Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

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Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Thu Jun 29, 2017 8:05 pm

Hello everyone...I've been working closely with the Valentina team on their 3d object plugin, as a contributing designer. I've learned a few things in the process of creating meshes that work well in Makehuman, and so I'd like to share some of this knowledge with you.

First off, I don't have all the answers as to why one mesh worked so much better than the others, so I'll leave that solution open to comments.
Here are two meshes that looked fine when designed, but only one worked when I began to test if for a karate animation.

The first pose is the Arms Overhead 90 Degrees, Flat Palm. The mesh was connected to the armature by Automatic Weighting, with Preserve Volume checked. Also, I added the subsurface modifier.

First the T shirt--draped no less!--that didn't work. Also, adding the subsurface modifier didn't help, even moving it up and down the stack. This is important, because I've ofter heard the phrase: "It will work once it gets subsurfed".

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And now the mesh that did work, using the same armature, with Automatic Weight Painting and Preserve Volume checked.

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Now, the real test. Can I raise the arms overhead ninety degrees with only trivial mesh intersection? The answer is yes. :D

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And finally, few additions that Valentina team thought useful, as they told me they can create this n a 3d printer.

A birch-leaf mantle:

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A chain mail gown:

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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby blindsaypatten » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:45 pm

Are you creating a clothing mesh and placing it on the character and using the armature modifier without going through makeclothes? Or are you using cloth simulation? What did the tshirt look like in the initial pose?
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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Fri Jun 30, 2017 10:34 pm

blindsaypatten wrote:Are you creating a clothing mesh and placing it on the character and using the armature modifier without going through makeclothes? Or are you using cloth simulation? What did the tshirt look like in the initial pose?


Ooh..lots of questions! :D

First, this model is going to be special. I believe I chose the very best of Manuels meshes--the muscular and the braid--to work with the Valentina project. They are going to create their first wavefront export using this model. I could have used the base mesh, but the Valentina people want to use the Blender / Makehuman functionality to sell real clothes, so it's about presentation sizzle.

I'm not using MakeClothes until I've come up with a standard way of creating clothing meshes that work without hiding the body mesh underneath; MC is still in development, and I'd like to finish the animations I've started.

Second, yes, I created a clothing mesh in Blender 2.76b and placed it on the character, using the Snap function, and of course the Mirror modifier. Then I draped the mesh using the cloth simulation, set to standard Silk, nothing special.

This is what the T shirt looked liked from the front, in UV and OpenGL. I can't see why it animated so differently from the other mesh.

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brkurt
 
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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Wed Jul 05, 2017 3:22 pm

Okay, back to it. Try as I might, I could not get the arms to go overhead without losing control of the shape of the torso.
To solve this problem I had to do two things: one I like doing; one I detest doing.
First, I had to add sternoCleinoMastoid bones to the neck, because of the immense musculature there, then armPit bones to control the sides of the torso, and finally Latissimus bones to control the middle back.

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And now the part I didn't want to do. I had to make loop cuts in armpit area, because there weren't enough vertices to spread evenly.

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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby blindsaypatten » Wed Jul 05, 2017 3:46 pm

It would be interesting to see her posed with her arms hanging straight down. It looks like they will be hanging way out off her torso.
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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Wed Jul 05, 2017 5:46 pm

blindsaypatten wrote:It would be interesting to see her posed with her arms hanging straight down. It looks like they will be hanging way out off her torso.


Very good point. The solution is fairly easy, and comes from planning ahead with the mesh. Notice that the clavicles are not connected directly to the sternum; this allows those parts of the mesh to be pulled into the center. But no problem.

Even more difficult is the creation of the pose I really need, which is arms straight overhead.

So for this model, we need: an A-frame stance (or in martial arts,'Ready'); a T-Pose; Arms Overhead Ninety Degrees; Arms At Side Zero Degrees.

This requires some very delicate weight painting, ie., without losing the advantages gained by the automatic weight painting algorithm.

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And here is the pose I originally intended, Arms Overhead Flat Palms. It works great in the front, but I have to edit the weight painting for the Scapula and Latissimus vertex groups:

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And from the back. Workable. Now is the time to use Shape Keys as a fine-tuning tool.

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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Thu Jul 06, 2017 3:26 am

And finally, here's how much easier it can be, once you know how to add bones to control the torso.
This mesh requires Latissimus bones and armPit bones, because of the number of otherwise uncontrolled polygons.
I made both of these sets of bones 25% smaller, and that also seems to have helped.

Image
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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Tue Aug 01, 2017 5:49 pm

Finally, some headway. I really like using the automated weighting algorithm, but it took a re-design of the armature for the muscular topology. The problem was the location of the clavicle bones. I extended the clavicles to match the topology:

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Now, to test using the opening move of Chatan Yara Kushkanu:

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and now, the real test, arms overhead, palms together:

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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Sat Sep 30, 2017 3:33 am

Sorry I haven't done more work on this tutorial, but the academic year is in full swing. :oops:

Anyway, here is the hardest part of Chantanyara Kusanku in terms of animation: Arms Overhead, Left over Right.
(It seems funny that the punches and kicks are child's play in comparison.)

This model has no Shape Keys, and no Subsurface Subdivisions. What you see was done entirely by rig design, and automatic weighting. Oh yes, and about a month of trial-and-error. But here it is!

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Re: Getting Clothes to Fit: Planning Your Mesh

Postby brkurt » Sun Oct 01, 2017 9:46 pm

And here is the first in a series of Chantanyara Kusanku videos

https://youtu.be/OtVWI2zWAxA
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