Trying to make open bottom dresses

[Guest]

Always trying something new... LOOK WHAT I CAN DO!!!

Got back from church and decided to see how to put the multiplier on a mesh while in Blender. Found a good video. )

[Nonsequitur]

well, share the link.

[Guest]

14 hours ago, Non-sequitur said:

well, share the link.

Yea, probably should have done that without needing to be asked! ?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZSD7pVIUkY

 

Not sure it will help, but I've just tried overlaying my multiplier on the mesh and then adjusting multiplier alignment between top and bottom skirt sections. What's been killing me is that I'll take a mesh out of the package, merge all vertices, clear unwanted sharps (don't understand where they come from), delete the inner skirt faces (they were causing shadows, despite being edge split and sharp) and apply sharp to the hem... use that as a reference mesh, and add custom split normals.... THEN, I import a fresh mesh, fix sharps and use data transfer for the normals from the reference mesh to the one I'm going to put back in the package.

 

That mesh exports absolutely, perfectly smooth... but still has a visible seam where the top and bottom meet. I thought the multiplier was aligned, but when I did this, I saw it was off just a tiny bit. Fingers crossed, but we're heading out in a few and I won't see the results until I restart the game.

[Guest]

Its enough to make me want to scream! Starting to understand why no one makes open bottom dresses, and the few I've seen have belts at the waist to hide the seam! This is the exact same mesh as the pics above it that show absolutely no seam at all.

Well, I'm walking to the corner store to by a bottle of vodka!

[JoshQ]

Would you be so kind to send me the mesh? I want to see that seam from close.

 

Also, BalancerLite is free, on the same .zip it includes the shareware version and the ‘lite’ version which is free but only accepts meshes below 10,000 polygons.

[Guest]

Ok. Some background on how I made the mesh... Its an EA bra top, above knee skirt and bottom briefs. The skirt is shortened by removing vertices and legs (of course). Then, waist vertices merged. UV is resized on x to better align with the top, then UV vertices are merged to align the UV. On this mesh, the split between top and skirt UV is two rows below the natural waist seam because with the low cut back multiplier, skin texture would be lost on the lower back. The skirt parts are full size and rotated 90 degrees, so vertex spacing should be aligned. I aligned the multiplier with the UV, and then realigned it using the texture overlay in Blender.

 

To try to fix normals, I take that mesh, clear all sharps (Blender still adds some, I think on import sometimes).

I edge split and shrink the inner skirt because it will make shadows at the hem, even after marking sharp. Then merge vertices on 0.000, which gives me a perfectly smooth reference mesh, I mark the hem sharp. Then use object data> geometry data> add custom split normals, and hide that mesh. Then, I import a fresh mesh, clear sharps, and remark the hem as sharp.

 

Add modifier> data transfer> face corner data> custom normals (nearest corner and best matching face normal) with the seamless geom as reference... apply. This is what it looks like on export...

I'm also sending the multiplier. I aligned it to the UV, so it shouldn't be creating any shadow seams. I did find that was a problem on past work. Thanks Josh!

mu raw.dds1022.simgeom

[Guest]

Oh... and another tool I'm learning to use, the texture overlay. I saw you used it on some examples but never got around to asking you how you do it. Then, I got curious and started googling stuff. Again, it only adds to my frustration since everything looks great to me...

[Guest]

OY! And one more thing... This mesh is from the "finished" package, so there is no TSRW changing things. I made the package in TSRW, did bones and morphs, and exported the finished package. In game, I saw the seam and pulled the mesh to import to Blender and put back the mesh after thinking it was fixed, since all morphs are already attached to it.

[Guest]

You know that even though you always help me, I continue to look for answers... So, I remeshed my mesh into a two piece mesh, I hoped that the tool kit seam fixer, might fix a waist seam, even if I moved the back UV and mesh vertices. I'm testing now...

This is the piece of the back (looked like crap with the crunched mesh UV and has no shading if attached to the skirt bottom) that I modified and attached to the bottom.

I added a couple of vertices to get a smoother curve, moved the UV, and moved both to match the multiplier.

 

With the new waist seam at the EA basic position, I think Meshing tool kit did the job of matching the waist seam.

 

And as I always leave my messages, its being tested in game now.

[JoshQ]

Importing the .geom into milkshape doesn’t show the seam, even after making a very quick and dirty compile TSRW didn’t show anything, CAS barely shows it on the back:

 

 

But once on the game it appeared fully:

 

My first guess is that this might be fixed by merging the vertices in that area, then mark a UV seam to separate the skirt from the rest of the dress. Going to try it tomorrow.

 

[Guest]

Won't merging vertices create the spider web on the UV? I thought "mark seam" automatically split vertices???

 

So far, the new remesh seems to look okay in game, but I'd love to find the answer to fixing the first mesh. You can see my frustration. It looks good in Blender or MS, looks good in TSRW, and has a seam in game... although the seam wasn't that bad when I was testing the mesh.

 

Here's the new mesh and multiplier for you to look at and compare. Its 2 piece instead of one but still uses af chemise for bones and morphs. With the waist seam moved back to the EA seam position, I think tool kit may have gotten it.

S3_015A1849_00000000_0C8B482F27972124%%+GEOM.zip

[Guest]

Lousy weather here. Looks like I'll be inside today. I downloaded Balance Lite and started playing with it a little. I see it works with .objs. I was able to convert the mesh to .obj with Blender (I have to try it with tool kit) and used Balance Lite to reduce to 80%. I converted back to geom, but Blender gave an error for bone weights. I was able to use tool kit and the original mesh as reference to replace all the bones and open it in Blender. )))

 

What level of reduction do you use??? I did 80% for LOD 2. I haven't done a LOD 3 yet. I'll play with it to see what looks okay, then put them into a package and open it in TSRW to do bones and morphs.

 

Non-Sequitur, have you played with using the image overlay yet? I really like it. It takes a lot of the guess work out of aligning the UV and multiplier! If you start using Blender 2.8 and have problems with bone weights when you decimate a mesh, like me, check Josh's link to Balance Lite.

 

 

[JoshQ]

21 hours ago, LadySmoks said:

Won't merging vertices create the spider web on the UV? I thought "mark seam" automatically split vertices???

No, the ‘mark seam’ command is specific to the UV map; you can have a “solid mesh” but the texture can be divided in several sections.

 

18 hours ago, LadySmoks said:

What level of reduction do you use??? I did 80% for LOD 2. I haven't done a LOD 3 yet. I'll play with it to see what looks okay, then put them into a package and open it in TSRW to do bones and morphs.

 

Around 60-55% because going lower tends to mix both interior and exterior faces and then you have to fix it manually; you can diminish this by going to ‘Tools/Join Vertices’ on the Menu before decimating. For locking vertices just press this button:

 

And then select the vertices using ‘left-click’ once finished press the button again.

 

 

Ok, I did merge the vertices as I said, it didn’t worked. Then I made my own interior, didn’t worked. Then I decided to start from scratch and make my own edit following your texture, and the seam appeared in the same spot, I also tested a version without any interior with the same result…

 

All this attempts were made on Blender (plus Meshtoolkit to convert WSOs to OBJs and back, and of course create morphs and assign bones), everything was compiled in TSRW.

 

Opening all these meshes in Milkshape doesn’t shows a seam, the same happens with Metasequoia, S3PE’s mesh previewer or even Window’s very own 3D Viewer, so it seems we’re doing something the game doesn’t like…

 

This is the first time I see something like this but that’s because I normally move all the textures away from the body, but this doesn’t apply for this project so I’ll do some more investigation on the weekend.

 

[Guest]

Hey Josh, my husband always says, if you run into a wall, sneak around it or blow it up! Not sure which it is that I started trying, but I've been trying a 2 piece mesh for LOD 1 and the 1 piece meshes for LODs 2 and 3, using the EA cocktail dress as the base package. The 2 pc is split at the EA waist seam, instead of lower on the skirt area, so tool kit might fix the seam being in that position. Still working on it.

 

So often, it looks like its a matter of doing things in a particular order, and they work out, ONLY when done in the correct order.

 

I've been reducing at 80% for LOD2 and 60% for LOD3. I saw the problem with the inner mesh, and my fix was to simply delete it since the lower LODs really won't be seen in close up, and it helps reduce poly count. I'll have to go back and play with "join vertices". I did notice a split seam on LOD2 in game.

 

One thing I've been trying is to take the mesh from the semi-finished package, import it to 2.8 and do normals data transfer, and put it back. It seems to work sometimes.

 

Well, I'm still learning tools that I've been using for a long time. In TSRW, in the mesh section> materials, I found you only need to replace the diffuse map, normal map, and specular one time. Then, they are all accessible from edit> then the browse folder. So, every mesh half and every LOD can just copy the same img. It would be easier if the option "copy to all" came up like it does in the texture screen. Anyway, I now know how to do that after all this time!

 

Thanks for looking at that mesh! Have you looked at the second one? The second one is what I'm trying now. 

 

 

[Nonsequitur]

I'm still working on PG world - made a Loader Screen and a CAS room for it - and a few outfits. Working on setting up characters in the game (jobs, uniforms job level, etc.).

No I haven't touched Blender 2.80 except to check it out and try a few things. I haven't been able to find the time to re-read and practice anything you and Josh have been discussing since the Open-Bottom Dress thread started. I'm way behind you!

 

I figure I have about another week or two to polish up Version 1.5 of PG world. Then it's time for a break, read the thread and go through the agony of relearning Blender. About 1/3 of what you two discuss here lately is over my head.   

 

I will agree that the root problem to the seams is procedural.  One vectored calculation can skew the coordinates buy a piccil  then the next vectored calculation is based on last position and it skews it further.  Seems logical.  In deep space, a tiny miscalculation in vector angle or distance, when combined with numerous course corrections base on the original mistake can be lightyears off at the end.  Specific order of operation. Finding the procedural order and recording it is the problem- I think. Have you had one complete success? If so - it can be done - there are just too many steps to track without going old-school on it.

 

[Guest]

Hey! Did I send you the link to the billiard set? I put it on the second floor of the Irish Pub. I have it in a few places in different worlds, and it seems to work perfectly.

 

I have a lot of frustrating problems with 2.8. I wanted to fix the collar on the long coat. The best look would be to use solidify, but I always get some error message. This time, about tangents. I try running it through tool kit tangent fix, but 2.8 still won't let me do solidify and export the mesh. So many neat features, but half don't work for me.

 

I've had meshes that look great, then I catch an angle and see the seam. I looked at some open bottom dresses that others made, and it appears to be something they just covered up. Some are full dress UV moved and reduced. Some have belts and one, has extra texture lines to simulate folds in the cloth that hide the seam.

 

Even Josh said my mesh looks good in MS and TSRW, but loses something in game. Going for a walk!

[JoshQ]

This time I went back to use Milkshape to convert your meshes to .wso and the seam went exactly were you divided the dress. I’m going to insist the problem is not the mesh itself but how the game process it.

[Guest]

Thank you for taking the time to look at this for me. The game does process things in ways that rarely make sense. Its strange that tool kit seam fixer does not fix this. That is why I moved the seam back to the same set of vertices as EA waist seams. I mean, a totally nude sim body does not show a seam, and it is two separate meshes. When I transfer wso bones for the top and bottom, I use either a one piece mesh, which has no seam and should transfer data seamlessly, or I use a two piece mesh that I frank-mesh together... even though those will have more than 60 bones, my top and bottom only take the bones they need, so a combined mesh with 64 bones does not make a bottom take all the bones, but only the 13 to 18 that, that part will need. Also, the franken-mesh will have a smooth waist because there is no seam in the reference mesh. I have opened my meshes and looked at bone weights, and they are smooth at Spine 0. 

 

I figured that with vertices aligned and bone weights being transferred from the same mesh, it should work. Well, I guess I have a few choices..... 1) give up... NO! ))))) 2) belts and corsets? maybe??? 3) keep working on it and looking for some program that might fix the seam, or at least trick the game into not seeing it.

 

 

[JoshQ]

Well, you could make a ‘3d belt’ to hide the seam or just hop to another kind or garment, outfts are just one of many opportunities to learn.

[Guest]

I've played around with belts, and of course, corsets as a way to hide the seam. I went "shopping" earlier on TSR and found an outfit I was going to open, but found it was already open bottom! Funny, because you made me a critic. The hem has a gap, maybe 2 clicks in on x and y for the inner skirt. ) I guess that creator had the same problem I had with shadows and not knowing how to use sharps and other things you taught me. ))) The multiplier for that dress also used a belt to divide the seam! Again, I'm not alone.

 

But the reason I want to make outfits (dresses) is that no one really does them... probably because of the seam problem? Anyway, I haven't surrendered yet. I returned to the one piece mesh, since it was really close. I do the data transfer of the normals from a mesh that I merged all the vertices on. After going through making a package and making 3 separate LOD wsos. I saved the wsos and can just plug them into a new package any time.

 

I remove the inner skirt for making LODs 2 and 3 (you can't see its gone on lower detail) so it won't bleed through when I reduce it in Balance Lite. I did 70% for LOD 2 and 50% for LOD 3 using the vertex tool and pin you told me about, and they came out okay. Now that I found you can go into browse and reuse the same diffuse map, etc for all the LODs and not increase package size, I've been doing that too. I think I end up with only 5 or 6 imgs and a smaller package.

 

A final step that seems to get the seam as good as it will get, is to take the mesh out of the package and do data transfer one more time for the normals and put it back in. Basically, back to where I was a week or so ago with LOD 1, but with better L2 and 3, and fewer imgs. I really think the cocktail dress might be okay. And it wouldn't look right with a belt and the low back line.

[Guest]

Well, we're all back in the USSA as my husband says, a couple days. Hope you had a Happy Halloween! 

 

You know, I had forgotten about a corset project I put on hold a while ago. When I opened the mesh again, I quickly remembered why... After making the mesh top, I ran into another of Blender 2.8's error messages, this time about tangents, and it won't export the mesh. I did export it as .obj, and tried using Meshing tool kit to convert it back to a geom and then using tangent fixes, but when I re-import that mesh to Blender, the corset is blended back as part of the torso. It seems to be another problem with 2.8 and solidify, since the corset itself is an af bra mesh with faces deleted and added, then solidified, and joined back to an af bra mesh. 

 

On paper, it looks great, if I do say so myself... but just another thing I can't get to work right! OY!!!

 

 

This is getting on my nerves!

 

So, after trying to get that mesh to work... I tried converting to .obj and back to mesh and all kinds of stuff... AND... I blew it up! I deleted the file and then emptied the recycle bin! There is just something screwy going on when I try to use solidify. Started from scratch with a new mesh. This time, I just made the corset an extra row on top and bottom, and folded over those rows to get 3D... then attached it to a bra top mesh. Looks the same, but no error messages about tangents!

 

 

 

I'm still working on not using a corset or belt on every mesh. The cocktail dress is back in game testing after playing with it again. But, I'm working on a belt now too! (Just in case)

[JoshQ]

Looks like one I did recently:

 

Are you using TSRW? If you do then you don’t have to use .geoms, just convert a .wso to .obj and back. You don’t have to worry about tangents and other things .geoms require.

[Guest]

Hey Josh! Yup, mine looks very similar to the one you made. Your influence on me is beginning to show! One of my biggest problems is a total lack of organization and bouncing around projects. Yes, I use TSRW. I actually did save that first mesh as .obj, converted it to a geom and tried fixing the tangents in tool kit, but it didn't work. I also put it in a package, repacked it in TSRW and took that mesh out and opened it in 2.8 with the same error. Honestly, I don't understand what the tangents are, only that 2.8 gave me an error because of them.

 

So, the second photo is of a totally new mesh that I didn't use solidify to get it 3D. As I wrote, I just made it from the bra mesh waist area and left it one row extra on top and bottom, and folded them, and no problems. I think this one turned out better than the first anyway. ) Now I just need to figure out what to use it with.

 

And yup... I'm also working on a belt in between other things like repackaging some old stuff I did and applying things I've learned. I'm redoing an Altea dress with layered skirt that I did a while ago, but it has shadows at the hems. I opened the old mesh to fix it, but 2.8 made it wonky, so I opened the original Altea package and started a new bottom mesh. This time, nice clean sharps on the hems!

 

Like I said, this doesn't appear to be a new problem, or just me. The more I examine CC and meshes that others have made with open bottoms, I'm realizing they used belts a lot to hide the waist seams... usually, just drawn into the multiplier at the seam... At least one had extra folds, or wrinkles running horizontally at the waist to hide the seam.

[Guest]

I forgot to mention, I wrote in an earlier post (way back by now) that during a search for answers, I read where cmomoney says the newest TSRW doesn't work right with his tool kit. Something about the switch to TS4, they use different "somethings" to do "something" and refused to let him see the code so he could write his tool kit program to work with their changes.

 

I went back and downloaded an older version of TSRW, and uploaded it on one of the pages here. I told Non-Sequitur what I read, and he grabbed the older one... I'm having trouble uploading it again, but will try later if you want it.

[Guest]

TSRW_2_0_86.exe.zip