’t see what the issue might be you can try the alternative SimPE method (given below)
7. The lot is now ready to use. Once your sims have found the map, they should be able to visit the lot as normal. You should find the Wise Old Man hovering on lot when you arrive (he’s usually over by the tea table). Do the usual things: get a sim to make tea, talk to him, do tai chi with him, fish etc. etc. If he seems a bit reluctant to come out into the open to fish or do tai chi, move your sim over to the open space, click on him and call him over. The one tile bridge can restrict movement a bit (it looks better aesthetically which is why it’s narrow). Once you build up enough relationship points with him, he will tell your sims the Dragon Legend (see pics)
Alternative SimPE method
1. Once the lot is in place in your neighbourhood, exit the game and load up SimPE
2. Load your neighbourhood and sub-hood – that is (see picture), choose your neighbourhood in the neighbourhood browser but use the drop down box on the dialogue box to get the right sub-hood. I called my test custom BV location for this example New Eastern Place but you can call it whatever you want
3. Once the hood has loaded, go to
- Lot Description (top left hand box – see picture 1*)
- Find your lot and click on it (top right hand box – 2*). You should get the lot details in the bottom box as shown
4. Find the Lot Type drop down menu – choose VacationHidden – 3*. This makes the lot into a vacation secret lot
5. Find the U01 number and add 0x00000010 to it – 4*. In that case the number would become 0x00002041 (instead of 0x00002031). This hides the lot from view. Commit and save.
I was making - a few months back now - a pet bed for the Pets Theme at MTS and, well, life got in the way. I'm still not finished but I wanted my pet theme sticker so I thought I'd post these which are some recolours for the Comfy Pillow Pet Bed that came with Pets. My new pet bed is slaved to the Comfy Pet Pillow and I was going to release them together. But nevermind - look out for that coming.
There are two sets of recolours
a plain set - blue-green, light green, pale blue, pink, yellow, orange, dark gray, plum cord, red (dark pink really). I wanted some alternatives to the bright (and sometimes garish) original colours
a set in plaid patterns - blue-green, bright red, burberry (hur!), green, orange, pink, red, yellow - because ... plaid. y'know
They have a dirty state and everything.
The plaid set has some free patterns taken from Naldz Graphics
I was in the MTS TS2 forums a while back swapping ideas about favourite picture sources when Amura mentioned Luiza Vizoli. Lovely art. I wanted to make something for the seasons theme and I whipped up a long narrow picture mesh to take four lovely paintings by Luiza Vizola called Seasons which can be seen here.
These are gorgeous paintings and Vizoli seems to be fond of making triptychs, quadritychs and more - so the picture shows how the paintings are ideally displayed - going winter, spring, summer and fall - though each one is lovely on its own.
They can be found under Decorative>Paintings and cost $900
This was my contribution to the Maternity and Beyond theme at MTS. It's a set of 10 recolours of the painting Albert's Discordia which came with Apartment Life. It is found in Decorative>Wall Hangings and is priced at $1400.
The images are from a website called Petit Collage which is a company which makes delightful wooden toys and decorations for babies, toddlers and children. These images were from their 0-2 years range of wooden pictures for nursery walls - though the company no longer sells them. The images are so cute though.
The pictures are in two groups. The first has a theme of transport with trains, planes and boats etc.
The second has the theme of natural world (though how natural a mermaid is is debatable).
Both sets of files are clearly labelled so you can delete any you don't want.
So this is part three of a set of things for my Arcady Ice Cream Parlour. I made these so that there are some useful recolours of objects which might fit a shop selling my ice creams. There are four sets of recolours here. Please read down the page for information about required meshes and items included. The other parts of the set can be found here:
Awnings
I have created a set of four awning recolours matching the wallpapers for my Arcady Ice Cream Parlour. These are recolours of Windkeeper's Awning Superset which can be found here. You must have the original meshes from Windkeeper to use these recolours. It's TSR unfortunately.
Pictures
I have created a set of four recolours of Shoukeir's Painting 36 which can be found here. I have included the base mesh with the recolours here so you don't need to go to Shoukeir's archive to get it but the set of recolours for that painting are very nice and you might like to have them.
Shop Signs
There are two recolours of the plain OFB shop signs to match the paintings and bucket design of my ice creams (the wording colour is picked up).
Bistro Table and Chairs
To be honest, I am not sure about these recolurs. I, personally, don't think the design gells well with the rest of the set but I finally decided to include them in this upload because, in a technical sense, the recolours came out well. It was a new technique/process to me for recolouring and I like the design - I just don't think they quite fit. But you might like them anyway. Maybe I'll make myself some nice plain recolours instead.
Collection File
Finally, I added a collection file which includes the object recolours and the walls and floors (if you have them) so you can find them more easily.
Additional Credits:
Windkeeper and Shoukeir for the meshes of course. Most of the images and textures were created by me but I got the textures for the tables and chairs off the net and then messed around with them in Paintshop Pro.
I wanted to contribute something to the Performing Arts theme at MTS, so I went back to some lovely images I had collected a while back and made them into some recolours for the in-game Nightlife Pineapple Posters (I've made quite a few of these now!).
Please note - recolours of the Pineapple poster need the CEP and you will need to have Nightlife - the Pineapple poster came with that EP and was not originally recolourable.
The Pineapple poster costs $850 and is found in Decorative>Wall Hangings
There are six posters: two for dance; two for music and two for theatre.
Dance
Music
Theatre
The images used are from the following brilliant creators:
Ballerinas - are from one of my favourite commercial graphic artists Eleanor Grosch. I don't quite know why I love her work so much but it really speaks to me. I think these two ballerinas are very pretty,
Piano and Violin - are from The 1Gallery. I love that random, rainbow colours silhouette effect.
Theatre Masks - the regular theatre mask image is also from 1Gallery (as above) and that looser intriguing, emotional and stylish interpretation of the comedy-tragedy theatre masks is from Marion Bolognesi.
All worth your time to go and have a look at their sites - some lovely images there. I recommend strongly.
Posted by: maxon - 10-09-19, 12:14 AM - Forum: Buy Mode Objects
- No Replies
These were originally posted at MTS.
I hadn't planned on making any more poster recolours for the Pineapple mesh(es) - well at least just yet. But then I read about these lovely poster designs and saw the pictures and, well, I got waylaid on the way to doing something else.
They are from the travel firm Expedia who commissioned the art works from Matt Lindley, a London-based marketeer. This is from a short article about that project which can be seen here
Quote:When travelling in New Zealand, Matt Lindley started thinking about the flightless moa bird, which was endemic there until it became extinct around 1300AD. This gave him the idea for the series Unknown Tourism (link to the expedia site given above), which commemorates lost wildlife with vintage-style posters inspired by 30s to 50s air travel ads. The project, commissioned by the travel site Expedia UK and illustrated by Jon Barmby, includes the dodo as well as bringing to light the unfamiliar galliwasp. “Hopefully these posters are a fun, visual way to convey that information to a lot of people,” says Lindley. “We felt many of these animals weren’t getting the attention they deserved, so this was a way of paying tribute to them.”
There are six lovely graphics about extinct animals in six countries: Alaska; Jamaica; Mauritius; Costa Rica; New Zealand and Tasmania (well, strictly a mix of countries and states). I set the graphics on the Pineapple poster mesh from Nightlife and Simlished them. So you will need Nightlife and the CEP in order to see them.
L-R: Mauritius; Jamaica; Cost Rica
L-R: Tasmania; Alaska; New Zealand
So there we are - a bonus set of poster recolours from me but no more planned for now (until I see the next lovely set of vintage style posters no doubt - there seems to be something of a fashion for them at the moment!).
I've made lots of posters with vintage style images and in my internet travels found these pussy cats running around unattached to our sims. I thought I'd better fix that.
As before, I used the Nightlife Pineapple poster to make recolours. There are twelve in total. However, it's not quite that straightforward. Five of the images are quite long and narrow and I thought they'd look better on a narrower mesh. As I wanted them to make a set, I made a new mesh based on the Pineapple poster but slimmer and more elegant. Hence there are three files attached to this post - I separated things out so you could choose what versions you'd prefer to download. Please note - recolours of the Pineapple poster need the CEP and NL.
Pineapple recolours - these are the seven more regularly shaped images on the Pineapple mesh (so appear as recolours). They are the pictures by El Gato Gomez, Grosch, Munn and Mibus
Narrow Pineapple Mesh - new mesh - with recolours - five images in total by Moldonado and Beary
Pineapple recolours of the narrower images (five), on the standard mesh not on the narrow mesh (Moldonado and Beary)
So, you can download the straight Pineapple recolours and have a very nice set of seven cat images with which to decorate your sims homes. You can add a further five cat images to that by either downloading my new narrower Pineapple mesh or, if you prefer not to add yet another new mesh to your game (and I understand that, believe me), you can have the alternative version of those slimmer pictures on the standard Pineapple mesh. I hope that's clear. It's envisaged that you'd have either the narrow mesh and its recolours or the alternative setting on the standard mesh.
The new narrow mesh
Please see the swatch pictures to match names to images - the files are named accordingly. The new mesh was cloned from the Pineapple poster and I didn't change the catalogue settings - so it is the same price and in Wall Hangings.
Gomez1; Gomez3; Gomez 2
Grosch; Beary2; Beary1
Moldonado3; Moldonado2; Moldonado1
Munn; Mibus1; Mibus2
Images credits:
The images are not original vintage cat images but modern interpretations of that style. I have used some advertising images from several artists who produce this type of material (and I think you would agree they are very lovely). The artists are as follows and I have provided links so you can go and have a look at their online pages/sites for yourself:
These are in a more traditional (Turkish or Oriental) style than my previous recolours for this mesh. The images came from around the web but, as before, I also got a lot of good quality images from the John Lewis website. See this thread for copies of the mesh files.
So why a more traditional style? Well, there are plenty of rug recolours around in this style but I wanted to get some not just on Nengi's rug meshes but on Huge Lunatic's larger room-sized versions of the mesh which are slaved to Nengi's mesh. You can find Huge Lunatic's larger meshes here. Because, after all, if you are building stately homes, you need big Oriental-style room-sized carpets. Well you do, don't you?
There are 24 recolours in total (I couldn't choose and whittle them down further). I thought this was perhaps a bit much for most people so I have divided the files into four collections of six rugs apiece (see pictures). That way, you can choose the collection you like best and download that.
Collection 1
Collection 2
Collection 3
Collection 4
Here is a comparison picture with Nengi's rugs at the top and the two larger HL versions at the bottom. All rugs are slaved to the 3x4 rug at top-right.
Here are some more recolours for Nengi65’s great rug mesh (lots and lots: 18 recolours in all)! This is my third set of rug recolours using textures taken from the John Lewis site (though I’ve had to do some work with them to make them work with the mesh properly). Why so many collections based on the rugs there? Every time I go back to the site, I find another rug I really like. Sometimes I think I’d like to carpet my entire house with John Lewis rugs (expensive!!!) – they make some gorgeous rugs. But being able to carpet a sims house with these rugs is the next best thing and I so hope you like them too.
Additionally, if you download these additional slave meshes from Huge Lunatic you can also have these lovely rugs in full room sizes too. See this thread for copies of the mesh files.
I have stuck the files in one (large) zip. I have named them all carefully and also the pictures on this page. If there are any rugs you don’t want, you should be able to delete the relevant files easily.
