Question on masks

[PegasusDiana]

I would like to make a mask for a few things

One is a bigger preggo belly that can be put on or taken off.
The other is belly piercings for our mid drift shirts.
A belt like the belly dancer chains that go right against the skin
temp tatoos for like the belly or lower back

Could I take a full body mesh and cut off the top area and bottom area to make an alpha mask that goes below the clothing layer?

[BeosBoxBoy]

I am not sure I understand your question.  I think you mean an alpha group in a body mesh or maybe an accessory mesh? No?

[PegasusDiana]

Yes I want to make an editable body alpha but not full body just the mid from say the neck to genital area only. Or do you think an accessory would be better? The problem is "I think" is it would need to go below the clothing layer does that make sense? I'm not too worried about the belly piercings since you would wear those with a mid drift shirt or the belly dancer chain. But the pregnant belly mask would have to go below the clothing and the removable tatoo's also. I think the bigger belly could be done with maternity clothing if push comes to shove. But do you think it's possible to get a layer between the skin and clothing for the tatoos? I'd need it for front and back because I'd like to make some smaller tatoo's like flowers butterflies for the belly area, but some mid sized ones like fairies, tribal art for the lower back. If you don't think it can be accomplished Please let me know I think I've tore up about 20 Maxi's body meshes now trying to do it. Good thing I can just keep exporting them to work on.

[BeosBoxBoy]

well - the problem you face is the limit that all accessory makers to date have faced, there simply is no way to link the accessories to the skin tone except as a part of the nude meshes.  And I have not seen a nude mesh with an alpha layer yet.

The same holds true for linking it to clothing layers - it would have to become part of the clothing mesh.

The ideal would be if the pregnancy morphs were all controlled by a single file (which they aren't) then you could simply alter that file.  Alas, EA/Maxis chose to not use a magnet based system for the morphs, thus resulting in the large body of work by Marvine, Warlokk, and others. =/

[BlooM]

Blast, they got it working for tattoo's!!
go here:
http://www.modthesims2.com/member/showthread.php?t=239851

[PegasusDiana]

Blast, they got it working for tattoo's!!
go here:
http://www.modthesims2.com/member/showthread.php?t=239851

Dang them, got some rotten tomato's I can throw. rofl. You know Dew was talking about doing a full body overlay and said I'd be welcome to use her's once she has it finished, but I couldn't figure out what she meant by overlay. Oo they included a tutorial! I am so there, ok I'll throw flower petals. I am trying very hard to learn all this meshing stuff, I think I should stick to one thing till I learn it well instead of going from hair to objects to clothing and then back to the second set of tutorials. Last night I went back to Beos's separate an outfit there are a couple male outfits I'd like to do and a couple female ones, but I did something wrong big time. So going to try again tonight. I was trying to separate the teen female's looks like a suit jacket and jeans and add some fringes to the shirt part so I could make a jacket I wore in high school all the time, I called it my Davy Crockett jacket, it was fake buckskin. Plus, I wanted bring the tops of the jeans down some and increase the bottom of the leg part so I could make some elephant leg pants the way we used to in the 70's by cutting down the outside of our jeans and adding different patterns. Thank you for the link, I really appreciate it.