Hi, All~

I've been spending this year learning Blender. I currently use 2.58 on a WinXP system. I'm currently making a dress for Antonia for the Xmas giveaway. I have learned a lot doing this, and it is near completion. I have two questions, though.

1 - In the process of making the dress, I've separated out the collar, belt and belt buckle. After I finished the modeling process, I moved them into place. Because they were separated from the main mesh, I am not sure what I need to do to reattach, if anything. They are staying in place and seem to have integrated with the main mesh, but I am sure there is a part of the process I am missing. I've spent a good deal of time on the Blender wiki searching for an answer, but I am still uncertain as to how this is accomplished. Do I parent them to the main mesh?

2 - Now that I am almost finished, I am unsure as to the next step in the process. I know the mesh needs to be UV mapped, and then textured. I have Auto Group Editor and Quick Conform from 3D Utils, so making it work for Antonia shouldn't be too much of a problem. What I am unsure of is the exact workflow. Can someone help a poor old man out here? Any help or suggestions much appreciated.

C~

Is this a conforming item or dynamic? If dynamic, you'll want to vertex/poly group in addition to material grouping. And you'll want to make the mesh contiguous (all one piece) or it will fall apart in the sim.

For conforming you don't have to worry about it. If you plan on making a fair bit of clothing, I'd suggest you get your head around rigging - agreeing with pjz99 from other threads: it's worth the time investment - otherwise, get a copy of Obj2Cr2 and rig with that. Easier, but you have much less fine control over how your item is rigged. No offence, PhilC: just nothing beats doing it manually. I've finally pulled the finger out and have rigged my first clothing item, and yes, it's not easy but no, it's not way too difficult either... well worth-while learning. Go with Phantom3D's rigging tutorial: it will demystify the whole process!

I'm just posting to agree with RobynsVeil, and add that it will probably be better to group your item in Blender where it's easier to control  what goes where.  Dresses need special treatment for conforming.  It sounds like this might be a hard to make dynamic as you've made it.

Conforming clothing can have separate meshes that act as one.  Dynamic needs either to be a single mesh (easiest solution) or to use the various special groups like soft decorated, hard decorated, constrained, and choreographed.

Thanks to you two for the feedback. Sorry I haven't gotten back sooner - I have been very sick this year, and bed-ridden a lot of the time. Doctors can't find out what is wrong with me, so they are using me for a guinea pig. Been in the hospital and I am looking at another stay very soon, I fear.

The dress would be conforming, not dynamic. I have finished it, but I am having an awful time with Blender trying to get it UV mapped. Blender is not playing well with me - I can't get it to enter into the UV editor for some reason, and the interface is messed up, not allowing me access to the File menu. One thing I truly hate about blender is the goofy interface with the sliding windows that never go where ya want them to go, and then sometimes disappearing altogether. Sometimes, I just can't stand it...

I am disappointed with this because I want to get this finished for the Xmas giveaway. As things are now, I am thinking it might not be possible. The upside is that I have learned a lot about Blender in the process of making this outfit. "Always look on the bright side of life..."

C~ (Just another Blender noob)

without having the mesh or actual screen shots of the issues its hard to say whats the holdup

to map i normaly just mark my seams in the edit screen the split the scene to open a UV/Image editor screen then while the cursor is on the edit screen press U to unwrap

and yes the interface is a bit wokny thats why i tend to work in 2.49 mainly and only use 2.5+ for tutorials for new users

for help with the interface and a wealth of free tuts checkout www.blendercookie.com and just be patient long enough not to become a mental patient

Oh, you're very welcome.  And I'm so sorry to hear about your health.  I hope you get better soon, and that you manage to avoid another stay in the hospital.  This is an awful time of year to be away from home.

I'm not all sure what you mean?  I've never had windows do anything I'd call sliding, nor ever had to "go into" the UV editor,  so I'm not sure what behavior you're describing.  Maybe if you could describe what's happening in more detail? 

I generally have a "window" open for the Image/UV editor, but it's just kind of there.  UV mapping is actually done in the 3d view.  The UV editor only comes into play after a UV map exists.  To UV map something, I select an object in the 3d view, go into edit mode, mark where the seams should go, select all the faces I want to map, and then UV map them.  After that, if I select all the faces I want to edit the mapping of, I can see those faces in the UV editor and change them if I want. 

Which part of that process isn't working for you?   If you just can't switch to Image/UV editor at all, then there's a major problem with your copy of Blender.    Which definitely might be true if you're losing access to your File menu.