Porting Meshes from Skyrim to Oblivion using Blender

[kosukosu1]

So I think I figured out how to convert Skyrim clothes to Oblivion. I wanted to do this because I want to stay on Oblivion as long as possible - I just don't like the visual style of Skyrim. If a clothing mod I want comes out for Skyrim only, I want to be prepared

The biggest challenge was adjusting for the pose differences between Oblivion and Skyrim.  Oblivion meshes have their arms up like in a T-position, while Skyrim has its arms pointing downwards.

 

I can post more detailed instructions and I'll try to update this to provide the needed details.

You'll need:

A complete Oblivion skeleton:
I used the one in Data/meshes/Characters/_male/skeleton.nif - I think something like this would work:
http://oblivion.nexusmods.com/mods/27945

The body of your choice - I used DMRA GUTS:
http://oblivion.nexusmods.com/mods/42840

gerra6's Pose Converter
This is optional but makes things a LOT easier. I recommend you install it:
http://www.loverslab.com/topic/13140-pose-converter-073-2082013/

The Skyrim mesh you want to convert to Oblivion. I used Siggy from Queen's Blade:
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/14546


0. Prepare the Skyrim mesh for import into blender 2.49b

 

• Open the Skyrim NIF in NIFSkope
• Delete ALL nodes, except for the NiTriShape and NiTriShapeData nodes.
• Go to View -> Block List -> Show Blocks in List
• In the NiHeader node, change "User Version" to 11 (from 12)
• Change "User Version 2" to 34 (from 83)
• Save the NIF - now it's ready for import into blender

1. Create a version of the Oblivion body of your choice in the arms-down Skyrim pose, using gerra6's Pose Converter to convert the skeleton to the Skyrim Pose.

•  
• Open blender 2.49b, import your chosen Oblivion body. I imported the upper and lower bodies.
• Delete the skeleton (right click skeleton, hit X)
• Hit 'A'to select all your meshes (should just be the body parts you imported)
• Import the complete Oblivion skeleton from above
• In the import options, Choose "Import Skeleton Only + Parent Selected"
• Your Oblivion body should now be rigged to your complete skeleton:
• Now let's use gerra6's awesome Pose Converter script - select the skeleton and go to Object -> Scripts -> Convert Pose
• Note that the chosen object is called "Scene Root.01" - you'll select that on the next part
• Choose the Convert Pose to Skyrim button and hit Done
• Now your body is converted to the Skyrim pose, but you need to apply the pose. To do this, select the upper body mesh and hit the Make Real button
• Then hit the Apply button for "Scene Root.01" - that's the skeleton
• Now your body should be permanently in that position - hit Tab to go to Edit Mode to make sure your mesh is in the Skyrim pose
• Go into Pose Mode and choose Pose -> Apply Pose as Rest Pose - this permanently changes the skeleton
• Export the NIF to get a body you can use for future conversions of Skyrim meshes

2. Import Skyrim mesh and copy the bone weights from the Oblivion body

• Import the Skyrim mesh that you prepared in step 0 (File -> Import -> .nif)
• Select the mesh of the Skyrim armor/clothing (right-click) and also select (using shift-right click) the corresponding body mesh of the oblivion body (ex: for a shirt select the upper body)
• With the 2 meshes selected, go to Object -> Scripts -> Bone Weight Copy
• Choose a quality of 3, and press the Update button and start the copy
• Repeat for every piece of the skyrim mesh

3. Attach the Skyrim mesh to the Oblivion skeleton modified in the Skyrim pose

• For each skyrim mesh: right-click to select the skyrim mesh, shift-right click the skeleton
• Hit Control-'P', Choose Armature, and then choose "Name Groups"
• Do this for all mesh pieces

4. Use Pose Mode and rotate bones to match the Oblivion pose

• Split the window into 2 so you have a 3D view and an Outliner view:
  • Middle-click between the top and bottom windows and you should see a menu and choose "Split Area"
  • Click the drop down icon on the lower left of the window and choose Outliner
• In the Outliner, under "Scene Root.01" (or Scene Root), there should be "Pose" - expand that and you should see a tree of bones.
• Select "Bip01 Thigh.L" - it should be Bip01 -> Scale Shoe -> scale NonAccum -> scale Pelvis -> Bip01 Pelvis -> scale L Thigh
• Hit 'R' to rotate, and then 'Y' for the y axis
• Move the mouse to rotate the left thigh to align with the oblivion body's leg
• Do the same for Bip01 Thigh.R
• If you've bone weighted correctly, you should see your skyrim mesh move with the legs
• Go back into Object Mode, and then select each skyrim mesh and press the "Make Real" button under the Modifiers section in the lower Buttons window - doing this locks your mesh in the posed position - do this for all your skyrim meshes

5. Attach the Skyrim mesh to the normal Oblivion skeleton (in Oblivion pose)

• Delete the skeleton you used to pose your meshes - this is no longer needed
  • If the meshes go back to their original position, you didn't hit the "Make Real" button for that mesh - make sure you do that
• Select all objects in Object mode, (the 'A' key) and import the complete oblivion skeleton:
  • File -> Import -> .nif -> choose skeleton.nif
  • Press the "Parent selected armatures" button
  • Import
• Your oblivion skeleton should be attached to your meshes now. You can use Pose mode and move the bones to see if it worked

6. Create texture maps for the Skyrim mesh

• Make sure you are in object mode
• For each skyrim mesh:
  • Under Link and Materials, hit the Delete button where it says "1 Mat 1" or that kind of text - keep pressing Delete until there is no more material
  • Press the "New" button to create a new material
  • At the top of the Buttons window, you should see "Panels" and a set of icons - Choose the circle looking one (mouse over should say "Shading F5"
  • Under "Texture", press the "Add New" button
  • Go to the "Map Input" tab and choose the "UV" button, and enter "UVTex" in the text box
  • Hit F6 to go to the "Texture Buttons" panel, and Choose "Image" for Texture Type
  • Press the "Load" button and choose the texture file in your oblivion Data\Textures directory for this skyrim mesh (you might want to just copy the skyrim textures for your meshes to the oblivion Data\Textures beforehand)

7. Export the NIF and it's ready for Oblivion!

 

 

[Happysparkles]

Hey there KosuKosu,

 

Good work I will have to look into following this, when I make sometime.

I see your making strong strives in your quest to convert stuff.

Good work .

 

BTW for your siggy link I forgot to tel you.

It goes to your log in.

 

Maybe you should use this

http://oblivionfantasy.tumblr.com/

 

So then it can lead people to your blog instead of a log in screen.

 

I hope this helps

 

-Happysparkles

[kosukosu1]

Hey thanks happysparkles!

 

And thanks for letting me know of my sig link - didn't know that - ill fix

[Alakbar]

Good info there Kosu, I was able to import a skyrim body model into blender without deleting any of the NiNodes (first pass was an error because Pyffi.toaster choked on BSLightingShaderProperty - reloaded in nifscope, deleted it, imported - had a medium wait time when compaired to oblivion models).  Weights were present (just different names) so attaching gerra6's mk2 skeleton should be fun - hehe yea I do everything manually to learn more.  I'd love to get skyrim models into Oblivion   

[kosukosu1]

Hey Alakbar, if you can get the existing weights from Skyrim over to Oblivion, let us know - they seem slightly different and i just assumed it would be easier to copy existing bone weights from an existing oblivion model

[Mailamea]

Kudos kudos

[Ark of Truth]

Loads of KUDOS!!

[Happysparkles]

Me being s bum I forgot to click Like not sure how I did that thank you KosuKosu as well for providing support to my inquiry the other day.

I still did not play with it as I've been making boobs in Skyrim but I'll send you the links to my Shop soon which includes a couple of sets you've inquired about as a Thank you .

 

-Happysparkles

 

*Edit* Just finished not being lazy and yes it worked like a Charm .

I did not actually convert anything but it is good to play around with it.

Ty KosuKosu

[Ark of Truth]

I was fine with this until I got to step 2....After that the lack of not knowing what I was meant to be doing caused me to stop making process.

 

I would appreciate if someone could go into more detail with the rest of them steps.

[Alakbar]

Yea what Kosu means is in blender loading up the skyrim mesh and then using an oblivion mesh to copy over its weight values into the skyrim mesh.  When you're in blender and in object select mode, select the mesh's and in the menu Object/Scripts/Bone Weight Copy, and a menu comes up.  I havent tried the no x crossing parameter.  Experiment with it and see the results by going into the skyrim mesh object in Weight Paint mode and take a look at the new weights.

[lovender]

So I think I figured out how to convert Skyrim clothes to Oblivion. I wanted to do this because I want to stay on Oblivion as long as possible - I just don't like the visual style of Skyrim. If a clothing mod I want comes out for Skyrim only, I want to be prepared

 

Hello, kosukosu1...

 

I had a plan to convert Lord Haun's magicka saber http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/3174 from Skyrim to Oblivion.

Any idea / tutorial that can easily help me to do that? 'Cos I'm a BIG fan of lightsaber & already had a lightsaber mods for Oblivion:

http://oblivion.nexusmods.com/mods/34766

http://oblivion.nexusmods.com/mods/35329

 

& yes I also had a plan to convert Cleric Armors http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/26904 to Oblivion if possible.

 

Let's see if I can follow your explanations above to do the project.

 

Thanks.

 

[Silvist]

Very nice guide~  To bad I don't use blender.  Though it came in handy for doing a quick rig of the oblivion skeleton and body of choice in the skyrim position.  To bad nobody will make that script for 3ds max

 

Due to that I was able to port crosscrusades nightingale partially to hgec (top only so far):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Was terribly easy compared to converting to skyrim.  No weight sliders, no insane crashing while testing.  What blows me away is those are 4096x4096 textures I used from Zerofrost Satyr (hate the guy personally, but he does excellent work lol), from nightingale prime.

[lovender]

Any response for my problem I mentioned above?

I want to port weapon from skyrim to oblivion...

[kosukosu1]

Any response for my problem I mentioned above?

I want to port weapon from skyrim to oblivion...

 

I've never converted a weapon before but I think the process is the same, except for maybe not doing the bone weight copying?

 

I know I need to flesh out steps 2 and beyond - i'll try to get to that sometime

[Nighty]

Hello. I'm very sorry for uh... bringing this thread back to life but finding any other tutorials that covers armor importing to Oblivion is pretty much impossible, so, I thought it's okay since my comment isn't "lol thx" kind of comment. Though, I appreciate time and effort put into this tutorial.

 

I have several questions and I hope that someone could help me out. I'm a noob when it comes to working with Blender so my questions might seem stupid to some but please, bear with me.

 

1. When importing body meshes to Blender does "Import Skeleton Only + Parent Selected" has to be selected as well or is it only for the skeleton?

2. I can't find "Make Real" button anywhere and I'm using 2.49 version of Blender. If it's not there, what kind of button I suppose to click?

 

Thank you.

[kingkong]

the 'import skeleton only'  is only for skeleton   it is the last part you need to do when you need to rig the body to a skeleton bones  and after export the mesh to a file.nif

 

the 'make real'  for the skeleton pose is  in 'object' 3rd position near the 'select'    

for the mesh 'make real' is found   in the bottom window 'panel'  in 'edit mod' ( f9    key)    under the 'modifiers' selection just after "add modifier "  and before "Armature"

[Nighty]

the 'import skeleton only'  is only for skeleton   it is the last part you need to do when you need to rig the body to a skeleton bones  and after export the mesh to a file.nif

 

the 'make real'  for the skeleton pose is  in 'object' 3rd position near the 'select'    

for the mesh 'make real' is found   in the bottom window 'panel'  in 'edit mod' ( f9    key)    under the 'modifiers' selection just after "add modifier "  and before "Armature"

 

Thank you very much for the help!

[norinvaux]

I'm sorry if I'm necroposting a little, but I can't seem to get passed step 1. Right at the end of step 1, after following everything to the T, everything breaks the second I hit "Apply Pose as Rest Pose". Everything seems to go fine until then (I redid the whole process over and over again), but when I hit "Apply Pose as Rest Pose", the oblivion body mesh goes back to default, separating from the skeleton. I thought this might be intentional, but I came to believe it's not when noticing that if I did ANYTHING from that point on, the body mesh would get all distorted, and the entire upper skeleton would suddenly scrunch up behind the body, facing backwards (almost looking like it's holding its hands behind its back).

What could I be doing wrong?

 

Here's what I get when I try to do anything after step 1. Or even when I just load the saved file from step 1.

 

EDIT: I fooled around a bit more, and got it working. Don't ask me how.

However, I'm now stuck a bit later on, where I attach the skyrim mesh to the modified skeleton (part 3).

I'm assuming this is still in pose mode, as in object mode, if I hit "P", it starts the damn game engine thing.

Anyway, in pose mode for the skeleton, I unselect everything, select the main chest piece of the skyrim armor mesh, then select the skeleton. I hit "P", but all this seems to do is add a little pointer showing directions into the middle of the mesh. Where can I find these mysterious "Armature" and "Name Groups" to "choose"? The only mentions of "armature" I can see are in the editing panel, and not only are they not buttons I can "choose", but there's no mention of "name groups" ANYWHERE that I can see.

[kosukosu1]

Oops when I said 'P' I actually meant Control-P (Parent to object). Sorry! I'll fix the instructions.

[Mailamea]

Very very helpful kosu.

[Ark of Truth]

Very very helpful kosu.

 

Deja Vu!

 

http://www.loverslab.com/topic/16198-porting-meshes-from-skyrim-to-oblivion-using-blender/?do=findComment&comment=382442

[tse7en5]

I hate to necro this post, but it is the only bit of information I can seem to find on converting Skyrim meshes to Oblivion.

 

I am getting hung up on step 2, where I import the Skyrim mesh. When I import it, it takes the Skeleton and jacks it up... is this normal? Step 3 suggests it is not and that the Skeleton should still be in the Skyrim Pose.

 

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[gerra6]

Unmodified Skyrim skeletons don't import cleanly into Blender.

 

One of my current projects is a stand-alone verison of my Bone Weight Copy tool.  I'm building out the skyrim mesh support now, but the goal is to allow you to fully rig an unrigged Skyrim mesh by using a fully rigged mesh as a template. 

 

Since I was testing stand-alone seam mender here, I decided to test the Bone Weight Copy script over at Nexus.  

 

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/49368/?

 

It's not there yet, but it's getting close.

[tse7en5]

Unmodified Skyrim skeletons don't import cleanly into Blender.

 

One of my current projects is a stand-alone verison of my Bone Weight Copy tool.  I'm building out the skyrim mesh support now, but the goal is to allow you to fully rig an unrigged Skyrim mesh by using a fully rigged mesh as a template. 

 

Since I was testing stand-alone seam mender here, I decided to test the Bone Weight Copy script over at Nexus.  

 

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/49368/?

 

It's not there yet, but it's getting close.

 

The bastardized skeleton in that pic I posted is an Oblivion Skeleton in the Skyrim pose. It became contorted upon importing the Skyrim mesh.

 

Also, if I go into Edit Mode, the skeleton will look like it should...

 

[gerra6]

That's weird...I have no idea why an Oblivion skeleton would get jacked like that...one question...how did you do the import?

 

Did you select the skeleton and import mesh only and parent to selected?  If so, try importing the skyrim mesh without initially parenting it to the Oblivion skeleton.  Once it is imported, if everything looks fine, delete the skyrim skeleton (or import it without a skeleton), delete the skyrim boneweights, copy the Oblivion boneweights to the skyrim mesh, and then import/parent an oblivion skeleton.

 

Another alternative is to just use an Oblivion mesh with a skyrim pose as a template, and use my stand-alone boneweight copy tool to replace the skyrim scene root with an Oblivion scene root.

 

Note: scene root replacement is not available on the public version of my boneweight copy tool, but I can send you a dev version that contains that experimental feature...if you promise to tell me if it works.