Since I learn from watching and doing better than from reading, I decided to show how I did it with pictures and put it here on the group blog just in case anybody else doesn't know how to achieve this effect or is having a bit of trouble with it.
I've made the pictures as large as it will let me (I'm still trying to learn to use blogger properly), but you can click on any pic to see it full size if you need better detail.
It's long, but that's because I'm horribly verbose, and I like screenshots. ;)
Actually, I just like LOTS of DETAIL in a tutorial. I don't see much point in a tutorial that leaves the reader to figure out half of it for themselves.
First of all, I select which bed I want to use. I like this one because the bed frame has a smaller profile, meaning I'm not going to have such hard work later when I need to hide it from view. Burying the bed in the ground is the easy part, but if the bed frame shows, then it won't look like a sleeping bag.
This next step is the key to the sleeping bag trick. In build mode, press CTRL SHIFT C to bring up the cheat console. Type in the following cheat exactly as written:
ConstrainFloorElevation False
Now, open the cheat console again and type the following cheat exactly as written:
MoveObjects on
(Okay, I know I said exactly, but I type these all the time without capitalizing, and it works fine. It's the exact spelling and spacing that's vital.)
ConstrainFloorElevation, among its other uses, allows you to raise and lower objects by raising and lowering the terrain upon which they are placed. Afterward, when you lower/raise the terrain back to where it belongs, the object stays where you put it.
MoveObjects allows you to move almost anything almost anywhere, and ignore the placement grid the game wants you to use.
Now I lower the ground a little bit with the terrain tool so I can put the bed in the hole. I like to use the middle square shape for this, with the slider all the way to the left so it makes a nice clean hole. That's personal preference, but I find it makes a nice big hole with steep sides and that makes it easy for me to place the bed where I want it.
You might need a little bit of trial and error to get the bed at the exact height you want it relative to the ground. I find two clicks to be about right. I have a TERRIBLE time getting the game to recognize a single discreet mouse click when using the terrain tool. For some people it works fine. If you're like me, it might take a few tries to get just what you want.
Here's my bed in the hole.
Now I'm going to drag the flatten tool over all the terrain I've messed with, which puts the ground back to normal.
You may have read some tutorials that say not to use the flatten tool. For some projects, you won't want to use the flatten tool because it messes up other elements of your construction. But for making a sleeping bag, it works fine.
This is just what I wanted. The bed is now swallowed by the ground up to the bottom of the mattress. Essentially, I've cut off the legs and the bottom of the bed frame. If at this point, the bed looks a little too high or too low, I just repeat the above steps.
One word of warning at this point. After you've placed an object below ground or up in the air by using these cheats, if you click on it with the hand tool again, it's going to pop right out of the ground again and you'll throw the computer out of the window in frustration. Once you've got something placed where you want it, be very careful with the hand tool from then on.
Now is a good time to pause and go into live mode to make sure the bed is fully functional.
Notice how she sinks into the ground when she gets in and out of bed? I can't find a way around that. Sorry.
Now the fun part begins!
I have to hide the bed frame so it looks like a sleeping bag and not a deformed bed, and add other decorations. This time I've decided to make it look as if my sims are camping out in the wilderness, or maybe in a cave. The rock hides the frame at one end of the bed.
Place the object you're going to use to hide the bed frame as close to the bed as you can get it. Then, grab it with the hand tool. While you've got it grabbed, hold down ALT and move it around freely until it covers the bed frame. That's MoveObjects in action.
You can move the bed partially inside a wall, too. Build the wall first, then dig the hole. It will deform the wall, but when you fix the ground the wall will go back to normal.
The boom box is almost exactly the right size to hide the rest of the frame - but not quite. See how the bed frame sticks up too high?
If I raise the terrain a little bit, I can stack items on top of the boombox. I experiment with raising the ground one vs. two clicks, but it was either too high or too low, so I raised it to just barely too high and used the Soften Terrain tool to lower it back down in the tiniest increments until I could just barely see the top of the boombox.
I've put some CDs, a camping lantern, and a bottle of ... liquid sustenance ... on top of the boom box and used the flatten tool to level the ground. Now it looks more like I'm camping, and you can't see any of the bed frame from any angle.
That's it. You now have a functional and decorated sleeping bag.
Ahh ... I nearly forgot. It's probably a good idea, when you're all finished, to open the cheat console again and type ConstrainFloorElevation true, thus deactivating the cheat you activated earlier. Now if you go into build mode on this lot again, you won't accidentally click on the wrong thing and mess up your hard work.
If you have a teen sim, you can even make her sit cross-legged on the sleeping bag. Just make her do her homework on the ground, then enter buy or build mode and use 'MoveObjects on' to move her onto the bed. Use our friend the terrain tool to raise the ground under her ass just a smidge so she's sitting on top of the bed and not floating inside it.
Thanks for reading. :)
