The recent threads have inspired me to make another attempt at dynamic cloth... I seem to recall that some members had figured out a way to make the edges of dynamic cloth look slightly thicker than the middle of the cloth, as though they [the edges] were hemmed. Would anyone mind pointing me to a tutorial or sharing the method (if it's not a trade secret )

make a loop and fold it back on itself

like a cuff in reverse

Quote - like a cuff in reverse

Do the edges of the loop get joined (like a real hem) or do they just stay loose, really like a cuff? If they stay loose, what's to keep them from falling out during the simulation?

I would join them.

I've not used the cloth room much, isn't there a way to keep certain parts out of the simulation?

I'd be going with displacement in the texture (material room) during the render instead of actual 3-d mesh mods... folded-over mesh doesn't do well in the cloth room, is my understanding.

I use displacement maps for most applications. :) I have never tried a loop, but it sounds like it could work.  You can also add a layer on top of edges, like seams and such and make them soft decorated.

I use displacement or bump maps.

select in the modeling software the edges that give it tickness. then in poser make it soft groups. they will folow the dynamics but will not move away.

Do you want to make them thickier from a mesh perspective, or do you want them heavier from a cloth perspective?

in the latter case (not mentioned yet), the way is to select the vertices, put them in a new dynamic group for the cloth, and assign different cloth parameters to it. Especially a higher density, in your case.

This is the way to make multi-material clothing, like dresses from linnen with leather stipes. Or lace/latex patchwork clothes.

Quote - Do the edges of the loop get joined (like a real hem) or do they just stay loose, really like a cuff? If they stay loose, what's to keep them from falling out during the simulation?

You can do either. If they're joined, it's easier to simulate, however I found I had trouble UV mapping a mesh made that way (the loops wanted to be a separate area on the map). That may have been due to poor technique and/or tools, though, so try it yourself on something simple.

However, I don't bother with all that any more. This is what I do instead.

I simulate the cloth as usual; however I may use a slightly higher offset value than normal.

I export the cloth from the frame I want to use.

In Anim8or, I "shell" the mesh to add thickness - as little as I can manage - and then subdivide the result, and export it.

I undo the above actions, and repeat them but with a thicker shell action.

Back in Poser, I hide the cloth. I don't delete it in case I change my mind and want to re-simulate.

Then I import the "thin shell", and apply the "thick shell" to it as a morph target.

The result is smooth clothing with adjustable thickness. It has the same UV mapping, so the same textures will work. However the material zones are lost (other modellers may not do this), but since I generally use this method for simple clothing it doesn't usually matter.

Also, the same mapping applies to both the outer and inner surfaces. With a bit of work, these could be separated, and a lining of a different material applied, but since this process has to be gone through for every image, maybe more than once if I procrastinate about the pose, I prefer to keep it simple and not bother. :)

It only takes a matter of minutes to do, and can be used on some downloaded clothing as well as items I've made myself; whereas the hem loop method is a lot of work, at least with my modelling tools, and I'm happy to be able to avoid it.

bob's sounds good

i have done depth mapping to the very edge of the texture to pull the cloth down to the body.  here's a pretty obvious one:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1832729&user_id=567120&np&np

it uses neutral grey for the whole garment, but whiter on the seam...it's only about a 2 pixel jump on the garment from grey to whiter, the grey is of course set as the 0 height.

then on the very edge of the garment it takes about 2 pixels and turns black, dropping it against the body.

to get it to be a smooth edge though, the mapping coordinates had to be exactly straight, so if the garment bends near the edges, i just add a row of verts right below the seam and then straighten the verts right up

of course, up close you would see the weird shell effect this makes.

so i've tried to loop edges many different ways without success.  the cloth collapses on itself in the loop.  so i tried filling the loop with more cloth.  then i have gotten the cloth cutting through itself, even when the cloth starts with enough room between them.  looped cloth simulated just tends to fold in on itself.

so the way everyone else does it successfully is to have a separate obj as the seam sitting just above the cloth and added to soft decorated group.  it doesn't seem to work for me if the seam is connected.  this looks pretty damned good!  but it doesn't collide with other cloth, which i hate!  for instance, if you wear an undergarment or tee shirt that has these soft decorated group, then drape another garment or shirt over it, the new sim will ignore those groups.  this, i would like to see fixed up.

i've been working on and off on some method to make seams on undergarments displace the cloth above.  still working on it....