Texture Scaling in Gimp

[Derek Torvalar]

I am trying to import a jacket texture created in Gimp for a mesh Jackt. When I export it and the bring it into SL and apply the texture to the jacket it shows up completely diffuse. Of course when I scale it in the Edit box the shadows are all askew. But I have determined that scaling to 6 restores the crispness of the weave of the fabric. 

Can I adjust the resolution via scaling in Gimp to account for this? By increasing resolution of the texture (prior to layering and shadow maps application) by 6 fold do the trick or is there a different formula involved in doing this? The original texture is 1024x1024. If I do what I am thinking in Gimp the texture meory goes from 3 MB up to about 9 I believe. Is that too high?

Any help appreciated. 

Thank you.

[markkemp]

Ideally you should try to use as small a textures as you can without losing too much detail. 

If an object is small you can get away with using lower resolution textures such as 512px or 256px.

There is no limit of how many MB you use for your creations on textures. It's just a matter of ethics, because it may lag out peoples viewers if you use too many textures unecessarily. And some tech-savvy customers will not be happy with you either.