Understanding Minimum Coverage Guidelines (MCG)

Categorizing Content

It is very important to properly rate products that are either submitted, distributed, or sold via the IMVU Catalog.  

IMVU is a huge diverse community made up of different backgrounds, nationalities, races, and ages (13 and up). Therefore, to meet everyone’s needs, a comprehensive product rating system has been implemented to categorize products according to IMVU’s audience.

Content can be categorized in three categories:

Minimum Coverage Guidelines

The Minimum Coverage Guidelines (MCG) are rules that describe what areas of the avatar’s body must be covered for a product to be rated General Audience (GA). It covers clothing products and all depictions of avatars or humans, including product icons and any images on a Product Page.

The MCG

Sensitive areas of the body must be covered. The UVs may NOT be manipulated, to change the size or location of the red areas GA products must contain built-in underwear: Areas that have to be covered on female avatars: Nipple Area Genitals Buttocks Areas that have to be covered on male avatars: Genitals Buttocks

•  Minimum Coverage Skins

To accurately test the coverage of a clothing product, IMVU created the Minimum Coverage Skins. These are skin tones that show areas on the body marked in red and white.

Minimum Coverage for the Female Avatar

 

Minimum Coverage for the Male Avatar

For a product to be rated GA, these red areas must be completely covered by clothing that is 100% opaque (ie. not sheer or transparent).

The white areas on the Minimum Coverage Skins do not need to be covered, they are there to demonstrate that to adhere to the MCG, clothing products must be ‘held up’ in some way.

On all products, there should be a layer that is skin tight or skin composite which is the layer closest to the avatar’s skin. It is on this layer that the MCG must be met. 

It is important to know that if the MCG Area is covered by an additional layer on your product, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you properly covered it. You can have as many layers as you like covering this area but the requirement is that the skin composite layer completely covers it. See example below.

If your product does not comply with the MCG, it must be rated AP.

•  Download the Minimum Coverage Skins

You can obtain the Minimum Coverage Skins for free.

JPG and PSD templates have been made available for Creators to download so you can easily verify that your products comply with the MCG.

 Female MC Skin                                      Male MC Skin

Making sure products comply with the MCG

• Using the MC Skins through your Inventory

The Minimum Coverage Skins can be equipped through your Inventory like any other skin tone.

• Using the “MCG Skin” and “MCG Pose” properties in Studio

In IMVU Studio, you can select the MCG Skin as a layer on your avatar as well as a special MCG Pose to let you see those hard to reach areas that an avatar does not normally show off.

MCG Skin Property

By clicking on the Visual Aids Tool  and selecting the MCG Skin option, the MC Skin is applied on your avatar.

MCG Pose Property

When clicking on the Visual Aids Tool  and enabling the toggle switch MCG Pose, your avatar is placed in a pose that makes it easy to check the clothing’s coverage. Use the Camera Controls in IMVU Studio to have a better view of the product.

• How to ensure that MCG are met

It is important to test different scenarios as you are designing your product. It can be easiest to ensure that the MCG are met by hiding materials on your clothing with a black Opacity Map until you reveal your lowest skin composite layer.

Once you have placed your underwear and covered the MCG, simply unhide the materials again by removing the previous Opacity Map to continue working on your design.

Important things to keep in mind about the MCG

MCG Specifics

It is very important that the MCG area is 100% completely covered. That is to say, there should be no visibility of the MCG area outside of the edges of clothing and no transparency revealing the MCG. In the example below, only the leftmost top complies with the MCG; the center and right do not. The skin composite (or skin tight) layer below any clothing layers must also be completely covered. In the following example, the top appears to cover all the red areas of the MCG Skin.However, if we zoom in, we can see that beneath the “fabric” of the top there is nothing on the skin composite layer. The red areas are entirely visible.In the example below, a Skin Composite layer has been included to create “underwear” with a solid grey MCG color that covers the red areas. This top is now compliant with the MCG and can be rated GA. The MCG color must be a solid color. As in the example above a grey color has been used on a Skin Composite material layer to cover the red MCG area. This color must be a solid color. The MCG Area cannot be covered in fake flesh or skin tone that would give the impression of nudity. This violates the ethics of the rule and would get your product reclassified as AP. Commonly used and acceptable colors are Black, White, and Grey. Other colors are also acceptable as long as they stand out from the avatar’s skin tone. Keep in mind that skin products come in a variety colors. This is why Black, White, and Grey are generally considered safe colors to use. It is very important that every pixel of the red portion of the guidelines is 100% completely covered. That is to say, no pixels leaking off the edges, no transparency. Otherwise, those products must be rated AP. It is a good practice to use a solid white color as your MCG color to test that the opacity map you have created for your Skin Composite material completely covers the red mcg areas. In this example you can see inadequately covered MCG pixels. If your product does not meet the required guidelines, even if the MCG is covered, the product could be reclassified. If your product is re-rated to AP, it will cost you as your product is automatically refunded to all users that purchased it and are now unable to use it with the exception of AP users. Additionally, it is possible that your account could be suspended due to the severity of the violation or the debt your account is placed in as a result of the refunds. Beside the MCG, be aware of other guidelines that must be met to ensure your product meets GA Guidelines. Please make sure you understand the Virtual Goods Policy, which covers these guidelines in detail, before setting the rating category of your product.