IS there one? Is there even any interest? If there isn't , too bad, cause I'm gonna start one...lol.

As you may or may not know, I've recently learned a few meager modeling skills with which I apply mostly to dynamic clothes as of late. Anyway, I'm no cloth dynamics guru by any stretch of the imagination - I'm definitely not dynamic cloth's answer to bagginsbill's shader genious...lol. What I would like though, are any thoughts, tips, suggestions - anything really on your experience with dynamic cloth. There's so little information on it, even still. I know there are quite a few of you out there who use it, some more of you who model it. I'd like to pick the brains of anyone who knows about it so that my models get better and better ;o). It will benefit the community as a whole as I normally give away the lion's share of what I make. I have no aspirations of becoming rich at making Poser content (even if I were the world's most capable modeler I don't think I could do that...lol).

Anyway, what do ya say? World's longest dynamic cloth thread? ;o).

I'll start...

I made this dress for Eepo. It has a row of buttons down the back. In this render, the buttons are in a soft decorated group, but obviously, I'd rather have them stay rigid. But when I put them in a rigid group, they do odd things. Sometimes, depending on the pose, the mesh even explodes at the buttons if I put them in a rigid group. So, what would you suggest? Leave them in a soft decorated group since they're small? The bodice they are sitting on is in a constrained group, btw. I made it so that there is dress underneath that bodice so that the bodice and buttons could be hidden for just a straight, smooth dress.

Thanks :o).

Laurie

Hi,
Good idea.
How about a wireframe showing the mesh setup you're using. Both for the cloth and for the buttons.
Plus how did you "attach" the buttons..? Seperate mesh or part of the whole object or parenetd perhaps.?

Keep up the good work, Laurie.

Actually, the buttons are welded to the bodice by one vertex at the back of the button ;o). The buttons don't have many verts...I tried to keep them as simple as possible because they didn't need to bend. I'll show a wireframe in a bit...

Laurie

Screenie from Wings...

Laurie

i would love to learn how to do dynamic clothing ...  ..... i'll keep an eye on this one!!!

Hello.

Though I've never created any meshes for Poser I have worked with dynamic cloth extensively in Poser.

One thing I've noticed when particular parts of a mesh start "exploding" or doing weird things, the problem is often in the vertices selection process. Even though you drag-click a box over  an area, sometimes not all points in that box get selected and you have to zoom way in (obviously you should be viewing things in wireframe mode) and  make sure all the points you want selected actually are.

Dunno if this will help but it was the first thing that came to mind =P

Actually, that can't happen with my meshes stimuli. I make groups based on my material zones, which I set up in Wings with an eye toward the groups in the cloth room ;o). If I chose a particular material zone, ALL the verts in that zone are selected. I don't have to use hand done selections. On purpose...lol.

Laurie

Me too!  Bookmark. 

Expanding on my previous post and group selections...

What I normally do when I make a clothing item is divide it up into either groups or material zones based on what I want to use in the cloth room as either constrainted, soft decorated, whatever. I think it makes things easier for the end-user. I think so anyway...does it? Does it make it easier for you if you can just, let's say, select a particular material zone as a group rather than having to chose your own verts in the mesh? I would think so, but what do the rest of you think?

Laurie

Something else that may be interesting (or not...lol)...

When I model a piece of clothing, I start with a cube or a cylinder. From there, I tend to push vertices around at first and when I have them in a basic setup, I start to add rows of edges, slide them to where I want them and then move those verts around, etc. Because I'm an old graphic artist (literally) I understand splines and nurbs more than pushing points in 3D space because of years and years of using programs like Adobe Illustrator ;o). However, I've found that plain old box modeling is not only quicker, but easier in the end.

Because I use Wings, I've set up ready-to-use files with just a figure in them, ready to be modeled over ;o). Makes things quicker since I've already got a file ready to go all nice and merged into one solid group with all the material zones I don't need to worry about deleted. I just do a Save As when I start a new piece of clothing with one of these files. I keep the figure locked so I don't erroneously select any vertices on it while I'm working on the clothing. I also save incrementally cause, well, I just never know when I'm going to do something seriously stupid and have to go back to an earlier iteration ;o). Happens often enough that I learned to do this pretty quick...lol. Programming from being a graphic artist maybe, but a good practice nonetheless...hehe.

I also tend to run lots of what I call "experiments" in Poser. If there's something that I want to try and not sure how it will work, I'll export it out and run a few sims. It helps me get a feeling of what I need to change, what works and what doesn't or if I need to fix/change a material zone for use as a dynamic group. Sometimes I don't know if something will work at all, so I test it just to see if it does. It's why I model hems into all my clothes now...they work and it makes the clothing look more realistic and I'm all for that ;o).

I hope this helps someone. Yeah, they are only ramblings, but it might give someone some ideas that they maybe didn't have before. I think dynamic clothes are great and there should be more of them. I figure, if people have someplace to go to get the info they need, they'll be more willing to try the cloth room. And maybe some modelers will be more willing to make dynamic clothes. So, I have ulterior motives...lolol.

Laurie

helps me cause i want to learn this, i've done a basic course in Maya and so i know a lil bit of modelling

 Thanks for this thread LaurieA!  It's much needed.  One thing I love about dynamic clothes is its cross figure ability, meaning you can use dynamic clothing that's designed for one figure on another figure.  For example, I've used your Summer Dress for Angela on V4 and it was only a matter of fitting V4 into the dress before calculating.  After calculations I spawn a morph target on the dress and save it in the library.

Thanks so much for starting this thread, Laurie. I've started using TY2 and there is really hardly anything available for her, so I was going to start making a few dynamic blouses and tops and skirt for her in Blender (it's what I know). I was wondering if we could start an accompanying thread called The Cloth Room For The Compleat Moron?

I thought it was needed. I've heard some people say that they don't understand whey their clothes always slide off, and even that they're flat-out afraid of the material room...lol. Since it's really so simple, I thought a thread might teach people how to set up groups, how to fit to another figure as you suggested, even make the clothes ;o). Edumacate folks you might say...lol. I'm not very good at writing tutorials, but I'm much better at giving what I know in small doses. I know I'm more confusing that way, but at least I get some kind of message across. Also, it might get some of the more knowledgeable folks in here who might give me a flash of brilliance so that I can make something better next time ;o). I don't know nearly as much as I probably should and any knowledge I do get I can put to good use. Right now I've seemed to make it my mission to see just how detailed I can get on a model before the whole thing gets too unwieldy. I've had some success in adding all kinds of parts and have them all behave the way I think they should. Still working on it, but the more I know, the more I can make it work...lol.

Mostly tho, I just don't want people to be afraid to use the cloth room. It's so very simple, really.

Laurie

Quote - Thanks so much for starting this thread, Laurie. I've started using TY2 and there is really hardly anything available for her, so I was going to start making a few dynamic blouses and tops and skirt for her in Blender (it's what I know). I was wondering if we could start an accompanying thread called The Cloth Room For The Compleat Moron?

Oh, that sounds like something I need...lol ;o). Maybe we should do it in increments - 1 a week...The Cloth Room for the Complete Moron: Episode 1, etc....lmao.

It doesn't matter what modeler you use to make the clothes in. Actually, I would think that box modeling would be the same pretty much from modeler to modeler so if it came up, it shouldn't be too hard to follow no matter what proggie you use. After all, it's all just pushing points...lol.

Laurie

joining in!

i haven't tried anything with hard decorated groups, but i'm definitely interested in your solution.  my guess is that the issue is that vertice in the back.  is it part of the cloth or part of the hard decoration?  i can say that reading the manual (which, for a change, was useful), i solved a problem with a hem i had made soft decorated to keep from stretching.  it went right through the floor and i couldn't figure out why.  it turns out that if a decorated group shares vertices with the dynamic group, it doesn't handle collisiions properly.

Quote -
If the decorations group shares vertices with the cloth mesh, the decorations
vertices will not be simulated. This causes the simulator to treat these areas as
boundaries, resulting in increased movement of these areas compared to
neighboring regions of the cloth.

Welding accessories to the cloth mesh often creates a complex mesh where one
edge is shared by more than two polygons.

i think despite what people think, you're not supposed to attach decorated groups.

oh, and here's another piece of information that makes me think you're supposed to just lay decorated parts on top:

Quote - These are usually items sitting on another cloth group and have only passive movement, either following underlying body movement or other parts of the cloth.

i haven't put it to test yet, though.  LaurieA, you've certainly worked more with ribbons than i have.

oh, and i don't do box modeling or NURBs and splines in general.  i mean, i think i need to learn more about NURBS because they make a nice regular surface, but i use a highly altered version of the tutorial by Adorana at RDNA.  i converted her methodology to Blender.  i'm also not nearly as wed to using the exact process a seamstress would, but i'm pretty conscious of how the clothes are actually built.  between thinking about  modeling and creating dynamic groups in terms of how clothes should actually work and using Blender's cloth dynamics to build the clothes, i get pretty good results.  i wish i understood more about how to control stretching in Blender's cloth, but all in all, i'm pretty pleased with the results.

Attached Link: pantsuit with belled sleeves (2Mb animation)

I don't have much experience with making clothes, but I've begun, at least.  I've used Phil Cooke's *Clothing Designer* plugin within Poser to get a basic shape, but then I use *Silo* to modify it.

Antebellum ball gown, with the doll kneeling on the floor:  (Goth isn't my thing, but someone requested this for use as an avatar)

Attached Link: Tink's school for fish (Flash animation)

And my favorite subject, TinkerBell. ^^

@kobaltkween...

I'll try bringing the dress into Poser without the buttons welded and see if that makes a difference ;o). I have had problems with hems falling thru themselves if I add them to a soft decorated group and there is a dynamic group underneath. I guess what's happening is that the dynamic group underneath is passing through the soft decorated group somehow causing ugly things to happen ;o). I still need to work more on this...lol. Maybe I'll try moving the hem away from the dress just a tiny, tiny bit in Wings and see if that works....maybe by .0001 or something really small and not noticeable.

Thanks for the input - I really appreciate it! :o).

Laurie

Laurie two things first that cute Morris avatar (remains me of my Jeffrey that passed away last year at the very young age of 23 plus - human years), love her/him.

Now back to ye olde thread:  Since I can't get my dumb brain around Wings, I use Carrara (the sister Hexagon is too complicated for me).  I'm going to be a LURKER and follow your thread closely-something will sink in.  Okay one question, can you go over again how you do grouping in Wings eg do you make separate boxes for arms, legs then weld them together??? I must be missing something simple errgh.  Jan  

Thanks Jan...first things first ;o). The Morris avatar is actually my own little kitty Stinky, who looks as though she's smiling while getting a bath from her big sister Tinks...lol. I love mine too :o). You'll have to forgive the names as my kids named them when they were still at home. Since they're 6 and 7 respectively, I'm not gonna change em now (the cats, not the kids...lol) ;o).

Now, ye olde thread you say? LOL...k....I don't model separate boxes. I model everything from the same box or cylinder. Therefore everything's already welded. The only things that aren't are things that I shell extrude or extract from that "box" or add on separately, such as buttons. If you do happen to have more than one box, you can bridge the faces between two objects and have them merge into one that way. Far as I know (I'm still learning modeling), those two faces must have the same number of verts (at least in Wings they do). For me, it's just easier to keep the thing whole while I'm doing it. Normally I'm working on one half of a mirrored object that I freeze later on when I think I'm done. Then I add the details like hems, buttons, ribbons, etc. What kobaltkween said gave me pause for thought, so I'm gonna go back a few dress iterations and restart on another dress; this one with the hems separate and not welded to the rest of the dress with the tiniest of gaps and see what happens. I do small experiments in Poser with dynamic cloth all the time just to see what happens...lol. A lot of the time I'm pleasantly suprised ;o).

As for grouping, I do that all with material zones. Sometimes I do actual grouping and leave groups in the finished prop, but it seems I have better luck if I make one solid group and just have material zones do all the grouping for constrained, soft decorated, et al. I set these zones up as I'm making the dress in Wings, selecting faces for each material zone and assigning them while I'm working.

If someone has a better way, please chime in...lol. I'm always looking for a better way ;o).

I hope I've explained myself in a way you can understand. I'm not always very glib...lol.

Laurie

Thanks Laurie, I've got to copy your last message to me Word Processor, blow it up and tackle each sentence one at a time.  -hate it getting old, never had a need for glasses twenty years ago, could read a newspaper across the room, now I need computer glasses and bifocals arrgh.  Jan

Hi Laurie, me again.  I transfered your instructions to my word processor and blew it up 200 percent so I can read it.  Got it I think!

Now I'm confronted with another problem that  Wings has a solution for,  you call it locking so its vertices don't interfere with the mesh you are modeling.  Since I'm attempting to do it in Carrara, I opened a thread in that forum to see if Carrara can do something similiar.

Why did I post this here?  Well there are a lot of Carrara users that also view Poser threads and vice versa besides me that may want to know or already know a solution.

Again Laurie, thanks for starting this thread.  Jan

Well, this thread won't be purely Poser due to the nature of what I'd started....not just the cloth room, but modeling the cloth too. Since it does relate to Poser in the end, I don't think the mods will have a problem with the mention of all the modelers any given person may be using to get the clothes ;o). After all, final compatibility with and usage in Poser is what we're after. Was a good idea to though to place a question in the forum of your modeler: there will be people there that can help you better and you may get a tip that you can place in here...lol.

I wish I could help you with your locking question in Carrara. I have 7 pro and I never took to it, like you didn't take to Wings...lol. Got it as a gift though so I'm not really out any big bucks thank goodness ;o).

Laurie

Quote - As for grouping, I do that all with material zones. Sometimes I do actual grouping and leave groups in the finished prop, but it seems I have better luck if I make one solid group and just have material zones do all the grouping for constrained, soft decorated, et al. I set these zones up as I'm making the dress in Wings, selecting faces for each material zone and assigning them while I'm working.

in my experience, it doesn't matter so much how you define the zones, as the fact that you have to be careful with actual group names.  for instance, it will mess things up if you want to change how a group is handled if you named it "constrained." 

that said, it's probably better in general to use real groups, not materials, because materials cover polygons, which isn't how grouping works.  grouping works on vertices.  using materials leaves questions, imho, about how borders will be handled when you set up your groups in the cloth room. which group do they belong to?  the one you define first, or the one you define second?  vertice groups are much clearer.

Shall I post my renders of things shredded and lying on the floor? Snicker

@kobaltkween:

I'd love for you to show me an example of your work so that you could show me what you mean...

:o)

Laurie

Quote - Shall I post my renders of things shredded and lying on the floor? Snicker

Yep, then we can figure out how to fix it ;o)...lol

Laurie

hmmmm.  let me see if i can start something from scratch.

so, let's say i want to make a T-shirt.  just something simple.

this is the low res preliminary cut outs of the two pieces of the shirt.  both pieces are already UV mapped.  they have two materials: fabric and hem.  they also have a vertex group: seams.  those are the selected vertices. right now, i'm going to use that group to virtually sew the pieces together.  later, i can use that group as a second, more stiff dynamic group to help keep the structure of the shirt.  i don't have to, but i can.  i could (and probably will) make a group for the hem, but what group will the vertices joining the two materials be in?  to tell you the truth, i'm not sure.  i've used materials to make groups before, but i've been too lax to pay attention to what happens to them.

i also have an extra edge loop at the shoulder that i'm hoping will help with posing later.

just as an FYI, the mannequin is a V4 posed by me to have as much straight lines as possible.  i had some problems with making pants using my methods and just an awful time trying to model shoes in general, so i thought this might be better.  i've saved the pose to the library, so i can include it with the clothing.

i've used a hook to as a parent for those seam vertices.  at frame 1 the hook is scaled 100%, and this is frame 30 where the hook is scaled to 0 on the Y axis (gotta love Blender interface choices; i swear just getting rid of right click select and the stupid axis choice would eliminate 90% of the interface issues).  i've also added collision to the mannequin, and made the shirt a cotton with no gravity and made the seams group pinned.  lastly, i've increased the polycount of the shirt, probably a little more than i should have at this stage.  ah well.

Hi poeples :)

Great to see some people getting into the dynamic cloth stuff.  I love it and have a mission to spread the word :)  In my opinion it is the easiest way to get people making their own clothes and using them, without all that fiddling around with bones and joints and stuff.

You may be interested to know that on my you tube page I have four videos on the cloth room.   I did them ages ago but I think they might help a bit.  Im afraid I cant post the link cos I am at work and cant get to you tube, but if you go there and look for Fugazi3D you'll find me.

There is also a merchant resource in the marketplace here that contains some cloth meshes and some cr2s for conforming.  The meshes could be used to make dynamic stuff easily, while you work on your modelling techniques (vendor OCKRMP they have dev packs for a few figures).

While I will go on ad infinitum about the joys of 3D Coat, it is the perfect tool for creating dynamic clothes.  I know not everyone can afford it but I thought I'd mention it anyway (there are some videos about using 3d coat for making cloth meshes on my you toob too).

I'm intending on doing a video tute for 3D Hobby Mag for the next issue, if you have any thoughts about an aspect of the cloth room you'd like explored please let me know and I will see if I can work it in.

I also have a freebie dynamic dress and some cloth room python scripts over at 3D Hobby which you might find useful.  The scripts set the cloth parameters to make the mesh behave like certain cloth types, it also has a blank one which you can use to make your own presets.  I think it's pretty useful, well I'd be lost without it.

Last of all and I can't remember if it's been mentioned, I use shrink wrapping alot in the cloth room.  So once I've made my mesh and got it into Poser, if it's a little rough I shrink wrap it onto the model in the cloth room, that can save alot of grief, especially with socks and stockings anf the like.

Also in the later versions of Poser I use the morph tool to fix minor poke through issues when they arise.  Together the shrink wrapping and morph tool can take some of the squarer edges off a mesh.

Oh Oh and not forget about the shrink wrap method of converting cloth from one figure to another :)

I'll shut up now

John.

Quote - While I will go on ad infinitum about the joys of 3D Coat, it is the perfect tool for creating dynamic clothes.  I know not everyone can afford it but I thought I'd mention it anyway (there are some videos about using 3d coat for making cloth meshes on my you toob too).

ok, now i'm curious.  why is 3d Coat the perfect tool for creating dynamic clothes?  edited to add: i'd always been interested in it as a substitute for getting ZBrush.

here's the two sides "sewn" together using a Blender cloth sim, edited more than i should have had to with regular vertice/edge/poly tools and sculpting (i made a stupid error). the seams group is now a single line.  no polygons, just vertices. 

Quote - > Quote - While I will go on ad infinitum about the joys of 3D Coat, it is the perfect tool for creating dynamic clothes.  I know not everyone can afford it but I thought I'd mention it anyway (there are some videos about using 3d coat for making cloth meshes on my you toob too).

ok, now i'm curious.  why is 3d Coat the perfect tool for creating dynamic clothes?  edited to add: i'd always been interested in it as a substitute for getting ZBrush.

Well it goes like this :) 

3D Coat can import V4 (or whoever) as a voxel mesh, you can then sculpt the voxel mesh like clay to get your garment shape.  You can also add primitives to V4 to do skirts and stuff or add bulky detail.  3D Coat has a full set of primitives including Free Forms which I use alot.

Once you have your garment shaped you can then add the poly mesh.  Every vertex or poly you add in sticks to the Voxel like glue.  I start off putting big polys on the mesh then use the subdivide and relax tools to get the detail in.  every time you subdivide 3DC will automatically snap the new vertices and polys to the voxel mesh, so you dont have to worry about moving them around too much.  The relax tool then will adjust them poly mesh to fit the voxel better, loosening up snarl points and evening up the poly sizes.

You can then add material groups and create a uvmap.  The uving is so simple, add seams with the loops tool and unwrap it.  Relax the uvmap to flatten it and you are done.

Then it's a question of exporting the mesh and importing it to poser.  3DC will preserver the size and origin of the original V4, so as long as you don't move it around suring the scuplt and retopology tasks it will fit perfectly when you import into poser.

That in itself is worth alot, but 3D Coat also has a painting feature, so you can create your texture maps in there too.  It has a great range of tools for the job but also can integrate and synchronise with a traditional layered 2D painting program like Photoshop or PSP.  I've got all sorts of videos on my you tube site that shows you that stuff.

Oh and 3D Hobby have got about an hour of my videos in a resonable high resolution available as part of their first issue.  It's not clothes related but goes through the process of voxel sculpting, making the poly mesh and texturing which should give you a good idea of how 3DC works.

Hope that helps :)

John.

PS if you want the mag have a look over in the Daz Commons Forum, I think there is a 50% discount voucher there ;)

John

Quote -
that said, it's probably better in general to use real groups, not materials, because materials cover polygons, which isn't how grouping works.  grouping works on vertices. 

It's possible to import all vertices from a polygonal (material-) group and name the imported group the way you like. So what's the problem you see?

How do you import groups of vertices into Poser?

Using Posers grouping-tool is only a way to go with simple meshes or some fine-tuning.

Quote -
It's possible to import all vertices from a polygonal (material-) group and name the imported group the way you like. So what's the problem you see?

where materials join.  so let's say i have a material called  "top" for the top of a dress and a material called "skirt" for the bottom of the dress.  where they meet is a line of vertices.  if you select the top material, it will include the vertices of the join.  if you select the skirt material, it will include the vertices of the join.  when you go to make those into groups, which are defined by vertices, i don't know how you'd control which group the line of vertices belonging to both the top and skirt goes to.  the one you defined last?  the one you defined first? i just don't know.  not a huge deal, but if i'm doing something fancy with my skirt, i want to be pretty precise about where it starts.  especially if my top is a little lower res vertically because it doesn't move as much or have as much material (as might happen with a gatthered skirt).

Quote - How do you import groups of vertices into Poser?

that's what i'm showing.  you make the groups in your app, then export them.  you do it basically the same as in Poser: name your group, select vertices, and assign them to the group.  but no matter what app you use, it's probably a lot easier to do that there than in Poser.

Quote - Using Posers grouping-tool is only a way to go with simple meshes or some fine-tuning.

did i say anything about using the Poser grouping tool?  i don't think i did.  i didn't mean to imply that you should use it.  sorry if that's what it sounded like i was saying.

I do it with materials.  If I was doing a dress I'd divide into 3 mat groups Top, Skirt and Waist.  The waist mat group is like a belt between the top of the skirt and the bottom of the top (:?).  Depending on the garment I make it from make it as wide as is necessary.  But if it's a dress I usually make it one poly thick.

it's easy then to add the Waist Mat group to the constrained group to keep the skirt part from slipping too far.

With a bit of work you can also use that Wait Material as one of the Dynamic groups, then set the cloth properties on that group to act like an almost elasticated strip, or at least a piece of cloth that does not deform too much so it stays more or less where it should be.  This can avoid bunching issues around the waist during the simulation.

John.

Fugazi1968 - thanks so much for the info!   i think it helps.  i know it's made me curious.  and it's certainly given me a lot to think about.  i wouldn't want to make clothes that way, i think.  i'm a bagginsbill follower, and i chose Adorana's method because it works with Loom and other procedural patterns as well as textures, and making cloth like it's clay tends not to work well with textures that follow polygon flow rather than UV.  it's actually easier to UV map than the method you described, too.  the stretching i get is purely due to me not mastering Blender cloth (yet), and it's also somewhat  realistic because it's where cloth is actually being stretched.  but i love the general concept and am seriously intrigued by the whole notion of voxel sculpting.  

i'm going to have to read your post through a couple of times to even begin to understand the workflow.  thanks again for sharing the information.  question: can you use 3dCoat to morph existing meshes?  or does working with it require starting from scratch?

Quote - I do it with materials.  If I was doing a dress I'd divide into 3 mat groups Top, Skirt and Waist.  The waist mat group is like a belt between the top of the skirt and the bottom of the top (:?).  Depending on the garment I make it from make it as wide as is necessary.  But if it's a dress I usually make it one poly thick.

but wait, that really creates a weird situation.   let's say you create that waist section first.  it's only 1 poly thick.  it doesn't actually exist as a vertex group.  if you create your waist constrained group, then create the top dynamic group from the top material which holds the top set of vertices from waist, and then create the bottom dynamic group from the skirt material which holds the bottom set of vertices from waist, isn't the constrained group now empty?  or can the vertices belong to two groups?

Quote -
i'm going to have to read your post through a couple of times to even begin to understand the workflow.  thanks again for sharing the information.  question: can you use 3dCoat to morph existing meshes?  or does working with it require starting from scratch?

It's no problem at all, though I'm not sure I really said ti all right :)

The clay part is just getting a basic shape, for a body suit for instance you'd hardly have to do any sculpting at all (just fill in a few errr bits).  The really brilliant thing is the retopolgy room, where you add the polymesh :)  It makes things so so easy :)

Using the workflow I use I can get a garment made, into Poser and simulated in the cloth room in about 45 minutes.

Saying all that I personally believe that 3D Coat in convjunction with a traditional Poly modeller gives you an enormously powerfull toolset.  I was working on a conforming piece yesterday, the basic mesh was made in 3D Coat, then exported to Hex where I added some harder edges and finished off the seams to give it depth.

As to morphs you can use existing meshes, just import them and go to the polymesh sculpt room and you can work away to your hearts content.  Again :) I have a video on you tube for that.

John :)

if i weren't such a dweeb, i could probably do it in less than 45 Adorana's way.  or if i had a computer less than 5 years old.  it's really, really easy to make clothes by cloth sim, and for me way easier than sculpting (because i am not so great at that yet).    but i almost always make a mistake and forget something or do something out of order.  i'm the kind of person who couldn't type without the backspace.  and i tend to like to sculpt in little wrinkles and things.  which i'm betting would be easier in 3d Coat or ZBrush.  have you used Zbrush?  can you compare the two?

Quote - > Quote - I do it with materials.  If I was doing a dress I'd divide into 3 mat groups Top, Skirt and Waist.  The waist mat group is like a belt between the top of the skirt and the bottom of the top (:?).  Depending on the garment I make it from make it as wide as is necessary.  But if it's a dress I usually make it one poly thick.

but wait, that really creates a weird situation.   let's say you create that waist section first.  it's only 1 poly thick.  it doesn't actually exist as a vertex group.  if you create your waist constrained group, then create the top dynamic group from the top material which holds the top set of vertices from waist, and then create the bottom dynamic group from the skirt material which holds the bottom set of vertices from waist, isn't the constrained group now empty?  or can the vertices belong to two groups?

I kinda get what you are saying :) and it does tie my head in knots.  The only answer my poor brain comes up with is that  when you have vertices that essentially belong to two groups it treats the join as a weld.  Otherwise the mesh would fall apart.  I would suspect there is then a group priority applied to the weld point, so that the vertex behaves in a sensible fashion.  I suspect that the constrained group would have a high priority, so over rides and other group behaviours a the weld point :)

I think that makes sense, though I'm not sure.

John.

Quote - if i weren't such a dweeb, i could probably do it in less than 45 Adorana's way.  or if i had a computer less than 5 years old.  it's really, really easy to make clothes by cloth sim, and for me way easier than sculpting (because i am not so great at that yet).    but i almost always make a mistake and forget something or do something out of order.  i'm the kind of person who couldn't type without the backspace.  and i tend to like to sculpt in little wrinkles and things.  which i'm betting would be easier in 3d Coat or ZBrush.  have you used Zbrush?  can you compare the two?

I have used ZBrush and it is an excellent tool.  However it's interface confused me and I found it too labourious to get a consistent workflow going.

3D Coat however I found to be much simpler to understand, it didn't take too long to get to grips with the interface at all.  Once I'd worked with it for a little while it had a very natural feel to it.  There are some quirks of course, all programs have them,

Features wise there are features missing in 3d Coat that are in ZBrush and vice versa.  But take it from one who uses 3DC every day to make something other.  If it's not in 3D Coat, I'm not missing it yet.

As someone who has learned both apps I would say that 3D Coat would be my recommendation.  It had loads of great tools for modelling and painting, and more importantly it's learning curve isn't near impossible.

John

wait.  grouping and welding are two different things.  they're not related, afaik.   the constrained group could become empty without the mesh falling apart.  you just wouldn't have anything in that group.  or maybe those vertices aren't in the two dynamic groups.  yeah, i'm just not sure.  and while i'm sure we can test and find out pretty easily, and figure out of the order of making the groups matters (because i know i've had vertices leave a group if i put them into another in Poser), i was just thinking,  it's probably just easier to avoid the whole situation when it matters and make vertex groups to begin with.

oh, and i tend to get annoyed at how constrained groups distort when you morph your figure.  i like to dial spin.  a lot.  so i just use friction most of the time.  do you have a way to keep constrained groups from distorting?

oh and this is my shirt after letting it settle as a cloth sim, doing a little sculpting to add a touch of wrinkles, subdiving and smoothing it (modifiers), and giving the hems a thickness.  selected are the new seam vertices.  i added some for the shoulder seam. and in the corner is the panel in Blender 2.49 for creating vertex groups.  i probably wouldn't actually do this with a soft shirt like this, but it's not bad for demo purposes, i think.

It's all a bit brain straining I know.  All I can say as I've been doing it that way for some years now and it works.

I know what you mean about the constrained group bunching things up sometimes, thats why I mentioned the Dynamic group option.  You use the waist group to give it its own cloth properties, somethin along the lines of leather would do it.  It will move a little but not too far, and will reduce the bunching effect.

There are times when the top of the dress is tight that I will constrain the whole of the top group, which works pretty well too.

Nice shirt :) nice neat mesh, always nice to see.

John

Quote -
I have used ZBrush and it is an excellent tool.  However it's interface confused me and I found it too labourious to get a consistent workflow going.

3D Coat however I found to be much simpler to understand, it didn't take too long to get to grips with the interface at all.  Once I'd worked with it for a little while it had a very natural feel to it.  There are some quirks of course, all programs have them,

Features wise there are features missing in 3d Coat that are in ZBrush and vice versa.  But take it from one who uses 3DC every day to make something other.  If it's not in 3D Coat, I'm not missing it yet.

As someone who has learned both apps I would say that 3D Coat would be my recommendation.  It had loads of great tools for modelling and painting, and more importantly it's learning curve isn't near impossible.

John

oh, thanks so very much.  i've been wondering how they compare, and trying to base it on galleries.  which doesn't really work that well since ZBrush is an older industry standard and has its pick of images from some of the best CG artists in the world, while 3d Coat is relatively new and probably doesn't have that kind of easy visibility yet. 

still, i think i'll check out its gallery again.

and tying this into dynamic clothes, i do find sculpting matters in dynamic clothes, but not in the same way it does in conforming.  something made to stand out from the body will droop if there's nothing to collide it against.  which is great if you want it to, and not so much if you don't.  if you, for instance, do some nice sculpting in the chest area on a default figure to get those fine wrinkles between the breasts, then morph it to a more boyish physique in the final frame of your Poser sim, it will accurately look like a petite woman borrowing a more curvy woman's clothes.

some wrinkles will just fallout in draping, and some won't depending on how the mesh is made and your cloth settings.  i definitely have more playing around to do in that area.

Attached Link: 3D Hobby Freebies

> Quote - > oh, thanks so very much.  i've been wondering how they compare, and trying to base it on galleries.  which doesn't really work that well since ZBrush is an older industry standard and has its pick of images from some of the best CG artists in the world, while 3d Coat is relatively new and probably doesn't have that kind of easy visibility yet.  > > still, i think i'll check out its gallery again. > > and tying this into dynamic clothes, i do find sculpting matters in dynamic clothes, but not in the same way it does in conforming.  something made to stand out from the body will droop if there's nothing to collide it against.  which is great if you want it to, and not so much if you don't.  if you, for instance, do some nice sculpting in the chest area on a default figure to get those fine wrinkles between the breasts, then morph it to a more boyish physique in the final frame of your Poser sim, it will accurately look like a petite woman borrowing a more curvy woman's clothes. > > some wrinkles will just fallout in draping, and some won't depending on how the mesh is made and your cloth settings.  i definitely have more playing around to do in that area.

Ah I may have been mildy misleading, when I say sculpt I dont mean details like folds and wrinkles.  As you say that would be lost in the dynamic simulation.

What I do mean is adding to the base figure to get the shape of your garment.  For example I always fill in the space below V4s breasts, and her cleavage.  meaning that when I make a top the cloth doesnt start out being tight to her body.  You might not get that with the blender method you use, I'm not sure.  Also fill in the space between her bottom cheeks for pants, and use a light fill over the details on her tummy to remove those details.

On top of that for skirts I'll add in a cone primative to form the skirt part.

The key difference between 3d Coat and poly modellers is that when I'm adding the poly mesh I can't add polys anywhere outside the voxel mesh.  So unless I have a cone there for the skirt part, I'd only be able to make pants.

This is both a blessing and a curse.  It's a blessing because once the sculpt is done the mesh takes care of itself.  On the other hand it's a curse because sometimes I forget.

But the good bits outweigh the bad heavily, you can always add to the voxel mesh, so that's not too much of a problem.

The sculpting part is really quite minimal and does not capture small details at all.  You can add some very fine details though and preserve them in the Normal Map.  3D Coat can automatically create a normal map which will preserve very fine detail and apply it to a low poly mesh.  Poser can do Normal Maps now so thats a real bonus.

If you check the attached link I have 3 Freebies in there all made with 3d Coat, a little RocketShip, some Makeup Layers and a top and skirt for V4.  they might give you an idea of whats possible with 3DC.

As to galleries and the like to see 3D Coat in action, the 3D Coat website has loads in it now, and I think it's pretty impressive stuff (I may be easily impressed though).  Phil Nolan also has some nice stuff, he uses 3D Coat as part of his toolkit I believe.  His Bruce Willis was certainly done in 3D Coat.

http://www.philnolan3d.com/

John

this is how i exported the mesh, and how i added the group to a new dynamic group when i clothified it in Poser.  i made sure to give the dynamic group another name, so i didn't destroy the old one, which i managed to do once.  things like that are why a pretty simple process that should be make and UV map  flat cutouts > sim pieces around figure > drape > finish off > import > clothify > package takes me much longer than it should.

oh!  i see!  yes, that would pretty much kill it for creation for me, i think .  it's hard to say without understanding the mesh it makes better.  the thing is, wide skirts and trains with a topology like a cone can have really bad problems.  i learned that the hard way on my first piece.  i actually don't think it's posted here.  i messed up pretty thoroughly.  like mega bad.  i had to take it back into Blender and subdiv and smooth it.  now when i want (big) circular skirts and trains, i give them a grid topology rather than a radial one.  that isnt' to say that's the correct answer, just whew that first big wide circular train i made was just really awful. i just didn't think enough about the topology.

with the method i'm using, which is derived from Adorana's using C4D, the cloth works as much like the real cloth would as i can make it.  meaning, if i cut it small, and give it what i at least think is a stretchy material (i really wish it just had a stretch property) with an overall smoothness but ability to crumple and wrinkle, then it will act like lycra and fit pretty tightly.  there are cotton, silk, denim and rubber presets, and i try to work from those.  again, i think i have a lot to learn.

so it's not shrink wrapped to anything, per se, and i don't have to sculpt to create, say, a gathered skirt.  i just actually take a plane, make it cloth, gather it, then sew it into a skirt.  how closely it follows the body depends on the kind of fabric i make it and how small i cut it.  silk follows every curve, pretty much, while even cotton is much less specific.  if i make something rubber, it won't show much detail at all.  and it all kind of helps, because from the beginning, it works as cloth.  there are definite differences in Blender and Poser cloth, but judging the effects of, say, edge loop placement and poly density can happen while i'm still modeling rather than after i'm all done.

does that make sense?  i'm still trying to imagine exactly what you're doing, so i'm not sure if it would address the issue you're talking about or not. 

nice gallery!  i like the Anime girl's outfit.  and the Star Wars ships are impressive.  i've seen some good stuff on the 3D Coat site last i looked, but it feel just a bit short of the ZBrush gallery, imho.  not quite as real, not quite as natural looking. but very, very close, so i can't tell whether i'm seeing just the difference between the very best CG people in the world and the next to very best CG people in the world or not.  or even a difference in renderers, which isn't so relevant to me.

on the wrinkles: well it would really depend.  i just simmed that t-shirt i just made, and i can still see remnants of those slight wrinkles i put in there.  but i'm less worried about tiny wrinkles and more interested in serious wrinkles like in togas and such that might be easier to sculpt than sim.  well, for me at least, building a properly bunched and gathered greek style that has wrinkles like a Renaissance or Pre-Raphaelite painting hasn't worked out so well.  and i've seen a Zbrush tutorial for making such wrinkles, as well as frequent wrinkles like that in their galleries.

just to clarify, i'm not saying the material method wouldn't work, or would necessarily make problems. i'm just saying, it's easy to avoid confusion and therefore avoid any potential problems by just using vertex groups in the first place.  i've used materials myself a lot.it makes sense when you already have a material, right?  but there's no need to make materials that don't need to be there just to add structure to the piece, either.  i mean, it would be kind of confusing to any texture maker to see a seams material.  and i can make a single line of vertices into a vertex group, which i can't as a material.