i use regular old Staples brand dvd+r sl disks (havent burned brawl though, just a TP copy)

It's perfectly fine to do a texture someone else did. I'm not saying make another freakin Shadow, but by all means try to make what you feel is best. The only time you need to get permission is if you are editing the edited pac from another person. I did that with my PN strap loader with Fit Artifex. There was no trace of FA on it when i was done, but i couldnt access an iso or have someone give me a file, so i used theirs just to have something to edit. Even the other day, n64billy asked me if he could redo my dimentio (and i said yes). You can give credit when you use elements of another edited pac, like injured2day's nude peach FS used parts of Jose Gallardo's pipes on the top and bottom

I say heck yes, make someone else's texture.

it takes several hours for me... toon link dimentio took me over 2 weeks to make between editing all the tga's, having Power Marshall test it, send me pictures, and then i make revisions based on that. plus the two sided face took forever because i had to do that for every one of his 400 mouth textures (more like 6).

but other than that, a good 2 hours for characters and 3 or more for stages

half hour for songs!