Hello! I was looking to use these defaults by maxboy here (http://modthesims.info/download.php?t=530552) but there is a shine on the hairs. It bugs me because it does not look maxis match at all IMO. Is the shine removable? Are the hairs really retextures or are they just recolours? If the shine isn't removable, are there other creators who have retextured or even recoloured (just so it matches) maxis hairs? I would be forever grateful if anyone would help. Thanks! <3 <3 <3

I'm not the best judge, but it looks like a retexture to me. And the shine is part of the texture, so what you want is a completely different default.

Fortunately, there's a database for that: https://sims2defaults.dreamwidth.org/

You have to start out searching an individual hair, but there's a couple of large Default All the Hairs projects that will show up in almost every search, so it's time to go exploring.

Simgaroop is the one 'Maxis-Match' texture that's shiny. Some people like it that way! If you don't like shininess, avoid MM recolors/retextures that are labeled Simgaroop (although sometimes people only use the Simgaroop colours, not the textures, to make things even more confusing).
But on the topic of retextured Maxis hair, the only other ones I can come up with are the more 'realistic' textures (like AlmightyHat's).

If you're relatively good at image-editing, then it might be possible to remove the shine, but it'll require time and not a little work. You'd have to extract/export the texture images from the existing defaults in Bodyshop or CAS, dump them into Photoshop (or a similar image editor) and edit them to remove the shine, save your edited version, then replace the original shiny textures in Bodyshop/CAS. OR, it might be easier to get your hands on a copy of the original textures the creator used -- extracted basegame textures, it looks like? -- and then edit THAT in an image editor to remove any shine, and then use that edited texture to make new retextures of the existing defaults. Either way, it'd be quite a lot of work. You can't just press a button and make the shine go away, unfortunately.

IF you could get your hands on the creator's working files -- assuming that they used layered working files AND assuming that the shine was painted on separately on layers on top of the texture instead of being part of the texture, which isn't usually the case -- then it would be relatively easy, though time-consuming, to "fix" all the textures in all the defaults. But if all you have to work with is unlayered BMPs or PNGs...Yeah, quite the project. In the end, it'd probably be easier to start from scratch, if you have any image-editing ability or are willing to learn that skill. Make your own non-shiny Maxis-y textures, and then retexture all the Maxis hairs for yourself, then make defaults. That's exactly what I'm doing. Well, not with Maxis styles because I don't like them at all and most of them are mapped weirdly and are a PITA to work with, but I made my own Maxis-like texture and I'm retexturing existing defaults and as well as making some new ones of my own. I've been working on the project steadily for about four months, and I'm only about 3/4 done.

Huh. Weirdly enough, I do use custom simgaroop hairs, actually, and the shine on THOSE isn't as shiny as these defaults. I'd still probably try and use them. Anyways, does anyone here know any creators that have defaulted all/most of the maxis hairs? My OCD-like tendencies have to make E V E R Y T H I N G match (simmer mood, honestly xD) Thank you so much for your help!

http://gardenofshadows.org.uk/garde...33072#msg633072
https://aquilegia.dreamwidth.org/20320.html

Huh, weird, I might be thinking about one or two creators who do that then, but it's definitely shinier than most other MM textures. Personally I avoid them.
Keoni has defaulted a bunch and alienpod too, but I'm not sure in which textures exactly, you can find both on tumblr.

Thing is, I read the download's description again, more closely this time, especially the credits...and it appears that those defaults aren't using Simgaroop's TEXTURE at all, only their COLORS. Those are different, separate things. (And, indeed, Simgaroop's colors are very Maxis-match, as are their textures; the Maxis texture is actually more realistic than not. So-called "Maxis-match" hairs are cartoony and simplified, which is really not like the Maxis hair texture at all.) Rather, the defaults are using Aquilegia's textures...which IIRC were actually attempting to be Pookleted default versions of the Maxis hairs. It just doesn't look very "Pooklet-y" because, as I said, the Maxis hairs have very complex mapping; it's not just the usual thing of plunking down straight sections of a pre-existing texture and then running a color action, which takes a minute or three to do if you know what you're doing. Retexturing a Maxis hair is hard work, with more advanced photo-editing techniques -- and some handpainting, too -- needed to make it look good. In the end, Aquilegia's texture on those defaults is more of a blend of Maxis and Pooklet textures, not purely either.

In any case, this is probably where the "extra" shine is coming from. It's because those aren't Simgaroop textures at all. I'm guessing the "Simgaroop'ed" default set creator simply ran Simgaroop's color actions over the existing textures from Aquilegia's defaults, which have the signature shine of Pooklet's textures, rather than actually retexturing the defaults. So, they're not really "Simgaroop'ed" so much as "recolored using Simgaroop's colors." There's a difference. And I certainly don't blame the creator! Retexturing Maxis hairs is a total PITA. I tried to do it a couple times and quickly gave it up as not worth the effort. I'm guessing that's why not a lot of retextures of Maxis hairs exist. It's MUCH easier to deal with custom hairs because they don't have the crazypants mapping that Maxis hairs have, so the far more common approach is to replace Maxis hair meshes with custom ones and then retexture those custom hairs in whatever texture/colors one likes.

If so, then, are there creators that have defaulted all/most of the default hairs? Not just a bunch. My OCD tendencies wants to make EVERYTHING match. LOL! PREFERABLY, I would like hairs that also look similar to the default ones. Although, I'd take whatever I can.

There are very few people -- perhaps even no one -- who've done a full set of defaults for both sexes. Well, maybe Antka did, but she did Pooklet textures, so you wouldn't want hers. There ARE a few creators who've at least done large chunks of the hairs for one or both sexes but who never finished or haven't yet finished everything. Working with defaults is a lot of time-consuming, repetitive work, even if you're just retexturing existing ones, so it's likely that most people just burn out along the way. But, if you go to the Default Database that Peni linked you to above and click on either the male or female hairs and then click through the styles, you'll quickly see who those people are who've made big chunks. Some of those people -- like Peppermint & Ginger, who's working with Zeusar's texture but with their own color set -- are still working on their sets and will presumably finish eventually. Others are no longer creating at the moment so, unless they come back at some point, their sets will likely never be finished. But, even if a single person hasn't done a whole set, you can likely go through the available defaults on that database and cobble together a whole set of defaults with "Maxis-match" textures/colors from several different creators, though the textures/colors might not match exactly. None of the folks who are working/have worked on complete sets are using Simgaroop textures/colors, though. The "Maxis-match" textures seem mostly be Remi's or Poppet's. DeeDee has made a TON of Simgaroop'ed custom hairs that could be used to make defaults, though, if you can run SimPE and want to learn how to do it. (It's not hard to do, but it is quite tedious.)

And I'll also self-promote and say that I'm also working on a full set of hair defaults. Mostly, I'm retexturing ones that already exist and that are on the Database, but I'll also be making some new ones. However, I made them for my own use because I dislike things about both "Maxis-match" (in the simplified and cartoony sense of the word) and "realistic" (in the "Pooklet" sense) textures, and I finally got frustrated enough to do something about it. So, I painted my own texture that actually IS pretty close to Maxis's texture, in the sense that it's detailed, with layered stranding and color variation, high- and low-lights built into the texture. So, it's realistic-like-Maxis's-texture, but it isn't shiny. (Well, OK, it does have realistic, diffuse shine, like Simgaroop textures have, but I paint that separately. It's not part of the texture itself.) So, it doesn't really fit with either main "aesthetic" at all, but a few people said they were interested in having them when I posted WIP pics, so I shared all the male hairs I did in one big dump the other day. It would probably be too "realistic" for your preferences, if you like the simplified/cartoony "Maxis-match" look, but it's here, if you want to take a look: http://dramallamadingdang.tumblr.com/post/178469302504 I'm still working on the female hairs, got about 100 of them to go, but I hope to finish them in a few months, and when I do, I'll share them in a big dump, too. So, then there'll be a full set...but it's pretty "niche" since it's neither "Maxis-match" nor "realistic," so it likely has very limited appeal.

And, as I said, I would never want to retexture Maxis styles because they're a lot of work and, frankly, they don't look that great for all the time you put into them because the meshes are very low-poly and very weirdly-mapped, and textures frankly don't look good on them, especially with today's graphics. And, hell, even Maxis itself didn't always use the same texture on their hairs. I'm amazed that there is even ONE set of retextured Maxis hairs, to be honest. Aquilegia must be a masochist.