Unimesh/Milkshape Tutorial: Level 3, Combining Mesh Parts

[tiggerypum]

This tutorial is the Advanced Unimesh Tutorial, #3 in the series.

You are expected to have successfully completed the Unimesh Beginner Tutorial (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=142305) and the Unimesh Tutorial: Level 2 (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=175147)

This tutorial assumes mastery of the materials in the other tutorials, and some steps (even new ones) might not include screenshots. Even with that, there are over 100 steps in it and 36 screenshots.

This tutorial covers a lot of ground – the many steps necessary to combine parts of meshes to create a new mesh of your own. It also covers an alternative way to create the fat morph, which is handy especially when the edits being made to the mesh are complex. This method can also be used to repair an exploding ‘fat mesh’.

Basically in the first tutorial, you took baby steps, and it was designed to avoid many complex things. In the second tutorial, you were walking along, getting aquainted with some more milkshape commands and learning about uvmaps. This tutorial is going straight to a full out run. Some people will be able to read parts of this tutorial and apply it to a mesh they’re editing and it will work. But if one step is missed, things might not work.

So – if you decide use this tutorial as reference and then have questions, please do the tutorial as written and maybe that will clear some of those issues up for you. If you have questions and the project you’re working on is not this tutorial project, please post them in a new thread in the BodyShop Meshing forum. And of course, if you do have questions, include as many details, step numbers, and screenshots as applies.

This tutorial covers putting new shoes on a mesh. In this case, I’m using Maxis shoes from another mesh. Tips for using Al’s shoes or shoes from another age mesh will be covered at the end. The goal is to learn a whole lot about editing meshes.

You will need:

SimPE, Milkshape, Unimesh 4.06 (or higher)
Make sure Unimesh is 4.0.6 or above, because it has improved code for reading in second meshes. (don't have them, go do the beginner tutorial!)

The downloadable patterns from this tutorial (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=135136)

Demon432's Tools (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=139859) – both align normals and extended edit. To install them, download both files. You then need to move the two files named msExtendedManualEdit.dll and msAlignNormals.dll to
My Computer/Local Disk/Program Files/Milkshape 3D (whatever version you’re using)

For this tutorial I used Unimesh 4.06, Milkshape 1.7.9, SimPE .58

Part 1: Set Up Your New Mesh

We’re going to dive right in from the end of the Unimesh Tutorial #2. This section is a summary, you should know how to build a mesh by now.

Did you save your project? If so, you can use the final SimPE file for this edit. If not, you can use the unaltered mesh and it will work just fine.

Make a new folder for your work files named TUTORIAL3TEENSHOES

In BodyShop create a new project and import it to the game with either the unaltered sundress or your new dress from tutorial 2 ( tfbodysundress_) Quit BodyShop.

In SimPE, build a new mesh file with the 4 parts of the mesh ( tfbodysundress_), save to your DOWNLOADS folder (I named mine MESH_tig_tutorial3teenshoes)

Fix Integrity, save again, and save the modified shape and cres to TUTORIAL3TEENSHOES folder

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345846

Put the modified shape and cres into the recolor file from your SAVED SIMS folder. Quit SimPE.

Check if the recolor shows correctly in Body Shop

When I went to check in BodyShop, this is what I saw:

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345847

My skirt is coming down onto the legs and it’s too short! Why?
The texture is for my new sundress, but the MESH pieces I just used to build the mesh are from the original Maxis sundress. I’m going to fix that when I read in my meshes into milkshape, so no worries. Matter of fact, this is nice because I can clearly see that the recolor is working correctly.

Now let’s go find some new shoes. I picked the shoes from this outfit:

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345848

While we have it, make a new project with the outfit, because we’ll want the shoes texture and alpha for our dress. Name it TEENHEELS. Quit BodyShop.

The name of the outfit is: tfbodyhipmandarintop_

In SimPE use the finder and extract the gmdc file for that mesh, and save it to the tutorial3teenshoes folder – I named it tf-bodyhipmandarintop so that I can tell it apart from the gmdc of the sundress. We don’t need anything else. Quit SimPE.

Part 2: Begin the Edit

In Milkshape I’m going to import first my original dress, and then the mesh I’d like to get shoes from. I am NOT going to make the fat morph yet, I’m going to work through all the details with my fit body first, and then later make the fat morph.

1) Fire up Milkshape, make sure autosmooth is off.

2) I am going to Unimesh Import dress3.simpe from my tutorial2 folder. If you made more edits than 3, simply import the last edit. If you don’t have your files from tutorial2, you’ll need to use the gmdc from tfbodysundress (which you just used to build the mesh)

3) This is important – answer NO to ‘create blend groups’

(this means you do not want to make the fat morph, we'll do that later)

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345849

4) Now we’re going to Unimesh import in the 2nd mesh that I saved to tf-bodyhipmandarintop in my tutorial3teenshoes folder.

5) You’ll get a new dialog box – “If you import over another model, results may be unreliable. Do you want to continue?
Click OK

6) :!: :!: THIS NEXT STEP IS CHANGED FROM THE (now deleted) SCREENSHOT, Unimesh's behavior around this has now been changed twice... Make sure your Unimesh says 'include' or does not ask at all. If it doesn't ask you have the latest unimesh and that's even better! :)

Then you’ll get another dialog box – “Do you want to INCLUDE additional bone definitions?” (this prevents another entire skeleton from being added to our project)
Click NO

If you don't see this box, and you have unimesh 4.09 that's all good, it's being smart for you

7) And lastly you’ll be asked again if you want to ‘Create Blend Groups’, answer NO.

Finding the Place to Cut

Now, you will see 2 body groups, and you should also notice that some parts of the mesh look identical, to the point that you can’t tell there are two sets of vertices there, and other parts of the mesh look different (skirt, shorts, parts of the shoes)

8) Now I’m going to zoom in on the area around the shoes. IDEALLY, I should look for a spot where the two meshes match up identically… like the set of vertices right above the ankle. That’s where I’d then choose to join the mesh. Here, I’ll circle it for you.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345851

Now, because this is a tutorial and I want to teach you MORE, we’re going to use the row above that instead – which does not look identical on the different meshes. That way I can teach you how to properly adjust everything – and you’ll better be able to combine any mesh parts you want in the future. (I might regret this decision, but here we go!)

9) Hide the second body by selecting the group and using the HIDE button. (the pants mesh)

10) Using Model – Select – Vertex, select all the vertices below that row of vertices on the dress body (the shoes and ankles)

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345852

11) Hit DELETE on the keyboard and delete those vertices.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345853

Now we’ve got a footless dress mesh

12) Go back to the groups tab, and click the 2nd body group and HIDE to show the 2nd body with the shoes we want.

13) Click on the first body, and click HIDE to hide the skirt mesh. Now you should not see the skirt any more, just the pants mesh.

14) Using Model – Select – Vertex, let's start deleting the body of that mesh. As we're not sure exactly where the dividing line is, let's first going to simply delete everything from the pants up. Zoom back out so you can see the body, or simply use one of the smaller left windows to select a large area to delete. And then hit DELETE on the keyboard.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345854

15) In order to be able to tell the mesh pieces apart more easily, right click on the window and set the display to ‘textured’ and then right click again and select ‘colored groups’ and right click once more for ‘wireframe overlay’

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345855

16) Now hide and show the first body, and then go in and select the rest of the vertices above the joining line, and delete them. Notice when hiding and showing the 2 meshes, there's an almost perfect match at that seam. Remember we picked a seam that was not perfect, and you can see that at the back of the leg. We’ll fix that later.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345856

Okay, so now you have the two parts of the mesh in two groups. Time to SAVE! We’ve been editing for quite a while now.

17) SAVE AS - tut1.ms3d in your tutorial3teenshoes folder

Part 3: Joining the Vertices Exactly

If we put the mesh into the game the way that it is, the legs would show a line (and actually have a section that does not match properly. So the first goal is to get the vertices to have EXACTLY the same value. We can’t do that by eyeball, we must use either of these two methods below.

Select one pair of vertices at a time
Then either use –
VERTEX – SNAP TOGETHER (useful if they look lined up already)
Or use Demon’s Extended Manual Edit

I’m going to use Extended Manual Edit because I want to show this to you – it’s a way for you to make the edges meet and choose which mesh you want to use as your guideline. While it doesn’t matter that much for this particular outfit, you might want to someday join a skirt to a belt area or such where you will not want the belt to be distorted.

Extended Manual Edit is also the tool to use to make sure that the neck is an exact match (if moving a mesh from one age to another) and to make sure that the waistline meets on top and bottom meshes.

18) Select a vertex on the front of the leg (which is really 2 vertices, 1 from the top mesh, one from the feet).

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345869

19) Use MENU – VERTEX – EXTENDED MANUAL EDIT. Set the settings to show Index, XYZ and B.Names. Now look at the values. In this case, the values on these front center vertices ARE identical, so just click CANCEL or close it with the red X in the upper right corner.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345870

20) Then continue around the leg seam, selecting one vertex (or the two close to each other). Once you’ve done a couple more, you’ll see this, a spot with 4 vertices!

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345871

This is because you’ve hit the seam that separates the front of the sim from the back. So yes, there really are 4 vertices all aligned perfectly so that they look and act as one. These vertices also have identical x, y, z values and bone assignments, so it’s all good. Be sure to check the values on yours and make sure they are identical, if they are not, follow the directions below.

21) As you continue around the back of the leg, you will hit a spot that DEFINITELY has different values, because you can see the vertices are not touching. Select both vertices and then bring up Extended Manual Edit.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345872

22) The Mesh marked with the 0 at the front is the dress mesh, the mesh marked 1 is the shoes mesh. (that is the order we read them into the program) Select the X value for the first mesh, and ctrl-C (copy). Select the X value for the second mesh and ctrl-V (paste). Repeat for the Y and Z values as necessary. When all the values are identical, press ACCEPT.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345873

23) Now select the next pair of vertices. Yes, this is a bit tedious, but careful work here will give you a mesh that acts as if it was always part of the same mesh! Go around both legs. Examine them and make sure things look right to your eyes.

24) Now let’s SAVE AS tut2.ms3d

Part 4: Adjusting the Normals

25) Right click on the 3D window. Turn off ‘Colored Groups’
Right click again, turn off ‘Wireframe Overlay’
Right click again, select ‘Smooth Shaded’

26) Now look really closely at that seam. Rotate the mesh around. I was able to see ever so slight a line on the back of the leg where the meshes meet. It’s not a gap, just a change in the gray shading. In this case it is very subtle, but we will smooth it over anyway.

27) Select ‘Colored Groups’ again so that you can easily spot the seam line.

28) Model Tab – Select – Vertex – and select the seam.

29) Right click and go back to wireframe, just so you can see you selected all the vertices.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345874

30) Now we'll use Demon’s Tool – Align Normals.
Do NOT EVER use the Milkshape ‘Smooth All’ command, because it will make all the seams on your mesh have a line on them.

Use menu VERTEX – ALIGN NORMALS

31) Now right click and select ‘Smooth Shaded’. This time it should look perfect!

32) SAVE AS tut3.ms3d

Part 5: Bone Assignments

33) First, use menu VERTEX – Sims 2 Unimesh Fix Underweighted Bones

You *always* need to do this on your mesh, so that any rounding errors are corrected and all the bone assignments add up to exactly 100%. If there are assignments that are not exactly 100%, there will be small display quirks; the mesh might appear to have holes or semi-transparent areas in some views.

Now, because we chose to use ‘Extended Manual Edit’ to join the vertices at the seam, we’ve already seen the bone assignments. And on this particular example (and likely with many Maxis meshes you might take pieces from) the bone assignments are identical and fine. Still, I’m covering how to check and change the bone assignments using the Unimesh Bone Tool – because you will need to set bone assignments if you make new pieces for your mesh or read in object file additions for your mesh, like Al’s shoes.

Also, if you did the quick thing and ‘snapped together’ the vertices, you still need to check their bone assignments.

34) Select a vertex along the seam (which you know will be 2-4 vertices that are precisely at the same spot).

35) Menu – VERTEX – Sims2 Unimesh Bone Tool

A pop up will show. To just view (and not change) the bone settings, simply press the arrows on the bottom of the screen. In this shot, there are 2 vertices selected. As you flip back and forth you can see they have the same value.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345875

If you change any of the values in the vertex’s bones, you must click the COMMIT button before you click on the arrow to view the next vertex, or the changes will be lost. When you are done making changes, click COMMIT ALL (or CANCEL).

Some areas of the mesh have complex bone assignments (such as the stomach area). On the other hand, some areas of the arms and legs have as simple bone assignment (just like this edit) and all the vertices have the same assignment. You can do many bone assignments at once with the Unimesh Bone tool.

If you have a ring of vertices that you want to ALL have identical bone assignments, the easiest way to make the change is to select them all and bring up the bone tool. Then make sure the first vertex has the bones assigned the way you want. Click APPLY TO ALL and then COMMIT ALL.

This section about using the Unimesh bone tool was primarily for your information. The bone assignments on the leg should all be fine – all that was needed was to fix the underweight bones. For practice, select a couple more vertices and bring up the bone tool to check their values. You can also check bone assignments on other parts of the mesh, for instance, if you check some of the vertices on the sim’s stomach area, you will find they have 2-3 bone assignments instead of just one.

Note: if you are working on a different mesh and/or cut your mesh pieces close to the ankle or knee (or are joining 2 meshes at, say, the waist) the bone assignments will probably NOT automatically match as they do in this project. So do make sure to check them and make them identical. A difference of as little as 1% on any assignment can cause your mesh to get a tiny gap along the seam as the sim animates.

36) Bone assignments are done - SAVE AS tut4.ms3d

Part 6: Separate the UV Mapping

We need to make sure that the points on the uvmapping match up exactly where they were snapped together. I expect that some of the lower leg’s mapping is currently very close to the upper leg mapping, but it should be exact. In order to make it easy to know which points belong to the lower leg once they’re merged, I’m going to pull the top row of vertices down a bit on the lower leg on the uvmap (not the mesh!), and then I'll realign them after I've combined the meshes into one. So, let’s get a texture on that mesh and look at the uvmap.

37) Assign a texture and bring up the Texture Coordinator
(This is covered in the 2nd Unimesh Tutorial (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=175147) )

• use menu – EDIT – SELECT ALL
• go to materials, hit new, read in checkpattern.bmp, hit assign
• menu – WINDOW – TEXTURE COORDINATOR
• change scale to .5

Now, because we didn’t change it, both groups are named ‘body’ which is a bit confusing. The 2nd one is the shoes, and you can see them there at the bottom of the screen.

38) Click SELECT and then select the top row of the leg. Then MOVE and move them downward some.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345876

39) Close the Texture Coordinate Window

40) SAVE AS tut5.ms3d

continued in next message

[tiggerypum]

Unimesh Tutorial #3, Continued

Part 7: Combining Groups into One (Regrouping)

Before exporting this mesh, it needs to have the same amount of groups as it started with, and with the same names and comments.

41) Go to GROUPS tab and click on the 2nd body. Hide and show it, make sure it’s the shoes. Then type in ‘shoes’ next to the RENAME button and hit the RENAME button. Now we have 2 groups – body and shoes.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345882

42) We need to save the comments from the body group. Click on the body group. Click on COMMENT, and a window will pop up with the comments.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345883

43) Select the comments with your mouse and CTRL-C and copy them. Open up a text file and save the comments there just in case. Click OK to close the comments window.

ModelName: body
Opacity: -1
HasTangentArray:
NumSkinWgts: 3

44) Select the entire mesh using MENU – EDIT – SELECT ALL

45) Click on REGROUP. The body and shoes groups will disappear and there will be one group named ‘Regroup01’

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345884

46) Now the original settings need to be restored.
Rename ‘Regroup01’ to body by typing in ‘body’ next to the RENAME button and click the button

47) Click COMMENT and paste in the comments you copied, hit OK

You do need to carefully keep track of names and the comments when you’re doing this, but that is all you need to do to combine different groups back into one group.

48) SAVE AS – tut6.ms3d

Part 8: Fix UV Mapping

Now there’s just the one body group. Time to go fix that uvmap where the legs join.

49) MENU – EDIT – SELECT ALL

50) MENU – WINDOW – TEXTURE COORDINATE EDITOR

Now the gap where the leg sections meet is visible. (We created/expanded that gap in Part 6)

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345885

51) Zoom in on the gap by typing 3 into the scale box and hitting SCALE.
Hold down CTRL and left click and drag to find the area of the legs with the gap

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345886

52) Starting with the lower left leg on the uvmap, one at a time,
Click SELECT, select the lower point, click MOVE and move to align it perfectly with the corresponding point on the upper leg.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345887

53) Repeat this all the way across, using CTRL-left click to move across as needed. Remember that there will be 2 back legs and 2 front legs to fix.

54) When you are done, close the Texture Coordinate Window.

55) SAVE AS tut7.ms3d

Part 9: Export the Mesh and Fix the Texture

56) EXPORT – SIMS2 UNIMESH EXPORTER body1.simpe
(you can quit Milkshape now, but it’s not necessary)

57) Open up your mesh (MESH_tig_tutorial3teenshoes) with SimPE

58) Replace the gmdc with body1.simpe (click YES)

59) SAVE

60) Quit SimPE

61) Start BodyShop
Create Parts/Start New Project/Create Clothing
Go to TEEN, Everyday, and look for that dress (with a * on it)

Hey, look at that, she now has high heeled sandals on.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345888

Now these shoes don’t look bad on that shape, but let’s go fix the texture to be the shoes.

62) Click the EXPORT TEXTURES button in BodyShop and name it something like TUT3.

63) Now we need to use our graphics editor and combine the shoes from the TEENHEELS folder we saved way back at the beginning of this tutorial with this dress.

So you must edit

body~stdMatBaseTextureName.bmp

in the teenheels folder and select and copy the entire bottom area (do it all the way across, that makes alignment easy) to get the shoes. Close that file

Open body~stdMatBaseTextureName.bmp in the TUT3 folder, and paste the shoes into the bottom of the texture. Be sure to line the graphic up at the bottom and left and right edges, so that it will be perfectly aligned on your mesh.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345889

64) Now repeat this for the ALPHA file - body~stdMatBaseTextureName_alpha.bmp. Copy the alpha for the shoes from the teenheels folder and paste it into the file in the TUT3 folder.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345892

65) Now click on the REFRESH arrow in BodyShop, and you should see your new shoes.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345893

66) If all is good, give it a name and Click IMPORT TO GAME

67) Quit BodyShop


Part 10: Testing in Game

68) Now is the time to test this mesh in the game. Take it into the game, double check the texture around the feet. Have the sim dance, sit, etc, and zoom in and stare at those lower legs. Pause the game. Move the camera around the sim, checking the lower legs from various angles. Let the sim move a bit and pause it in a new pose, and check again. Do this at least 4-5 times, looking for any signs of a seam or gap or strange animation (like a spike coming out of the leg is probably a bad bone assignment.) Also do make sure to look at the rest of the sim, just to make sure nothing got damaged in the edit by mistake.

I must say this - the animation in the game is not perfect even with Maxis created meshes. So, if you notice something, like the foot going a bit into the floor, or the leg/foot catching the hem of a long skirt in some of the sim's odder moves - do not immediately stress out. Compare your mesh's behavior to the behavior of the base Maxis mesh(es) you used; dress your sim in the Maxis outfit and try and get the same results. Back out a bit from the super-close zoom of your mesh and ask yourself - does this look normal, or is the error really obvious? You can definitely fix any gaps or seams on your mesh, so if you see them, do go and fix them.

I find having a cheat dresser in the game so I can 'buy' clothing without going to town very handy for the purpose of testing outfits.

Assuming this is all looking good, we’re still not quite done – because we didn’t make a fat morph. But we will.

69) Quit the Sims 2.

Part 11: Make the Fat Morph

We are going to start fresh and import the original mesh we started with in order to get all the parts we need. Then we’ll go get our new mesh and put it in place.

70) Go to Milkshape - MENU – FILE – NEW

71) I’m going to Unimesh Import the gmdc from tfbodysundress

72) This is important – answer YES to ‘create blend groups’

Now there are 2 groups, body and ~00MORPHMOD.0

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345894

73) Before going further, click on the body and COMMENTS and copy the comments to a text file

ModelName: body
Opacity: -1
HasTangentArray:
NumSkinWgts: 3
MorphRefNum: 0

74) Copy the comments from the morph group also

MorphNames: botmorphs fatbot

75) Now we’re going to Unimesh import our new changed mesh – body1.simpe (or whatever number you are at, if you found errors to correct) from your tutorial3 work folder.

76) You’ll get a new dialog box – “If you import over another model, results may be unreliable. Do you want to continue?
Click OK

77) Then you’ll get another dialog box – “Do you want to exclude additional bone definitions?” (this prevents another entire skeleton from being added to our project)
Click OK

78) Now we’ve got 3 groups – body, ~00MORPHMOD.0 and body

79) The 2nd body should be highlighted – go copy the comments we just put into a file for body 1 and paste them into the comments for the 2nd body. The difference will be that the last line will now read: MorphRefNum: 0
Click OK

80) Now click on the first body, and click the DELETE button.

81) Click on the body group that’s left (which is our shoes mesh) and click the UP button to move it to the top of the list.

82) SAVE AS – tut8.ms3d

83) Now to make the new morph.
Click on the ~00MORPHMOD.0 and the HIDE button.
You should see your mesh look like it’s become thinner.

84) Now, just to make sure, click on body and then HIDE. Now there should be nothing visible on your screen. Click HIDE again to show the body. Pivot it around, just to double check that it’s got the heels. Yes, good.

85) Click the SELECT button, the mesh will light up red.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345895

86) Menu – EDIT – DUPLICATE SELECTION will cause a new group to appear in your groups window (for me it was ‘Duplicate03’)

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345896

Now you have a new copy of the modified body. It’s important to make sure you are editing the duplicate and NOT your original at the same time – so take these extra few steps and save yourself a headache.

87) Click on the Duplicate and HIDE. Click on body and HIDE. The screen should be empty. Then click on Duplicate and HIDE to show your duplicate only.

88) Now you can hide and show the morphmod and the duplicate and adjust the duplicate to be similar to the morphmod. Only use commands like MOVE and SCALE. Do not add or delete vertices, that will make things explode.

The goal is to create a body shape *similar* to the morph, it doesn't have to be exact - but by being close, then as your fat sim changes clothing, they will still look like the same body proportions.

This next part will vary depending on what works for you. You can use the wireframe display or textured display with colored groups, or flip between them.

89) First I actually grabbed the pixels on the chest and used a simple move to pull the out and downward a bit. I was satisfied with that shape once I was done.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345897

90) Then I moved further down the body, pulling a few vertices forward on the stomach to smooth things.

91) Then I selected most of the hips/skirt area, and then I used SCALE with X and Z set to 1.1 (and Y set to 1) using the Center of Mass setting. Then I set X to 1 (so that only Z was 1.1) and I scaled one more time.

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345898

92) I then grabbed some pixels here and there to futher smooth the skirt shape. Remember that if 1.1 moves the mesh too much, you can try 1.05.

Make sure to check your mesh with ‘smooth shaded’ as a display from time to time. You want the mesh to have a nice smooth shape, with the vertical and horizontal lines still looking smooth as it distorts; it just has to be similar to the original morph, not a perfect match.

93) Once you have created your new fat morph, it’s time to replace the original.

Copy the comments from ~00MORPHMOD.0 to ‘Duplicate’
Copy the name ~00MORPHMOD.0 and then RENAME Duplicate to ~00MORPHMOD.0
Delete the first ~00MORPHMOD.0

In this step, you need to pay attention to the names and order on the list of your mesh groups. The 'colored group' settings in Milkshape will reassign as you delete or add groups, so you cannot use the colors of the mesh parts to identify the different groups.

Make sure you have the correct groups, you should have exactly 2, and hiding and showing them should be a fit and fat body with the heeled shoes.

94) SAVE AS – tut9.ms3d

Part 12: Testing the Fat Morph and Importing the Final Mesh

95) EXPORT – SIMS2 UNIMESH EXPORTER body2.simpe
(or whatever number you’re up to)

Now we’re going to do a quick test of the fat morph before having to go into the game to test. (Thank you Dr. Pixel for this test) We’re going to clear things and read in the mesh we just saved and see if the fat morph looks great.

96) FILE – NEW

97) IMPORT - SIMS2 UNIMESH IMPORTER body2.simpe

Now you should see 2 groups. Hide and show them. If anything looks exploded, you need to do Part 11 over again.

If you only get one group, body, and it looks fat – that’s because you accidently edited both your body and fat morph together, and since the data was identical no morph was created. Never fear – if you’ve been following directions here, you can still recover your unaltered fit mesh and put it back into place. Rename the 'body' 'morph'. Now import body1.simpe. Remember we saved all those comments and names - good. Move the 'body' up to the top, and paste in the new comments for body from that text file. Now paste the comments for the morph (from the text file) into the morph group. Rename the morph group to be ~00MORPHMOD.0 And EXPORT with a new number. Then test again with Step 96 and the most recent simpe file.

No explosion? You see both body and morphmod, and when you hide and show them you can see a difference between fit and fat? Good! Now replace your mesh with this new mesh.

98) Open up your mesh (MESH_tig_tutorial3teenshoes) with SimPE

99) Replace the gmdc with body2.simpe or whatever the last version is (click YES)

100) SAVE

101) Quit SimPE


Part 13: Fix the Shoe Sounds

We changed these shoes from what look to be flip-flops into high heel shoes. When sims walk in the game, their feet make small sounds, based on the type of shoe the sim is wearing. JM Pescado has posted the codes for fixing the sound to match the shoe!

102) Open the new recolor file we just made from your SAVED SIMS folder – I suggested naming it simply ‘tut3’ - mine was named 7fd17c27_tut3.package, yours will have different numbers at the beginning.

I usually find it easiest to look in my Saved Sims folder and use the view menu to see the directory listing ‘Arrange Icons by.. modified’ Then I just open that file with SimPE - it will be either at the beginning or end of my directory listing.

103) Find the Property Set (GZPS) and click on it in the left window, then in the right window.
In plugin view, you need to find the value for ‘shoe’

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345899

The following values have been identified:
0x00: None - This outfit is a top and has no shoe. Don't use.
0x01: Barefoot - This outfit is barefoot and has no shoe
0x02: Heavy Boot - Heavy stompin' boot.
0x03: Heeled: Some kind of heeled shoe, produces the heel click on walk.
0x04: Normal shoe: Generic ordinary shoe lacking noteworthy characteristics.
0x05: Sandal: Some manner of floppy sandal, found on Maxis sandal-skins.
0x07: Armored: Found on the OFB Knight Armor.

Note that the Armored value might not work for people who don’t own OFB, so be cautious about using that, unless you identify your mesh as only being for OFB – usually meshes we create can be used in all versions of the game.

So now I’m going to look. Indeed, the ‘shoe’ was set to 0x00000005 – the sandals.

104) Click on ‘shoe’, then in the box, change the 5 to 3

105) Click COMMIT and the SAVE

Part 14: Final Test

106) NEVER assume everything is fine. Always test in the game. Double check that everything animates well. Make your sim dance a bit or something and just make sure you didn't accidently move something. Go to CAS and flip between 'fit' and 'fat'. You can also delete any of the earlier recolors that don’t look quite right in CAS.

:gjob: Woo hoo! Yeah! We made it. Pat yourself on the back. There's a 'Thank You' button at the end of the first message (scroll back up), if you click that it will encourage me to keep writing tutorials. :D

http://thumbs.modthesims2.com/getimage.php?file=345900


Tips for Future Projects

Now you’re free to take over the world! Well, at least to start modding meshes like crazy.

Al's Shoes

If you’re using Al’s shoes (available at http://www.simskins.net/) which import as an OBJ and thus there are no bone assignments, you need to make those bone assignments match a similar Maxis mesh. Start up a second Milkshape and import a Maxis gmdc and look at the bone assignments on that mesh and make the same ones on your new foot/leg/shoe using the Unimesh Bone Assignment tool I showed you in Part 5. Do NOT use the tutorial provided at simskins, that tutorial is totally outdated and not compatible with the current milkshape/unimesh. Do not weld anything. Use the bone tools as taught in this tutorial.

Adding Other Parts

If you’re importing some other little OBJ, like a flower or something, make the bone assignments match that of the vertices around the the spot where it meets the mesh. You will need to test these sorts of things carefully in your game (not just BodyShop) and possibly make adjustments.

The obj will need to be uvmapped - it might already have one, although if it does, the uvmap would still need to be moved to an open space on the texture. See Dr. Pixel's Tutorial (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=145153) for an example of how it's done.


Converting A Mesh or Parts From One Age to Another

Start your mesh by building a mesh file that is the proper age, gender, and type of mesh - full body, or top or bottom.

In Milkshape, start by importing the gmdc that is the proper age/gender/type for your finished project.

Then import any other meshes, parts, etc, without adding any additional bones. (newest unimesh won't even ask, it will do the right thing)

Use the proper age and gender mesh as your guide for scaling down the other parts to fit. If going from teen/adult to child, consider using a child's upper body and adding on the unique mesh parts, so that you don't have to try and properly flatten the chest area. Pay careful attention to the proportions, a straight scale-down of another age mesh often will not look quite right.

You will also probably want to use the hands from a correct age/gender mesh, along with possibly the upper neck.

Make sure the neckline is a perfect match with extended edit, and the same for the waistline if the mesh is a top or bottom only. Or use Wes' new Vertex Data Merge and Normal Data Merge (http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=227858) tools, which make copying that data much quicker.

As usual, when you're done make sure you have the right number of groups with the right names and comments. If you're building something from many pieces, I'd rebuild the fat morph as with tutorial #3.


Bumpmapping

Unimesh supports bumpmaps (has for over a year). The easiest way to have bumpmaps is to use as your base mesh a Maxis mesh that _has bumpmaps_, even if the bodyshape is not what you want.

Make your initial recolor with that mesh, and use that mesh to make your meshfile, and read that mesh into unimesh as your first mesh. THEN read in whatever other mesh or meshes you want to use. Make sure to copy the comments from the original mesh before deleting the groups you don't need.

Alpha Meshes

Alpha meshing is extremely advanced for the most part. I strongly suggest waiting until you are really comfortable editing meshes, meaning you can do them without checking a tutorial, before even trying an alpha mesh edit.

Alpha meshes have multiple groups, similar to hair. Working with alpha meshes is complicated and they simply will not always animate perfectly. That is why almost all the Maxis meshes are not created that way. To get your alpha mesh to look good most of the time often requires a LOT of fiddly work going in and out of the game to adjust things.

You will need a base mesh that has at least 2 groups (and then when you add morphs there will be more than 2 groups, so you will need to look carefully at what you’re editing). The most common meshes people use for the base are the child fairy and teen hula and adult hula. That lets you make alpha meshes for everything but toddlers.

Use the same techniques to replace whatever parts of the meshes with whatever parts you want. You can give it a new body, you can add things to the body (which will alpha to skin). You can give it a new whatever it is where the skirt was. Depending on what you are doing, you might need to line the skirt (see the Milkshape Tips here (http://www.modthesims2.com/article.php?p=1109515) - About the ‘insides’) and also look at the uvmapping section. Once your new mesh is in, you'll need to make a new recolor and give the parts appropriate textures.

The steps (in this example using Hula mesh):

Make a mesh with the hula mesh
Import the hula gmdc, save the info about what the groups are named and their comments
Import any other gmdcs you want to use, say like the swimsuit or a dress mesh to replace the body with (do not import more bones)
Replace the 'body' group in the original mesh with a different body -- but be SURE to copy the comments from the original 2 part mesh to your new body group and have it named the same
Delete the original body and move the new 'body' up to its place
In the end, you should have the same number of groups with the same names and comments as you started with.

In order to have your, say, overskirt, animate correctly and move with the rest of the body and not have the underskirt pop through it too often, the overskirt has to have vertices that correspond to the mesh parts below it. Then you can start with making matching bone assignments, and the pelvis area and knees will bend on the outer skirt similar to the inner skirt. After you’ve done these assignments, you will have to go into the game and make the sim walk, sit on a chair, sit on a couch, and start adjusting things, by either changing bone assignments or moving the vertices. Then go back and make the sim dance and jump on a couch. You will want to minimize the quirks in the display that will happen from time to time, so that most of the time the sim in game animates well, and limbs aren’t popping through your alpha skirt. It’s one thing to have an occasional bad display during a dance move, but another to have it there the frequently when they’re sitting on the couch talking or walking around.

Tig's thoughts/experiences/comments on alpha meshes:
Generally simply trying to layer, say, and entire tight skirt or pants over a body mesh will produce a mesh that will have frequent 'bleed throughs' of the body mesh as the sim sits, dances, etc - this is due to how the vertices deform with the skeleton to animate - even if you match the vertices and bone assignments exactly, if they are too close together it's likely that you'll get some bleed-through. So only use alphas where they are most needed, and preferably not tight against the body. Even with all that effort (trying to align vertices, making the values the same) you will probably have to go in and out of your game alot and experiment with small changes to make your alpha behave well. I spent as much time (if not more) fiddling with my alpha loincloths as I did initially constructing their meshes.

Alpha meshes also usually have more vertices, and use 2x as many graphics, and thus are more of a demand on people's games. So don't make an alpha mesh unless you need an effect that you cannot get any other way - two meshes for shorts that are of different lengths will actually animate better and be easier to recolor and so on, compared to one alpha mesh to create variable length shorts.

Good luck on your future meshing adventures!

[simboy]

Wow, this was a really nice tut. All clear and easy to read. yet I found a little typo, that might need to be corrected.

Part3, phase 22) you tell to copy and past using command "cmd-c" and "cmd-v"
Should say "Ctrl-c" and Ctrl-v" there is no cmd -key in a normal keyboard. Might get confusing (made me read all the keys, even I know how to copy/paste with shortcuts)

Thanks anyway

[tiggerypum]

Thank you Simboy, if that's my only mistake in 5,900 words, I'm not doing bad. What you found was a slip by a tired Mac owner - Macs have an additional key named 'cmd' and that is used instead of the ctrl key for many things, like copy and paste. I fixed it, thank you :)

[simboy]

Thank you tiggerypum, I still bow at you. I "hate" Macs, one button mouse etc.. (way off topic) Keep up that good work. Love your tuts.

[WesHowe]

I am quite impressed.
While I can write code that delas with 3D meshes, I am not able to do 3D meshing this well. Lots of hard work and imagination went into this.

<* Wes *>

[.Hanna.Webster.]

Thank you so much! :D

[animera]

tiggerypum, i would just like to say thank you very much :) i just got a mesh working, and if it wasnt for your tutorials, i would have never been able to get this mesh to work!! you are the best!!

[newbie3]

First of all, thank you for this great tutorial tiggerypum! It was neat and very easy to follow!

I have a little problem though. On step 58, when I replace the GMDC with the new one, the 'Loading Geometry Node' message appears and stays for ages. (and it blinks repeatedly).

At first I thought SimPE had crashed but the message left in the end. I then saved the package file and opened up Bodyshop but instead of seeing the 2 mesh parts combined, I found them separately as if I hadn't combined them at all. The rest of the tutorial went well, so I don't know what could have happened.

A bit of help from someone would be much appreciated! :)

[tiggerypum]

Might you have accidently tried replacing the geometry NODE with the GMDC? If that is what happened, you probably need to build a new mesh file, fix integrity, and attach it again to a recolor (and then replace)

[newbie3]

Thank you so much! It works now... I must have made some foolish mistake like that. :)

[tiggerypum]

Newbie, I did that once. There's a lot of steps involved, and I've made more than my share of errors, had to started parts over, and made meshes explode :)

I'm glad you've got it working now!

[mynxie]

I'm having problems with step 6... for some reason the option to not import the second skeleton never appears.. Blending groups "no" unreliable "okay" poof second skelly.. no other options available, I'm running MS v1.7.9, any thoughts on the matter? Something not set correctly in prefs or some file that I might be missing or option not turned on... I've been playing around with it for the better part of 3 hours now and just cannot get that last popup. All the other steps I got and have no problems with but the mesh itself is screwy from the extra skelly.

[tiggerypum]

You need to get the very most recent unimesh, excluding the skeleton import was added relatively recently.

That is assuming you are reading in 2 gmdcs (since you said you're getting 2 skeletons, that would be the case). If you read in a gmdc and then an obj file (like Al's shoes) you won't see that because you'll be using the Maya import instead.

[mynxie]

You Rock Tiggery! I don't know how in the heck I missed that one, let alone for an entire day (must be time to brush up on my reading comprehension LOL) Downloaded the newest version and now it's working like a charm. Thanks so much again for both the tutorials that you have put out and answering of questions from silly people like me.

[wilhelmina]

Thank you so much!!!! I followed your three tutorials and I did great... you are an excelent teacher... this is amazing... I never knew I could do something like this. :)

[obsessisim]

I too add my thanks for this wonderful tutorial, in fact for all the tutorials, there must be so much work involved, I can't imagine. I ran into trouble near the end and I can't seem to locate my error. I am all the way up to step #95, but when I attempted to export I received a warning stating I had "missing morph names pairs detected." ?? I tried retracing my steps, I had copied the comments, copied the name, deleted the first morph, I have no idea what I have done wrong, obviously some stupid thing but I just don't know what. I tried swearing profusely at the computer and that didn't work either. any suggestions please?

[tiggerypum]

So your non morphing mesh works perfectly?
I think we can rescue your edit, although it might be a bit confusing. But we'll need to start over at Part 11.
You could just start over and redo the edits... but instead let's look at it carefully.
You should have 2 groups, 1 body and 1 ~00MORPHMOD.0
They should have the comments as in the text above in that section.
And I do not know if CASE matters (BODY might not be 'body') so look at that also. I also always copy and paste the names instead of typing them in. Morphmod seems to be 'tilde zero zero m o r p h m o d dot zero' .... maybe one of those letters/numbers is incorrect?

[obsessisim]

I copied and pasted rather than typed, but that seems to be where it went wrong, everything worked like a charm right up to there. I'll go back in and look at it with a fresh brain this morning. I was completely baffled. Thanks for answering, I'll take a look and come back asap.
edit: there was one more thing, when I was editing the duplicate, I found that a bit tricky of course, takes practise I imagine, but if I screwed that up, would that account for the message? If it didn't match up perfectly to the morph, could that be it? :blink:

[obsessisim]

:bunny: colour me happy! It's all fixed and working now. I'll briefly explain where I went wrong and that might help someone else. I believe I may have deleted the wrong morph. My first mistake was not quitting while I was ahead, this tutorial was set up to save at several different points which made it possible to stop and then pick up where one left off. sometimes it's best to stop and look at something with a fresh brain instead of obsessively trying to finish it when your brain is fried. I picked up from step 83. This time I actually wrote down the colours of the two different morphs, purple for the first, aqua for the duplicate. When I deleted the original the duplicate changes to purple and I believe that's where I went wrong yesterday thinking I had deleted the wrong one. This was an excellent tutorial, set up so well it was pretty much stress-free. anyway all tested, all works, me happy, does a little snoopy dance, thanks again Tiggerypum! :giggler: :lovestruc

[tiggerypum]

obsessisim, I'm glad. And I went and re-read and beefed up some of the text/explanations in that area of the tutorial.

[rabidkitty07]

I'm not sure where to go to ask this, so please don't get made at me first off. I'm wanting to shorten long sleeves on the medieval dress, but I'm not sure if I'm suppose to replace with regular arms or just delete the part I don't want. Am I going about this the right way?

[tampan]

Thanks for the great tutorial tiggerypum. And i want to ask you is theres a way to restore the bump map.

[tiggerypum]

tampan, you already found the thread... http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=182391

[mookie]

Hi everyone!
Tiggerypum i wanted to ask you something but before i do, thank you for creating a tutorialthat helps you to learn how to mesh! it is hard to work with for someone who isnt into academics (the methods that people have to use just to change something in there game do not seem fair for everyone ), but i like how you made it easyer by speaking to us with words everyone could understand. that is the main reasion i read through this and didnt give up. thank you for helping all of us!

my question is about step 35 , Menu – VERTEX – Sims2 Unimesh Bone Tool.
i have selected one of the dots which are really two, but any time i press Sims2 Unimesh Bone Tool, milkshape shuts down. it says on my program that it is 1.7.8 (not sure what that mean, but i think it is new then)
here is a picture of what happend. as much as i try and do this step over, it just keeps shutting down. i'm not sure why, the programs i have look new.
anyway, if you or anyone else knows why, i'd love to know.
bye everyone!

[NixNivis]

Tiggerypum, first of all I want to say a great huge THANK YOU for this and all your other tutorials. I never, ever thought I could learn how to make even the slightest modification to a TS2 mesh, but you have shown me that it's actually possible. On top of that, you're a great teacher, and just generally brilliant.

Unfortunately, I'm obviously not quite as brilliant. :( I thought I was following this tut to the letter - at least everything looked like in your screenshots and all descriptions of what was happening fit - but when I got to step 61 and was going to check out my new mesh in Body Shop, it looked like the screenshot. The UV map looks OK and I haven't even touched the skin or alpha... so obviously, I went terribly wrong with the mesh somewhere - but I have absolutely no idea where. :cry: Do you have any idea what I've done? And how I can correct it? (I have a nagging suspicion the solution might be just to start all over, but before I do that I'm curious to know what I did so I can avoid doing it again.)

[NixNivis]

Addendum: I tried it all again, on a completely different mesh. This time everything worked perfectly, so maybe there's hope for me after all. ;) But I still have no idea where I went wrong the first time, so any imput you - or anybody else - might have is greatly appreciated!

Again, THANK YOU for this tutorial! You are awesomely awesome! :D

[tiggerypum]

mookie - shutting down like that must be a milkshape error. I haven't heard of it in a while, I remember it being mentioned in the unimesh thread. Make sure you have the newest unimesh installed. If that doesn't help, check at the milkshape site, I believe there was something you can download there if you're having crashing problems that's an alternative way for it to do some functions.

Nixnivis, I'm glad you got it working! And to be honest, it looks like your uvmap got damaged and I have no idea how. If that happens _again_ maybe you should upload the project to a new thread (with manage attachments) so people can have a look at it.

[fg109]

Tiggerypum, thanks a lot for the great tutorials. I followed everything in the guide, but I have a couple of problems with my mesh. I circled the problems in the picture. I've done everything I can think of to fix it: using the alignment tool to smooth out the faces, snapping vertices together instead of the extend tool, and fixing up the uv map. Unfortunately, nothing worked.

The two meshes I used was the afbottomslinkyskirtboots and afbottomshortskirtshoes. I replaced the waistline and shoes of the short skirt with the parts from the slinky skirt.

[tiggerypum]

Well, first, on the waistline - the difference in color (assuming you stayed away from changing the normals or touching the rows of vertices right near the waistline) is because unimesh doesn't have bumpmaps and maxis outfits do. So... if you did change things on the waistline, you probably want to re-do that part of the mesh. You can then later try and add bumpmaps back with smd format, but it's likely not going to be perfect, although it should be close.

The 'seam on back' looks like a uvmap problem. When you look at your uvmap, are some parts of it overlapping? Looks like part of the gray area is repeating, is that the issue? Or if your uvmap looks perfect, go look again at your alpha and make sure it lines up with your uvmap.

The shoe/boot - same thing. Look at your alpha and texture and uvmap.

The other thing is that maybe what you're getting is a gap/separation on the mesh. If you've snapped the vertices and it looks perfect in milkshape, then the issue is the bone assignments. Select each vertice (which is actually several) and use the unimesh bone tool and make sure they have _identical_ assignments. Ankles have complex assignments, as do buttocks - and those assignments will vary slightly from one mesh to the next - so when you combine meshes you will need to pick assignments from one of the two meshes (or average them) but do an 'apply all' 'commit all' to each vertex group in order to have them then animate as one.

[fg109]

Thanks, your advice really helped. The seams were taken care of when I did the bone assignment. And it took me forever to figure out that I could switch between groups on the texture editor. I thought the texture for the fat body was it, so nothing I did helped. Thanks a lot! :D

P.S. For the top mesh, I think I'll just cut the waist off a swimsuit mesh and stick it on instead.

[bLURR]

Aww, i thought i had to weld all vertices together when adding a new part, this is gonna save me alot off time on my next project....ty

[tiggerypum]

bLURR,

There were changes made to Milkshape at Wes' request so that the original normals as assigned by Maxis would be better preserved.... as such Welding is now mostly a bad idea if you have body meshes loaded - and not necessary even if you don't.

Snap the vertices (or edit the vertices to have the same x y z values)
Make sure bone assignments are identical
Use Demon's tools (which has a special align normals command) to smooth the normals

The wonderful thing about Demon's tool is that you can select vertices and it will only align the normals at that spot, it won't redo the whole mesh on you!

[bLURR]

thank you

[kanno]

PFIOUUU

thank you!! That was incredible again! I can't imagine how many time you spent on this tutorial, since me, who only had to follow it.. spent half a day to finish it...

What I like in this tutorial is you never conclude things are okay for us, you're always going back on steps we might have missed, even if you don't need it.
You would be a good teacher!!!

[ronyu02]

Never noticed these new tutorials before. Incidentally, I've been combining mesh parts before and glad to find out I've been doing them right (and indeed they work in the game) :D

Your tutorials are really well-written. Thanks for ALL your help!

I do have a question though. Is there a faster way to copy rows of data in Extended Manual Edit plugin? I mean, instead of copying the values field by field (X, Y, Z, bones, etc.)? I always had the impression I've been doing it the hard way. In any case, this task takes up a considerable amount of meshing time.

[tiggerypum]

It takes up a lot of time, and no... I believe it was requested of the author of the tools, but the changes were never implemented to my knowledge. Yeah, very fiddly work, very repetitious.

[christina-x]

Hi firstly I'd like to say thank you for all your tutorials, they are easy to follow.
I used this tutorial to edit a top part of a mesh to a bottom part of a different mesh but in body shop and in game there is a gap between the two, it looks fine in milkshape.
For part 3 I used vertex - snap together. On milkshape I can't find extended manual edit I can only find manual edit. How can I fix this problem with my mesh? its as if I havent snaped them together.

[tiggerypum]

Extended manual edit (and the normals fixer) is with DEMON'S TOOLS (stickied in the top of the main forum). They're listed in 'you will need'. Perhaps you downloaded them but didn't install them into your milkshape folder?

If a thin gap appears where your two mesh parts join, it's because the bone assignments are not identical on the vertices - and thus they're being pulled apart. You can use extended manual edit or you can just select the vertices and use the Unimesh bone tool and make sure they have absolutely identical values and that they add up to exactly 100%.

[christina-x]

Yeah, I found my problem, I'd check that they all added up to 100% and they did but they had different values that added up to 100% I changed that and now it works thanks :)

Do you know if anyones going to make a tutorial on how yo make your own shoes as I would like to try this? Ive search MTS2 but cant find one.
Ive D/L als shoes but would like to learn how to make my own.

[tiggerypum]

Christina, well there is both a simple modifying your mesh to have heels and dr pixel's tutorial that covers uvmapping shoes (which is part of the task if you make new parts). You can go far by just changing the shape of the sim's foot.

It is unlikely there will ever be a tutorial to take one step by step through making a shoe from scratch, because what you need to learn still is not sim-specific - you can learn with the generic milkshape tutorials on their site or the web. Learn how to make new shapes with it and edit them.

As this topic is departing wildly from this tutorial, if you do have more questions about making shoes, please start a new thread in the main bodyshop meshing area, thanks :)

[Lo&Ri]

Wow!!!
you are fantastic!!!!

[cloudlessnights]

I just tried doing this tutorial several times, but I'm always running into the same problem: Everything seems to work fine at first, but when I get to step 61 (checking the edited mesh in Bodyshop) and open the page with the female teen everyday clothes, my bodyshop crashed (error message: The application has crashed. The application will now terminate.)

Does anyone know what could cause this?

[tiggerypum]

cloudlessnights - and you've done tutorial #1 and #2 and this has never happened before? You're doing this project as written it sounds like...

[cloudlessnights]

Well, I have done the first two tutorials without problems, but that was several weeks and one or two re-installs ago, so I'm not sure how much use that's going to be. However, I did make a mesh with some simple edits to both the mesh itself and the UV map recently (so basically, the same stuff described in tutorial 2), and it didn't cause any problems.

And yes, I'm doing the tutorial as it's written here.

[tiggerypum]

Hmm. So, you run bodyshop and you can see the teen clothing? But then you do this tutorial, and then bodyshop crashes? And you delete the file from saved sims and bodyshop works again?

If that's the case, then there must be something in the linking that isn't working right. Are you using the simpe that is good for your current expansion pack level? Otherwise, I would simply make a fresh recolor and do the part where you link the modified shape and cres in.

OR, as long as you're working with Maxis meshes, go take a look at the new tools by Inge and Peter : http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=187761 They come with the newest simpe, and if you read the directions, you can quickly extract your original mesh parts (and then do fix integrity) and you can also use it to link your new mesh to a recolor -- look at the directions they provide.

[cloudlessnights]

I'm an idiot ... *headdesks*

I know what was wrong now - I replaced the gmnd instead of the gmdc when I imported the edited mesh back into SimPE, so of course it couln't work - though why I did it right when I was simply editing meshes but managed to screw it up every single time I tried combining mesh parts I'll never know.

Sorry to needlessly bother you!

... the automated mesh extractor is very useful, though - so thanks for the link!

[tiggerypum]

I'm glad you found it, and I forgot that it will make things go boom in bad ways! I did that once too, you're not alone.

[Saikatsu]

This tutorial has been a HUGE help and I've been able to glide through my mesh editing without any problems... up until now. Somewhere along the way, something went wrong and I have absolutely no idea what it is, and it's not allowing me to export correctly. After I put in the filename and click save, an error pops up saying "ERR: No quaternion values stored." The resulting file does have data in it, but it's smaller than the previous version I had exported (the version I'm trying to export has many more vertices).
I know what quaternions are, but I'm not quite sure how they relate to just a mesh object with no position settings. o_O I did use Lithunwrap to do some remapping directly to the MS3D file, but I don't know if that's a cause of a problem here, it really shouldn't be... any ideas?

[tiggerypum]

I am pretty sure that is your problem, the use of lithunwrap. It sounds to me like you lost some of the morph data on your mesh.

Milkshape in and of itself doesn't support morphs or mulitple bone assignments. The Unimesh plugins (in conjunction with changes that were made to milkshape) allow for extra data to be stored that is then translated into the correct format upon unimesh export. If lithunwrap supports milkshape files, it would be in the old format, and thus a bunch of the data (comments, secondary bone assignments, groups) might have been blown away.

[Saikatsu]

Dangit. >< I should have known about the multiple bone assignment thing, it's just been so long since I've worked with 3D files.
Guess I'm stuck with Milkshape's horribly lousy UVW mapping tools. D:

Thanks for the info. :3

[melanise]

i've noticed with unimesh you can not use Bump maps why is this ? and can it be altered so its usable on meshes transfered through unimesh ?

[tiggerypum]

Melanise,

Unimesh does not currently create working bumpmaps for your mesh. But there is a simple technique you can use to re-enable the bumpmap. If your original mesh had a bumpmap, when you are done editing your mesh.

Look at the gmdc in plugin view, and use EXPORT and export as a smd.
Then Import the file you just exported, making sure to enable the bumpmaps. Simple.

-- I just added that text to the tutorial. I haven't had time to do the detailed thing with screenshots, circles and arrows, but it's not too difficult to do.

[melanise]

ty so much ^.~ this tutorial is so detailed there is no way a mistake can be made during the process lol thank you tigger ;)

Edit-- oh ya where would i enable the bump map when i export in smd format ?

[tiggerypum]

Did you try exporting with smd and importing? It should be obvious when you do it, I think it might be on the import.

[Weji]

Wow, Tig! This is an outstanding tut. You absolutely rock :)

[tiggerypum]

melanise,

As your project has shifted to involve a lot more than this tutorial covers and in more detail, I've moved the conversation to here: http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=210013

[cultjam]

I have a question..........

I am following your tutorial. But, I have a mesh that already has the fat morph. So, do I follow the same steps I did with the mesh in putting new shoes/legs onto it??

[tiggerypum]

Cultjam, the instructions if followed told you _not_ to import the fat morph to begin with, and then we recreate it later.

I will explain why - if you are combining mesh parts (instead of say, just moving some vertices) the order of the vertices in the mesh can change as you regroup and combine pieces and all that.

In order for the morph to work, the order of the vertices in the morph must exactly match the order of the vertices in the body mesh. After I carefully did my edits multiple times on both the body and morph mesh, and then had the morph go explodey on me, I came to the conclusion that doing it that way is _too unreliable_ and I'd rather do the work once than 3 times. So that is how I teach it for advanced edits. Do your original work on your body only, get it totally working, test in the game, etc - then follow the steps to recreate your fat morph. As long as you only move/scale the vertices to make your fat morph, it will work perfectly and save you a lot of headaches.

[cultjam]

Thank you. I will have to just follow your tutorial from the begining all the way instead of skipping steps.

[cultjam]

I have a question............

I went thru this tutorial (step by step this time!! And I have learned alot more from this) I have made a new mesh, but what I want to do with this mesh is add the long bootcut jeans. I used the mesh from one of the formals, as it was easier for me to re-make the kind of shoe I like. But, the mesh foot doesnt match up with the foot on the bootcut jeans. There are more vertexes on my mesh than the one on the bootcut jeans mesh.

Is there another tutorial on this??

P.S. Thank you for the tutorials. They have helped me grow tremendously.

[tiggerypum]

cultjam, I've run into that also sometimes, at which point I've pulled hair, sometimes collapsed 2 points into 1 and then fixed the uvmap, or gone looking for another mesh to use for the other part. Counting up those vertices and making sure they match around is the best/easiest way to get parts to join together.

I've also had some luck in uhm..... how to describe this w/o writing a tutorial, I've got a backlog on them... I've snapped 2 vertices to the corresponding other mesh part and left the stray one in the center between them -- if both of the two vertices can have identical bone assignments, this can work. Then I take the 5 vertices and I force them to be in a totally straight line with each other by using scale, set to center of mass, leaving 1 value to be '1' and setting the others to zero (I think). If you experiment with this idea, you should be able to get things to align on each other in a straight line. Then I might rotate the unit (still keeping all 5 vertices selected) as a whole, so that the perfect alignment is retained. Also all 5 have to have identical bone assignments, then there's no gap as the sim animates in that area, because they'll move as a unit. Course with this trick you still have to go and adjust your uvmap, as clearly there will be distortion in your final shape.

[cultjam]

Tiggerypum,

Ill give it a try and see what happens.

Thanks

[Bethgael]

Hi Tiggerypum, wonderful tute, again. I know how long it's taking me to learn all of this; I can't even begin to express my admiration of you, HP, Faylen, Dr Pixel and the other tute writers, for how much work has gone into these.

They're very clear and easy to understand.

I have a couple of questions re the way things are done, just because my logical brain is going "why?" and I need to understand before it leads me around in circles or I'll get stuck the first time I try it without being hand-held. *grin*

In Part 6 (Step 37/8), we do the UV mapping, moving the second mesh downwards a bit.

In Part 7 we combine the two meshes.

Then, in Part 8 we need to move all of the vertices of the former second mesh for the UV map.

Can you explain to me why it's done in this order? And would doing Part 7 before Part 6 then negate the need to do Part 8 (ie, would joining the meshes mean the vertices move together while UV mapping? I have no idea). I don't doubt you at all, I'm just wondering. :)

Sorry, another q. When editing the fatmorph, do we need to assign weights again?

Also, with the new version of Milkshape, every time I open a new mesh, just after the "Do you want to INCLUDE additional bones?" [sic, I'm not yelling :)], there's another box "Some skin weights do not total 100% Do you want these corrected?"

I've been hitting "no" and doing it manually as stated in the tutorial, but should/can I hit yes or no there?

[tiggerypum]

Bethgael, easy part first, Wes added the 'fix underweight bones' routine to the beginning of the newest unimesh and you can just say 'YES' and skip it later. I will update the tutorial, soon as I get time :S

The morph parts of the meshes are only there in order to show where the vertices will move - bone assignments do not matter. Wes' plugin will take the original mesh and the morph mesh and recreate the morph data (which contains the numbers regarding the new placement of the vertices). It's just that we can't edit a messy string of numbers by hand and make sense of it, thus he gives us a mesh to work with :)

The reason why I have you pull the vertices down a bit and then individually back up is so that you can tell them apart and make a consistant and accurate rejoining of them. In this case it _might_ be that your vertices would line up perfectly, or be just a tiny bit off - but trying to grab vertices in the uvmap that are just a bit off can get really messy. Also, if they're just a bit off, you might move the vertice from the top mesh one time, and the vertice from the bottom mesh another time, thus adding unnecessary distortion to your uvmap.

If you start 'frankesteining' more complex meshes or say, the legs of pants, you'll probably appreciate that they aren't showing up tangled together - the move away is a quick one (when they're not yet regrouped). When you do that you might also find yourself realigning entire columns or rows to accommodate the different mapping of the two original meshes, but I believe you'll get it figured out if that happens.

[Bethgael]

OK, that makes complete sense to me now. Thankyou. :)

[Ameliiya]

Is it possible to use this method to combine two meshes if one of them is saved as a milkshape project? Would it work to follow all the steps the same but instead of Unimesh importing the milkshape project using the merge option?

[tiggerypum]

Ameliiya if you import the sim mesh first with unimesh and thus get a proper skeleton, yes. BUT if you additional project has a skeleton in it, that will be a problem and you'll end up with 2 of them. How was this milkshape project created? You could save your additional project out as obj and then import that - but be aware that you must make all the bone assignments on the new pieces.

[Ameliiya]

The Milkshape project was created during one of the meshing tutorials (not this one) where it said to continuously save it as a milkshape project incase you stuff something up. I indeed stuffed it up but now can't figure out how i can use that milkshape project.

Is there a tutorial somewhere that explains how to make bone assignments?

Also thankyou for the fast reply =) Much appreciated.

Edit* I'm also unsure of whether or not it has a skeleton and how to figure that out. *feels stupid*

[tiggerypum]

Well this tutorial covers the mechanics of making bone assignments. To 'fix' bone assignments you'd compare to a working mesh, but that's a lot of bone assignments (like 1500-2500 on a body).

What tool were you using at the time? 'Bodychop'? 'Meshtool' ? I think you can check for a skeleton by looking at the tab about joints and unchecking the thing to show joints/skeleton. Blue circles mean 'skeleton'. Problem is if it was an old tool (from over a year ago?) then it might not be easily salvagable in its current form.

[Ameliiya]

Ok the milkshape file does seem to have a skeleton. I used body shop and followed one and two of these tutorials.

However i have discovered that i do have the milkshape file as a simpe file. But when i import it with Sims 2 Unimesh importer V4.07 i get this error:

"ERR: Too Many P4 Block A Data Items"

[WesHowe]

Almost always, that error comes from a second copy of the bones in the joints panel.

A Sims2 body mesh has 65 joints in the GMDC, always (they are not all assigned to anything, but they need to stay there). If you imported a second mesh with skeleton, there will be 130 joints. You will see a set that starts with "auskel" and then later you will see the whole list repeat. If you want to salvage the file, carefully delete the SECOND set of joints.

What you want is the original 65 joints, which are the first on the list, all in the original order. You don't want 65 that have two of one and another name missing.

<* Wes *>

[Ameliiya]

Ok done and done. After deleting the joints i followed the tutorial and everything looked like it was lined up properly, i checked the bone assignments etc etc followed every step, but my mesh has come out all weird with a combination of both meshes (even parts that were deleted). Any ideas?

Thanks for the help Wes, it's very much appreciated and i must say i admire your knowledge.

[tiggerypum]

You can hide groups and not have deleted them. When you load you mesh, go to the GROUPS panel and check how many groups you have there. If this is a huge edit, I usually suggest not importing the fat morph to begin with (how this tutorial is written) at which point there should be only 1 body group and that's it. Or you might see 1 body and one fatmorph. If you see more than that, you'll need to carefully click on the different parts of the mesh there and the 'hide' button to hide and show them (it toggles) and figure out which groups are extra and delete them.

The other possibility is that in Simpe you didn't say 'replace' but used 'add' to read in your new mesh parts. So double check that you only have 1 gmdc in your file. I have no idea what it'll do if there are 2 gmdcs in there.

[cultjam]

Another question............

I have used Al's shoe and leg in this tutorial to make my mesh. When I import, it says theres something unassigned. Which, is my legs. Should I use Dr. Pixels direction in assigning my legs??
I used the bone tool as well. Everything matches and weights. I must have missed something, again??

Thanks

[tiggerypum]

cultjam,
well, first, make sure to use the unimesh bone tool, not the joints thing in milkshape. You do somewhere have an unassigned vertice, probably on the leg or shoe.

Here's a general guide for the lower leg/foot and some useful discussion:
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?p=1550809

and in a thread Dr Pixel posted:

The easist way to find un-assigned vertices is to use MilkShape's "Joints" tab - do NOT try to assign them with it, but it does have a way to select only vertices that are completely un-assigned, instead of having to go through a bunch of them in the bone tool looking for -1.

Just make sure all morph groups are hidden (they should have no assignments anyway), then on the Joints tab click the button [SelUnassigned]

Any un-assigned vertices will turn red, and then you can open the BoneTool to fix them.

[Ameliiya]

Ok so i've followed the tutorial step by step all vertices match and everything yet i have a weird gap which i've attatched in a pic.

So i went back and checked with Extended manual edit (i used snap vertices but checked with eme just in case) and everything was fine. Then i checked the bone assignments which all add up to 100% but i have a question.

Look at the pic to understand what i'm saying.

If the red, black and green don't match on A and B but blue still adds up to 100% on both does that matter?

[tiggerypum]

Yes, it matters, very observant. You're almost there.
For two vertices to function as one, they must have _identical_ bone assignments. I mention it when joining the legs together, that the bone assignments must be the same.

Bone assignments.... they tell that particular vertex how to locate itself in relationship to the 'skeleton'. Thus when the skeleton is moved by animation, the vertices follow. So by having 2 different values there, the two vertices are being pulled a little bit apart.

For your changes, check every pair and make the assignments identical. I'd suggest simply favoring one value over another (but do it the same all the way around, like always using the value from the first vertex or something like that)

As for the other part, I am not sure why one sleeve shows and the other doesn't. And the legs look uneven in the front also. Did you do exactly the same procedure to each arm? Might not the boy's overalls have been a better choice as a base mesh, as they don't have the waist shape to begin with?

[Ameliiya]

Ok i changed all the bone assignments and it completely fixed my gap problem =) Thankyou so much!! The arm thing was just that the alpha had changed.

Now the problem i'm having is (i think) to do with the uv map. I adjusted all the uv mapping but am having trouble with the way the texture and alpha is applied to the mesh, which i figured is because of the uv map.

I've included a pic of the texture and how it comes out on the mesh. Only the shoes are a problem right now. I actually combined three meshes in this one (the shoes were a seperate mesh) so i'm wondering if that could have something to do with it.

Sorry for having so many questions, i'd just like the mesh to be usable for other creators.

[tiggerypum]

Ameliiya, please add a screenshot of the uvmap - select your entire mesh, go into the texture coordinator, hit printscreen, close the texture window, open up paint or another graphics program, PASTE. Crop the graphic so we just see the uvmapping, and save as jpg.

[natalove]

there's no greater success than success itself. :)

i have a question though - in Milkshape, is there a way that i can edit the vertices of one group WHILE the other overlays it, without altering the overlaying one's vertices? it came up while i was editing the fat morph, even though i had the "duplicate" group selected as the working group (though i don't think it matters), when i selected its vertices, the fat morph vertices that were in the close neighbourhood of them also got selected. i had to switch between hiding and showing the fat morph so i could move only the fit group with the fat one untouched.

this is just too annoying to be left without a solution. :(

either way, many thanks for your efforts, time and will. you're the best. :king:

[cwurts00]

What does this mean? I am very frustrated, I had thought building a body mesh was going to be so difficult because I couldn't figure out how to make the right shapes to do it. Then I suddenly figured it out, and was very eager to finish something I didn't even know how to start a few hours before. But now, after all that work, and being so excited to see how it looked in CAS, I tried to export it with Unimesh but got the above message.

I really want this resolved because it was such a good mesh, and it would be a shame for all that work to go to waste.

Thanks.

P.S. I used alot of spheres in my mesh and I did not assign to anything, that I'm aware of. I just want to know how to fix it without ruining my project.

[tiggerypum]

You have to give every new vertex a bone assignment. This tutorial covers bone assignments. If you continue to be stuck on the project (which is beyond this tutorial) then please make a new post in the main bodyshop area (not tutorials) and show as much of your project as you can and explain what you've done and what you want to do.

[DOEreoh]

it took me a while but now i understand everything covered in these 3 tutorials!!! yay!! u rawk!!!! :)

i have a little question for you tiggerypum, if i may!!!

at one point in the tutorial you spoke of a cheat dresser so that you dont have to go shop to get to try on your new cloths and meshs!!!

can you please tell me where to find it?

i tryed but didnt find anything!! :(

tyvvm!!! :)

[tiggerypum]

DOEreoh: Hacked Dresser: http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=87456

[DOEreoh]

tyvm!!! your tha best! lol! :)

[CLCNY20]

Tiggerypum, and HystericalParoxysm(sp?), I just wanted to thank you guys so much for all of your help in learning how to mesh (both clothing AND hair). This site is so awesome, and I'll always come here during my lunch break to check up with the latest.

I'm about to open a new sims site, and waited for as long as I did (I wanted to open it back in 2005!) because I did not know how to mesh. I finally found the time/money/patience needed, and want to show you what your great tutorials have lead me to do.

Thank you so much!

:lovestruc :lovestruc :D

[tiggerypum]

You can assign bones with extended manual edit, go look at the various options in the left hand corner and click on things to show what you need to.

[extrasecret]

Hi!

I ask your help. Fewer before i successeded to combine the maildelivery with a swimwear mesh, with your guide. I want to do this again with paperdelivery&tfspikeneck. I do the same way, but the result is a head with a non visible body... What can 1 do wrong? This is a mesh or a texture mistake?

Thx

[tiggerypum]

extrasecret, you can look in the 'faq infocenter' for some tips on what to check.
http://www.modthesims2.com/forumdisplay.php?f=451

It's pretty difficult for me to guess exactly where you went wrong. If you have the same groups with the same name as the base mesh you were working with (probably 'body') then something should show up, if it's linked in right.

[Ameliiya]

I know i've left it ages (been super busy) but this post is in regards to the toddler mesh i was making. This is the UV Map for it.

[tiggerypum]

Ameliiya, take your uvmap and edit it to just be the map 512x512.
Open your texture in a graphics program that allows for layers (photoshop, paintshop pro, gimp, paint.net)
Paste in the uvmap over it, then lower the transparency of the uvmap layer so you can see your texture.
Look at the shoes. Do you see how there is the soles and there is to the right of them the top of the shoe. That's how you have to color things. You can go back to your graphic and draw onto it having the uvmap over it as a guide. You might also have luck stealing the original shoe texture and laying it over your body texture.

Whatever you do with that, make sure your alpha graphic also corresponds

[extrasecret]

Hiya!

I've got another question: there's a body and a half-sphere. Do I need to snap together the vertex, or is it enought, if i create faces between the two groups?

[tiggerypum]

extrasecret, I'm not sure what exactly you are working on, but as long as you have vertices that meet and have the exact same bone assignments, the mesh should be fine. The new parts also need to be uvmapped, and must have normals (they should look silver/gray in milkshape, not black) - use 'align normals' on new pieces.

[extrasecret]

tiggerypum: on Lolo Ferrari's chest :D , but minimal success...

[fiepijah]

as far as i got the toturial was really helpful, but when i got to part 17, i got an error which said that milkshape had crashed and that all of my work would be deleted:( i tried again many times but the same thing happened every time! help me please?

[tiggerypum]

fiepijah - step 17? Where you first save a milkshape file? Uhm this is tutorial #3 - did you not have this problem the whole time? Did you change something on your computer? Milkshape crashing - the usual answer is to try and install the open gl stuff if it doesn't run correctly on your system.

[fiepijah]

no, it has never happened before. but i tried again now,but now it shuts down already when i am about to import the tf_bodyhipmandarintop! i don't understand, it doesnt happen when i just import one mesh, just when i import two meshes:(

[tiggerypum]

Hmm, I just recently had many meshes in my milkshape at once. Are you answering 'no' to the question about importing more bones after you bring in the first mesh? I'm wondering what could be overloading it. How much memory does your system have? You might try posting the _exact_ error message that appears at the milkshape forums (at their site) and see if they have suggestions.

[fiepijah]

should i answer no or yes to the question about importing more bones?

[fiepijah]

i didn't happen this time, for now unleast:) but there isn't anything called extended manual edit in the vertex menu, onlu manual edit:s

[tiggerypum]

go get demon's tools and install them. That's part of the instructions beginning of the tutorial.

and you're supposed to answer NO about including additional bones. I'm sorry, Wes changed the dialog box. You can say 'yes' to fix underweight bones (which is not in the tutorial)

[fiepijah]

now i have downloaded the demon's tools, and moved them to local disc, programfiles and milkshape, but heres still no extende manual edit:( but the two files i downloaded isn't called msExtendedManualEdit.dll and msAlignNormals.dll, they are called MTS2_260194_demon432_msAlignNormals and MTS2_260928_demon432_ExtendedManualEdit_v106c....?:S

[tiggerypum]

fiepijah, you need to unzip/unrar them first?

[fiepijah]

hi again:) i'm importing Al's shoes to the body mesh, but when i am finished with the editing and am about to export the mesh, i get an error that says: unassigned bones exists! ?

[tiggerypum]

fiepijah - my crystal ball isn't functioning well tonight. I'm looking but I see nothing.

[fiepijah]

you don't see the picture?

[tiggerypum]

No, you can't link us to a picture on YOUR C: Drive. You must go back and hit 'edit' then hit manage attachments button after your message, and upload the picture to the server here.

[Purple Sheera]

Thank you so much TIG for this wonderful tutorial, the 3 tutorials are amazing , and God bless you for this huge work.

I made the 3 tutorials and everything looked great. Now i'm trying to do my own mesh, and it's a combined one too, one of them is the adult female formal long black dress which it's name in simpe in prop. set is afbodydresslonghug_black, and the other one is the adult female short formal black dress which it's name in simpe is afdressaboveknee_bnw. I edited the 1st mesh and made it shorter, and i used the legs and shoes of the 2nd mesh and combined the 2 meshes together. Everything is looking great in UVmapping and all other stuff, except that when i opened Bodyshop to see what's going on , and i saw this thing (as shown in the image), can you help me REMOVING the long trousers or socks please ?

Thank you so much again.

[tiggerypum]

Purple Sheera,
So, is the body shape exactly what you imagined? It looks to me like you forgot to edit your alpha graphic - go make a new recolor, and make sure that the alpha part on the legs area is black - that looks like the bottom of a dress on her legs.

[Purple Sheera]

Thank you so much TIG for your reply. So if i'll make the alpha part of the legs area black , will the legs look normal into the game ? What i ment , will they have the original skin color of a Sim ?

Thank u again Tig.

[tiggerypum]

Purple Sheera - please go back and do the entire series of tutorials on bodyshop skinning (over here (http://www.modthesims2.com/forumdisplay.php?f=20) ), to gain more understanding of how sim clothing is made, which is gonna keep thwarting you (and also make it harder for you to create good mesh designs). The way sims clothing works *is* that the alpha controls which part of the design is 'outfit' and which part lets skin show through. I believe that is taught (probably by moving a neckline) in all 3 series of bodyshop tutorials we have on site. There's 3-4 tutorials each in a set for photoshop, gimp, or paint.net (the last 2 of which are free programs)

[Purple Sheera]

Thank u Tig.

[Sophia_]

Thanks, tig! This tutorial was great! Still I have one question. What would have caused my mesh to totally explode? I followed the steps carefully. :o

[tiggerypum]

Sophia_ explode when fat or explode... always?
When fat, remake the fat morph. Otherwise, I suggest just starting over, no idea.

[Sophia_]

Sophia_ explode when fat or explode... always?
When fat, remake the fat morph. Otherwise, I suggest just starting over, no idea.

Exploded before making the fat morph. But thanks anyway.

[melanise]

i wasnt sure where to pop this, but seen as there is a brief explaination for alpha meshing at the bottom i thaught i would take a chance. basically i was wondering say if you use the hula dress for one section of the outfit for say like the dress or something and you wanted more alpha areas on the outfit how would you go about making a flat plane to act as a member of that particular group for example alpha group 3 or something... do you just add what ever mesh you make to that particular alpha group or is there more to it ? :blink:

[tiggerypum]

Melanise, that's pretty much it - just like you can add/replace shoes on a mesh by regrouping and fixing the comments. You can delete the entire hula skirt mesh parts, but you need the group name and comments so that you can _easily_ tie in the new meshy bits to your mesh - your recolor file will have the two parts, the textures will be linked to the groups, each group will have a matd you can alter, etc. Note that when you start working with alpha, the alpha has a morph also - and morphs must still have exactly matching vertices - so either carefully do identical edits or recreate the fat morph as outlined here for the alpha part of the mesh also.

[melanise]

thankyou so much tiggery ^.^ also its accured to me that there is a front and back face to these alpha's.. or is it just me and is there another way of getting a front and back face on a flat plane without having 2 identical pieces close together ?

[tiggerypum]

once you have your shape the way you like it, if it needs a lining, read the milkshape tips in the faq/infocenter - there's a link there to easy ways to make a lining.

[maloekoegirl]

I have one question....Can I add pregmorphs to a body with this tutorial?

Thanks,

B

[tiggerypum]

Maloekoegirl, Start with a base mesh as your first import that has a preg morph once you have your initial mesh completed. Then repeat the procedure to remake the fat morph and also make a pregmorph. Note that the game alone will not support any new preg meshes, you will need to use a hack to use them.

[adrumsolo4u]

i was about to ask what was going wrong within the first step... the dress was not cut off short and on the legs like yours was in the picture. Then i realized that this fact is because i used the OLD dress, not the one from the last tutorial. this meant that the alpha and color were no-longer lengthened (which is what made your dress show on the legs when you used the old mesh) Because it is shorter than the mesh edited in the last tutorial. I thought that if this confused anyone else it would be a good idea to put in here in case others didn't want to have to use the dress form tutorial 2. or if they deleted it.

[play girl]

well i was making a mesh like always i thought it might explode lol but it didn't at least i think so...it has this weird line thing and i was thinking it might be a bad bone assignment i tried reassigning but i couldn't fix it...am i missing something or did i do assingments wrong?i'm pretty sure i didn't miss a step. can someone help btw i attached a pic so you can see what i mean

[tiggerypum]

Those are bad bone assignments, almost guaranteed. You need to go through your assignments on that foot and look at every one of them. Make sure they add up to 100% - and make sure that you somehow didn't assign them to some other bone than that foot. It looks like probably all those would be assigned to 100% foot. If you find one that's wrong, fix it, and hit the commit button before going to the next one.

[$RaMRoM$]

Thanks tig for these amazing tutorials! i had so much fun doing them and i have learned a lot! So Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you for the tutorial!

I havent tested it in the game but i will do that now and edit the post to tell you about the result :)

edit:
I tested the mesh in Fat Morph and normal body and it worked perfectly! the animation of the sims was great! thanks again :D

Here is a pic of my work:

http://thumbs2.modthesims2.com/images5/MTS2_563674_$RaMRoM$_Dress2.JPG

[melanise]

hiya, yet again another damn problem -.- what will we ever do without them lol. wasnt really paying attention whilest making this but somewhere along the line the smoothness has changed on this it was smooth before but now it looks like its been chopped and just placed beside each other help please hopefully its something i can resolve :-S http://img124.imageshack.us/img124/3937/weirdmistonesfo1.jpg

[tiggerypum]

melanise you either updated and thus reset your settings and/or didn't have 'autosmooth' unchecked (tutorial #1)

OR - you hit the 'smooth' command from milkshape.

You could try and patch it up using demon's align normal after selecting some of the vertices along the seams, but you're going to run into trouble at the hem edge. Would be better to start over than to try and get rid of the bad seams.

[melanise]

nooooo lol i was dreading that, ahh yes i remember i did use autosmooth but i selected the alpha part not the whole mesh O.o but oh well i'll have to give it another shot thank you tigs ^.^

[$RaMRoM$]

auto smooth is not availble for one part, it AUTO Smoothes the whole body when you import it :)

[tiggerypum]

it autosmoothes *everything* it smooths all groups, hidden groups, everything. As does the milkshape built in smooth command.

To adjust only part of the mesh you need to use Demon's Align Normals tool.

[loki23_1]

Mookie I read your message. I dont know if you have gotten an answer yet on why it shuts down. But in many cases good "computer defence" programs will alert you and shut down the cause of any change in "Vital" programs or files. To stop that from happening I always kill my Zone Alarm Pro. OR you could put those programs in the trusted files list...(spacing the name of it right now) I believe you can even have it warn you before it shuts down the program. But adding it to the trusted programs would proably be easier and even easier when you edit meshes just simply turn off the Zone Alarm.

Sincerly,
Noobie

[HystericalParoxysm]

The end of this tutorial has info on alpha meshes, fusi0n556 (and the thanks button is at the end of the first post). You need to be well-experienced in non-alpha body meshes before attempting it, as animating them can be tricky even for experienced body meshers. Tig's info there is pretty much all the tips and info you could need, and the rest one learns through doing regular body meshes (and practicing at it). They're really not all that complex besides having extra groups to keep track of, and being a pain in the neck to animate.

[HystericalParoxysm]

Please use the Edit button rather than double-posting if you have something to add or change.

All body meshes are animated - it's getting an alpha layer to work right, not clipping through the body mesh underneath that's the trickiest part... that's the animation, and that's usually a matter of trying to line up vertices so as many vertices of your alpha layer overlay the body mesh's vertices as possible, then matching their bone assignments vertex-for-vertex... and then testing and tweaking and testing and tweaking.

You also don't necessarily need to make an alpha mesh to do an open jacket over a shirt. There are ways to do that solid - take a look at Maxis meshes set up like that (there are several layered shirt combos) and you'll see how that's laid out. You should only use an alpha mesh if you have to - just putting together two garments in a way you could do without alpha is not reason enough.

[tiggerypum]

fusi0n556 - please use this thread to discuss actually DOING tutorial #3. For other projects, please make a new thread in the main area. Thanks :)

[BloomingExplorer]

Hi Tiggerypum and Hysterical Paroxysm,

First of all thank you sooooooooooooooooooooo much for your excellent tutorials :gjob:
and all your effort to help so many people.
I have learned a lot from you.

Last days I've been trying to attach Al's shoes to a mesh.
I got stuck......
Today I followed your handy tutorial.
That surely cheered me up :-)
In Milkshape everything looks just fine now.
There are no seams and the model looks great.
But in Bodyshop and in the game, there's still a seam.
There's no gap, but just a seam. :blink:

I used the extended manual edit and Demon's align normal.
Also I've fixed underweighted bones.
Like other people I can't use the Unimesh bone tool.
I even installed the drivers today, but the problem still remains.
Milkshape keeps shutting down... :-(

Does it always leave a seam when exporting the mesh with unimesh,
when you skip the step with the bone tool?

Could you please help me?

Thanks again and keep up the good work! :up:

[tiggerypum]

extended manual edit and the bone tool should do the same thing.
when you look at the uvmap, does your new leg section match up exactly with the other part of the leg?

Can you post a screenshot showing your problem, also your mesh in milkshape, and the uvmap?

[BloomingExplorer]

Hi Tiggerypum,

Thanks for your quick response.
I made some pictures of my problem.
The first picture shows the problem.
The other pictures show what I see in Milkshape.
In SimPe I did replace the GMDC with the new version.
I would be gratefull if you could take a look at them.

Thanks!!

[tiggerypum]

I believe your problem is with your uvmap. Sim feet (up to that ankle seam) are mapped separately from the leg. Look at the original uvmaps from various dresses, you will see that there is a gap at the ankle. By connecting that section, you are including part of the skin texture that's not supposed to be included and might have who knows what in that little area.

For examples, look at this thread at a glance for various uvmaps.
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=214890

how to fix? You could try using a uvmap of a bare legged sim having it as your texture. Then see if you can separate your seam back to the two parts where it belongs. Otherwise, you might need to reattach those feet.

[BloomingExplorer]

THANKS!!! :jest:

I'm so happy, you have really been a big help and solved my problem.
Now I can finish my outfit.
You are a great teacher!!
Thank you for all your effort and kindness.

:rofl:

[melanise]

hey tig and all, i needed to find out soemthing, i sorted out the tone problem and finished my mesh i used the hula girl outfit as a base for my mesh so i could use all the comments, the only thing i did do is import a bare body into it seen as the hula one has coconuts. ok just wondering weather i need to change any Materials or anything in simpe O.o i'm gonna go ahead and see if i can recolour as normal but i just wanted to make sure ty

[tiggerypum]

melanise, the material defs are in the bodyshop recolor file in saved sims. If you want to do the same thing as the hula, except with non-coconut breasts, then you should be set.

[melanise]

Thanks again tiggs :bunny: well i have another final problem i hope xD well i have finished everything i know how to make a normal alpha editable outfit and make the material have a see through effect but is there anyway of making it so i can alta my alpha outfits transparency using the body_alpha~stdMatBaseTextureName_alpha, i tried this because i wasnt sure and when i changed it grey slightly from white it disappeared so i didnt know what to do, i just left it with a transparent effect which is an option for the whole outfit (see picture) please if there is another way can i get help ty loads http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/8689/clp1gx7.jpg

Melanie :up:

This outfit is made transparent using Simpe chaning the MATD file alittle, but i want to know if i can make my alpha have transparency using the body_alpha~stdMatBaseTextureName_alpha sorry for repeating this slightly but its just in case it makes more sense than the first section... :wtf:

[makala896]

its confuessing me more T_T

[katala]

Firstly thankyou both for making such an easily understood tutorial <<bows reverently
I finished the first two tutorials with no problems but kept hitting the snag of using the bone tool in milkshape,after browsing different threads came upon the solution I had to delete duplicate bones or joints whatever they are called. I am definitely proud of my final result :D Now all I have to work out is how to get my custom avatar to show and I will be happy as larry
Anyway thanks again to all those who make such tutorials possible
Kat :)
*ooops my bad my custom ava is working <<does snoopy dance

[tiggerypum]

melanise

You need 2 things, first, that the alpha area is set correctly in the matd....

THIS sets things to make a see-through garment with alpha
stdMatAlphaBlendMode:blend
stdMatAlphaTestEnabled:0

This sets things to alpha on and off only (which is how hula probably was set)
stdMatAlphaBlendMode:none
stdMatAlphaTestEnabled:1

NOTE - the first set of settings are very fussy about the order in which things are layered, it's like hair - layer it the wrong way or have oddly intersecting pieces and you'll get funky bleed-through displays that won't look right at all. Also note that alpha pieces with hems need linings (tutorial is found in 'milkshape the insides' which is linked in the milkshape tips article in the faq area)

Once your matd is set correctly, to USE the alpha property, you need to make the texture and alpha file match what you want to do. For the hula settings, your b&w alpha graphic should be a sharp b&w shape, because it's an on-off alpha (either 100% solid or 100% invisible, which is how hula is).... or you can use grayscale alphas to make semi-transparent clothing if you set the alpha to blend.

[melanise]

i am so very lost... ok tigg so right now my aplha MatD has been set to stdMatAlphaBlendMode:blend
stdMatAlphaTestEnabled:0

before as you said it was
stdMatAlphaBlendMode:none
stdMatAlphaTestEnabled:1
i thaught with the second setting in simpe i could change the Transparency through the body_alpha~stdMatBaseTextureName_alpha file but it never worked, when i changed to grey it just disappears ... i'm really confused now...do you think the first setting i have it on is correct or have i done somethign wrong here ? i can cut parts away etc but cant change transparency on the normal setting:
stdMatAlphaBlendMode:none
stdMatAlphaTestEnabled:1

[tiggerypum]

with blendmode:none and alphatestenabled:1 you can change the *shape* of your graphic - like how the hula skirt is, with the grass leaves. So you can use a black and white alpha graphic.

blendmode:blend means you can use a gray alpha.

[melanise]

Ty so much tig so if i want to use the gray alpha do i just use:
blendmode:blend
alphatestenabled:0 ??

[tiggerypum]

melanise, yes - use black to make any shape changes, gray to have it transparent, white for solid.

[shamere900]

wow. confusing lol. I got through the others with good results, but i dont even think i can do the first step of this tut. :( . I'm so confused.

[shamere900]

Ok, i got to step 37, but the problem is, when i bring up the Texture Coordinate Editor, Its has the clothes but not the shoes, what could be wrong? And how can i stop this?

[tiggerypum]

shamere900 - your mesh at that point is still in 2 groups - each group has its own uvmap. (Note I mention that you should have 2 groups, at that point both named 'body' - one being the clothing, and one the shoes)
You have the wrong group selected.

[shamere900]

Ok, thanks

[melanise]

Wow after all these months lol, i'm finally somewhat used to attaching different meshes and making alphas all thanks to you tiggs ty so much for your support ever day, :lovestruc Here is what i've been working on my finished outfit.. http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/2514/oversizedjumperskinnyjewb6.jpg

I have a question, if i want to make alpha part on the male can i also use the hula outfit for females or not ?? i was thinking about it but dont really want to jump into that lol, if yes then would there be any thing i need to alter in simpe once i have made my male alpha mesh using the hula skirt for females ?

[tiggerypum]

melanise - uhm in short

Using hula to make a male base mesh.

1) recolor female hula in bodyshop, import.

2) build your mesh file using the 4 female hula parts, fix integrity, save modified shape and cres, link them to your saved sims recolor.

3) change the gender in your saved sims bodyshop file to male (tutorials for that are in bodshop-skinning although they tell you not to do it with adults because the necks of male/female are incompatible, do it anyway (instructions are for kids and toddlers, do the same thing))

4) go ahead and check in bodyshop, now you should see the female body on a male sim, neck doesn't match, etc.

5) start editing your hula gmdc - import female hula gmdc first. Now import a male mesh or meshes. Replace female mesh parts with male - making sure in the end you have groups named the same as the original hula and same comments.

6) go to bodyshop, hit 'new' - go find your MALE outfit. It will be a mess, textures all wrong, because hula is mapped all over the place. Make a new project - and replace the textures with ones that match your new mesh.

[melanise]

ty tiggs ^.^

EDIT: Tig about the transparent thing i am stombling across the same problem alittle i need to know the back and front faces do they need to be sperate groups ? or combined like i've always been doing... cuz i know with hair its sepearte groups like alpha 3...alpha 5... kinda thing !help! lol

[iamliz13]

Thanks so much for this tutorial Tig!

[tiggerypum]

melanise, I have not worked with semi-transparent skirts myself -- but this is what has been posted a couple of times.

Either use two groups (I think the woman's slip has 3 groups total) or you can also have 2 groups named the same thing (with the same comments) and they seem to combine -- this is a 'trick' that _some_ of the popular hair meshers use. Or you can regroup them back into 1 group - but see below - the order seems to matter.

At any rate - have the LINING group *above* the outer layer group when it comes to the group page. And scale the lining down a tiny bit, so that it's actually _inside_ the outer part. (as the usual way to make the lining is to duplicate part of the mesh, reverse the vertex order, scale it down slightly (like .99 or .999), and use demon's align normals on the new lining)

iamliz - :) Welcome to the world of meshing, hair tearing, and other madness :)

[melanise]

thats just it tigg i have my back and front layer and seperate them ever so slightly but i think i've seperated them abit too far apart i think thats where my problem lies because i remember on a test mesh i made everything came out shire and correct so i'm gonna give this a wirl thankyou so much tig again :-)

melanise - uhm in short

3) change the gender in your saved sims bodyshop file to male (tutorials for that are in bodshop-skinning although they tell you not to do it with adults because the necks of male/female are incompatible, do it anyway (instructions are for kids and toddlers, do the same thing))


i was also wondering about this sentense where in the saved sims file do i go to change this gender i wasnt sure what you meant, i checked the file and i see gender (this was on a womens mesh) and it had a number next to it ... not sure how to go about changing the gender is there a link to where i can understand this or could you let me know ty tig :beer:

[tiggerypum]

Melanise - did you actually go look at bodyshop SKINNING in the tutorial area and actually look for the tutorial on the list for changing the gender? Because it's there.

[dragonarts]

*applause applause*

"And this year's Delphy award for Tutorials in a Series goes to... Tiggerypum for her excellent series of tutorials on body meshing."


Well, if there WAS such a Delphy Award, I'm sure you'd get it. :rofl:
I've attached a picture of the outfit I made _after_ I completed this tutorial. I used parts of three different meshes, and altered part of the main one, to create this nifty set of capri pants and ThinkGeek T-shirt, for everyday or exercise. I have a little fiddling to do on the texture, but otherwise it's perfect. All I did was follow the instructions here, and it worked. So, thanks.

[melanise]

never mind i figured it out sorry about that tig

[tristessa44]

tigerrypum THANK YOU SO MUCH for everything

i was just reading some of your replyes 'cos i was looking for something, and as it usualy goes i find something totaly different, and it was something i was searching for long long time - BUMPMAPPING! I CAN'T EVEN TELL HOW HAPPY I AM :rofl: thanx to you

btw you should put it into the first tutorial with really big letters and red coloured 'cos i'm sure there's still a lot of people who are searching for the bump answer and they are surely as desperate as i was few minutes ago :rolleyes:

so thank you very very much again :lovestruc

[tristessa44]

hi, it's me again :rolleyes:

i have problem with milkshape (i think) - when i try to combine two meshes together, and i'm going to use sims2 unimesh bone tool v4.05, when i click on it, some window pops up telling me that it has to end the program and it falls down

does anyone know what to do?

and another problem is - when i want to add some object to maxis mesh, or some of mine (like high heels for example), then when i'm saving it, it tells me that there are some unassigned bones - so how do i assign them?

i was trying to make it like in this third tutorial but nothing works :(

and last thing - what does it mean "motphmod ....... has face count mismatch" and what should i do with this?

please help me somebody :help: could you please write it like to a 3 year old kid, because i feel like :llama:

[wolfmage64]

Question about adding shoes... I Don't know if this is the right place to post this:

I noticed on every mesh, adding shoes doesn't change the height of the sim, they are always the same. It doesn't matter if it is 3-5 inches high heels or business heel shoes. Is there anyway to actually add height to sim without using that "simstretch" cheat?

The reason I ask is because I'm seeing that the high heel shoes are merged with an existing pair of legs and you would have to remove your old pair of legs from your existing body mesh one and replace it with the new legs with the shoes. Why can't you manipulate your feet existing old mesh(oldmesh is default female body) to fit into the shoe mesh(foot that fits into the shoe)? If this is possible will I need to add, modify and/or scale the bone locations of the sim?

If any of this is possible, I would like to anyone to post, comment or direct me to any further tutorials or reference sources on adding shoes other than Al's shoes and this forum. Thanks

[tiggerypum]

tristessa44 - to get the bone tool working correctly, try going to the milkshape site and getting the alternate drivers. There's also a brand new version from only a couple days ago.

As for the heels - sim skeletons (including the ankles) are at one standard in sims 2. So the answer is no. You can only make careful adjustments to the bone assignments to make your altered foot look reasonable while the sim moves. I believe all the heels in game are fairly low due to this limitation.

You can add whatever shoes you want - make them from scratch. And do follow the Al's shoes tips here - because their tutorial last I looked was way out of date and not compatible with unimesh.

[tristessa44]

hi tig,

could you please tell me what exactly should i do when i want to add high heels to a foot? milkshape tells me all the time that i have unassigned bones, and i still have no idea how should i do that.

please please please tell me :help: i've tryed so many things allready but nothing worked yet :cry:

and thank you for your advice with milkshape but i have no idea what the alterantive drivers are :blink: ... i have version 1.7.8

[ulkrhsn]

tristessa44 here's the link: http://chumbalum.swissquake.ch/ms3d/download.html Check the 'show bone colors' box and see if there are any white parts (white will show the unassigned parts)
Or click the SelUnassigned button under the joints tab-to see which vertices are unassigned.
If you're adding Al's shoes you should do that because they come in .obj format which means they don't have a skeleton;)
edit: you don't have to use the bone tool..Select the vertices you want to assign, go to the joints tab and find the joint you want (for example l_foot for left foot), click assign..

[tristessa44]

hi ulkrhsn,

thank you very much for your quick answer - it helped me a lot - it is finally working! :giggler: i was trying to do it in that joints tab, but it didn´t work before, because i didn´t know what exactly i should do there

so thanks again :D

[Fashion2U]

Okays, so I need a little help assigning. Can you please help me assign the bones properly, because I used the tut on Sim Skins before to assign, and I got wonky ankles :| Thankyou

[tiggerypum]

Fashion2U - perhaps this will help http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=215835

[Fashion2U]

Thanks Tiggery, I'm gunna try it out this week, and I'll let you know how it goes :)

[tristessa44]

i have little problem with assigning long alpha skirt - in thighs area it still doesn't fit.
i tryed to assign it as pelvis + r/l thigh + r/l calf,
then pelvis + r/l thigh + r/l pantsleg + r/l calf,
then only thigh + calf or only as thight or as calf...
bottom of the skirt is ok but middle part is still acting strange.. and how should i assign those middle verticles which can't belong neither to left or right leg?

does somebody know what to do? :blink:

[tiggerypum]

Same assignments as the leg parts/body parts underneath them. It looks like perhaps you confused your left and right on part of it.
You also should make the vertices on the skirt 'match' those on the legs, same amount of rows and columns and location (just pulled out a bit) as much as possible.

Because what you've got is points 'glued' to a bone by their bone assignments, which will be rotated through space accordingly. If your skirt has points that correspond with the legs (but are moved out some) then in theory as things are all rotated by the bone movements - then they will hold their relative position to the bones. I found in the center I had to move the skirt vertices slightly inward and fiddle with the assignments, but you're having major problems in other areas.

[extrasecret]

Hi e.b.

Is there an easy way to combine an upper body with a lower one? I work on a naughty pizzadelivery chick, but it's too difficult to snap together the vertexes one by one. Especially, that I can't see precisely the vertexes. Any idea?

[tiggerypum]

Look at it in wireframe mode, and you need to combine the vertices. Actually Wes made a lovely set of tools that makes it even easier to do it here: http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=227858

[extrasecret]

Thx, I check it

[Cocomama]

Thank you very much for the fantastic tutorials, I completed all 3 tutorials with succes and thought I now can do whatever I want but........
I started new with the TF sundress, made the skirt longer and gave her barefeet from the TFunderwear, got all the way up to step 94, saved as tut9.msd3 and exported with Unimesh as body2.simpe. But then as I was going to do the Dr.Pixeltest I found there no longer were boneassignments in my FatMorph. Is that what you call an Exploded Mesh??
I tryed 2 more times from the beginning of tut2, everything is fine untill the exact same point 94 and the fat morph has boneassignments in the saved Tut9.ms3dfile but not in the body2.simpe meshfile.
What am I doing wrong??

[tiggerypum]

fatmorphs aren't supposed to have bone assignments. Why would you think your morph needs bone assignments. Also, I have you remake the fat morph using this tutorial anyway, during which it would temporarily have bone assignments - but a morph does not have assignments - it's a morph. it's all about moving the vertices.

[Cocomama]

Thank you for the very quick reply, after I posted it I went to bed and had a very bad night. I should have posted the question in the much longer version I had before.
I deleted the part were I explained how I made a new mesh for a teen by using a teenmesh for the upperbreastpart and a scaled down version of the afdresslongloose skirt and waist, when I viewed that one in Bodyshop she just had here arm stretched out sideways, don't know where I went wrong in that one, but it didn't had boneassignments anymore as normally teens have a very strange bended leg pose in Bodyshop. I made a new version of that mesh and that one came out allright, so I thought it wasn't relevant and edited that information out.
I must have had a blackout last night, as I supposed there was something wrong, I even didn't tryed my new meshes in Bodyshop , but I did first thing after I read your answer, and they are alright, only she has a very strange thing onder her skirt, must have something to do with that little box between the legs, I will look into that this evening.
Thank you very very much for your quick answer and patience with an uncertain newbie like me.

[Fashion2U]

Fashion2U - perhaps this will help http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=215835

I tried assigning them again, but they're still wonky :| Maybe it's not anything to do with assigning? It looks fine in MilkShape, just when I import it into bodyshop they are a bit wonky. Any ideas? Thankyou

[tristessa44]

thank you for your advice tig, i guess i fixed it :) it's not a hundred percent but it's enough for me

here's a picture of what i've changed - just in case that someone has the same problem - it might be helpful

[tetuo]

Thank you for the great tutorial, tiggerypum.

I have a question.
Why do their feeling of skins change after editing original mesh?
I wonder if the diffuse or ambient changed.
If someone knows about it, please tell me.

http://thumbs2.modthesims2.com/img/5/5/6/9/1/7/MTS2_tetuo_677144_heel.JPG
After

http://thumbs2.modthesims2.com/img/5/5/6/9/1/7/MTS2_tetuo_677145_hell2.JPG
Before

[tiggerypum]

tetuo - diffuse and ambient (matd's) are stored in the individual recolor file - if you don't see a change if you do a simple recolor (and don't change anything) then that's not it.

These mesh editing tools need to transfer all the data for the normals and have bumpmap support, it's possible that either one of them is slightly changed sometime during the process. I barely see a difference between the meshes in terms of the lighting. Certainly if you use the 'align normals' command on a section of the mesh, that will rework them and they might not be identical to the original. We don't have the tools that Maxis used to build those meshes.

[tetuo]

Thank you for the answer, tiggerypum.
I understand.
If one uses the 'align normals' command, it will change the original normals, slightly.

[strovod]

Me and my friend started of quite good with a coat mesh and some boots from another outfit, but we did every step untill we came to "Part 9: Export the Mesh and Fix the Texture". As we did the exporting a window popped up and said: "ERR: No quaternion values stored". As we don't exactly know what that means, we can't continue making our mesh. Could someone please help us?

Thank you

[Jrs1317]

Hello. This is an excellent tutorial. I am having a problem with step 35. When I try to bring up the unimesh bone tool, milkshape crashes. With that irritating "...has encountered a problem and needs to close." For now, I will skip this step and continue the tutorial. Any assistance would be appreciated. Thanks!

Oh I have

Milkshape 1.8.2

Unimesh 4.09

SimPE 0.64.5.39932

[tiggerypum]

JRS: There is an FAQ/Infocenter and one of the articles is "Milkshape Crashes" Try looking at that: http://www.modthesims2.com/article.php?t=222634

Strovod: Someone else had this problem (sounds like you damaged or excluded the skeleton?) http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=247029

[Jrs1317]

Doh! I tried to get back here in time but I was too late. Sorry. The problem is solved. It turns out that somehow my SimPE file got corrupted. thank you for your hasty reply! I'll have a look at that link for future reference though. Thanks again.

[OpenHouseJack]

I did another project, it came out OK except the leg
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1295/image1vc0.jpg
http://img212.imageshack.us/img212/9062/40891490pa2.jpg

what happened here; is it the bone adjustment ?
please help

[t2suggas]

Jack, the vertices on the left leg aren't quite in the right place.

Hard to explain without using the pic, but you need to move the second from the right vertice, as you are looking at the pic, more towards the right.

If you look at the mesh full on, match it up to look like the right leg.

[tiggerypum]

Jack, I am guessing that someplace on that leg the vertices are not matching exactly along the seam. So when you smoothed that area, that difference shows. Try checking all the vertices around the leg and make sure their x y z values are identical (as this error is showing in milkshape, that is the first guess)

If you bring it into the game or bodyshop with arms down -- and you see a gap or strange shape then - then it's the bone assignments along that same seam not being identical. Best probably to check both while you're there.

[t2suggas]

I finally did this tutorial. After approx a year from completing the other two, I managed to do this one.

Thankyou so much.

[OpenHouseJack]

[QUOTE=tiggerypum]Jack, I am guessing that someplace on that leg the vertices are not matching exactly along the seam. So when you smoothed that area, that difference shows. Try checking all the vertices around the leg and make sure their x y z values are identical (as this error is showing in milkshape, that is the first guess)

If you bring it into the game or bodyshop with arms down -- and you see a gap or strange shape then - then it's the bone assignments along that same seam not being identical. Best probably to check both while you're there.[/

I noticed the vertices on that leg is not even and one or two is too far from each other. I tried to change the value of the bone thing but don't know how; since they all come out 100%, I thought it would be ok

[OpenHouseJack]

http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/5033/image1qv6.jpg

which ones do I change and how?

[SweMarcus]

Hi, thanks for great tutorial. But I have a problem, when I´ve done all the steps and am going to look at the result, all I see in bodyhop is just the two maxis meshes. I don´t understand why! :/

[OpenHouseJack]

Hi TiggeryPum,
I finally finished a mesh, not perfect but acceptable for me.
I have some questions; I tried to make the flat boot into a heeled one but did not work.
I'm making adult mesh while following your tutorial on teen meshes.
Another thing; can I flare a pencil dress; even just around the hemline?
I tried that too and it did not work.

Please show me to a tutorial about these if it's too much to explain them here.

Thanks so much; here's my first wannabe mesh
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/4061/openhousemeshtestsequinpa5.jpg

[tiggerypum]

Jack in terms of the boot/choosing mesh parts.

There are two issues - before picking parts you want to use you might check their uvmapping and see how they were mapped. Sometimes boots are mapped into their own area, not part of the leg. If you want to try and just construct a small heel yourself, you can use the simple tutorial to change the shape of the heel area which is someplace in the tutorials area, and then adjust the uvmap as needed.

So of course it's possible. Question is which way you tried to do it and how well you can work with the parts of your base mesh.

Same goes for the skirt. Some issues might depend on how the skirt's hemline was constructed to begin with -- but if necessary you should be able to chop a sim someplace along the body and replace the entire skirt with one that will work better. (now this depends on how the meshes were constructed, some will be easier to work with than others - but you can load the full body meshes in and then look for a nice neat place where things more or less line up to do the chopping.

Animated/boned meshes have a lot of details to work with - the shape, getting seams to match up seamlessly, bone assignments, normals, uvmapping... then in game testing to see how what you did really animates -- and all of that has to come together. For some it takes several projects before a sort of 'ah ha' happens and things get easier and then they can go back and try things they couldn't figure out before... but really there is only so far tutorials can take you in order to be able to be creative in the ways you want.

You have now been given enough tools to do 90% of what can be done to body meshes. If you want to build your own parts from scratch, you need to go learn how to use milkshape, and then apply the bone assignments to them. As for the rest, the way to learn is by doing projects, experimenting, and posting thorough pics and descriptions of what you've tried or not (but not in this thread, in their own, this is really for -doing the tutorial-, so post other questions in the main bodyshop-meshing area)

[OpenHouseJack]

Jack in terms of the boot/choosing mesh parts.

There are two issues - before picking parts you want to use you might check their uvmapping and see how they were mapped. Sometimes boots are mapped into their own area, not part of the leg. If you want to try and just construct a small heel yourself, you can use the simple tutorial to change the shape of the heel area which is someplace in the tutorials area, and then adjust the uvmap as needed.

So of course it's possible. Question is which way you tried to do it and how well you can work with the parts of your base mesh.

Same goes for the skirt. Some issues might depend on how the skirt's hemline was constructed to begin with -- but if necessary you should be able to chop a sim someplace along the body and replace the entire skirt with one that will work better. (now this depends on how the meshes were constructed, some will be easier to work with than others - but you can load the full body meshes in and then look for a nice neat place where things more or less line up to do the chopping.

Animated/boned meshes have a lot of details to work with - the shape, getting seams to match up seamlessly, bone assignments, normals, uvmapping... then in game testing to see how what you did really animates -- and all of that has to come together. For some it takes several projects before a sort of 'ah ha' happens and things get easier and then they can go back and try things they couldn't figure out before... but really there is only so far tutorials can take you in order to be able to be creative in the ways you want.

You have now been given enough tools to do 90% of what can be done to body meshes. If you want to build your own parts from scratch, you need to go learn how to use milkshape, and then apply the bone assignments to them. As for the rest, the way to learn is by doing projects, experimenting, and posting thorough pics and descriptions of what you've tried or not (but not in this thread, in their own, this is really for -doing the tutorial-, so post other questions in the main bodyshop-meshing area)

oh my gush; still a long long way to go; but again thank you for the beginning 3 levels of tutorials

[Chimi]

Hi! In the step #16 you said this: "...and then go in and select the rest of the pixels above the joining line, and delete them." I don't get it, what does that mean??
:help: please!
Thank you :).

[tiggerypum]

Chimi, sounds like you didn't -do- tutorials #1 and #2. Because there's nothing confusing about step 16 if you know how to use milkshape.

[Chimi]

Hi Tig:)!
I just realised what I had to do on step 16:P But, in part 4, step 30, when I have to Align Normals, it's all Ok, the seam is gone, but it's not perfect, I still have some highlights, and it seems like I can't fix it...I'll give you some screenshots, one is the Smooth Shaded view, and the other the colored view. So I wanted to know, if it's normal, or If I'm doing something wrong...
Thank you for your time and your great tutorials :bunny: !

[SweMarcus]

Hi, when I´m done with the mesh and am going to check it out in Bodyshop, the upper part of the left leg is bumpning out a bit. Why?

[tiggerypum]

Chimi - you did not delete everything you need to - you have overlapping leg pieces there. You need to delete things so that the top and bottom exactly meet at one row.

SweMarcus - if your mesh looks perfect in milkshape but different in bodyshop/the game, then the issue is that the bone assignments are not correct.

[Chimi]

Hi Tig!
It worked! Thanks for this tutorial, clear and easy to understand :bunny: !
I'll give you some screenshots of my finished work:)
Bye!

[.Serena.]

I was wondering, is there a way to copy part of your mesh and flip it? I created a complex boot and I can't remake it all over again for the left side, so how can I copy & paste it?

[t2suggas]

I was wondering, is there a way to copy part of your mesh and flip it? I created a complex boot and I can't remake it all over again for the left side, so how can I copy & paste it?

Select the boot faces you want to copy, Click on edit, then duplicate selection. Then click on vertex (next to edit), scroll down, and click on 'mirror Left<->right'. You will need to align normals too.

This will give you a new boot on the other side, you will need to map it seperately, and then regroup it with the existing mesh.

Copy any comments before regrouping, then paste them back when you have regrouped.

[natwel]

Cool you took shoes from the chinese outfit and put them on the dress, looks tricky though. When Reading half way through I thought you were going to make the dress the same style/colour as the chinese top, would be a bad idea.

[HystericalParoxysm]

natwel - Colour and style really has nothing to do with this tutorial - it's merely teaching you how to combine mesh parts, which is an essential skill in meshing bodies. This tutorial is way more about the "frankensteining" technique than creating an actual project for something you'd really want to use. And info on recolouring is more suited to the Body Shop Skinning area anyway. ;)

[Starfish of Terror]

Oh, tiggerypum! I love you so much for creating all these tutorials; they're so helpful! None of your tutorials go unappreciated by me, that's for sure. Whoever thought I could say that I am a mesher? <3

[twisted FATE]

Oh dear.
http://i265.photobucket.com/albums/ii206/KirstenDe/WTF.jpg

This is giving me such a headache. ><

EDIT: Alright, I think I've found out the problem. I used the private school uniform as my base and Maxis' tfbodygothspikeneck mesh as my pair of boots to attach. When imported into Milkshape, it comes with two groups: body (which has the main body and the bottom of the boots) and body_reflected (which has the spiked collar, wristbands, and the boots themselves). Since I need both the boots and the bottom of the boots, I have to use pieces from all three groups: the school uniform group as my base, and both the body and body_reflected from the group with the boots. I think the problem is that everything goes along swimmingly until it comes time to combine everything as one. When I regroup, only two of the groups combine: the uniform's body and the boots' body_reflected. As you can see, this seems to be what throws the wrench in it and screws with the comments and whatnot. Because the uniform only has the one group that it started with, it can't have that second boot group in there in order for everything to work properly.

I only discovered this just now when I retried everything -- originally, I had simply deleted the group with the bottom of the boots (it was late; I don't know what I was thinking...) and thus didn't notice the whole regrouping thing since I only had the two groups which combined easily. So I think the first problem was the fact that I had deleted a crucial part of the mesh, which I now know to avoid. However, now my question is, how can I work around this and still end up with the original number of groups that the uniform had?

[tiggerypum]

twisted FATE, wow, that's special :)

First (and if this isn't your first try with this tutorial, forgive me) I strongly suggest following the tutorial pretty exactly the first time.

Secondly (and if you keep having problems with this project, you need to start it's own thread for it) you have two choices.

The first is that you simply regroup everything into one group, name it body and you'll be good to go. But make sure that the uvmapping of all the pieces doesn't get in the way of each other - it's easier to move things around and untangle that -before- you regroup. This means no separate extra shiny parts, just the normal look. But it should work.

The second alternative is that you -start- with a multi part group as your 'base' mesh, and then make all the groups of your finished mesh match that one with group names, comments, etc. You'd also make a recolor of that multi group mesh as your recolor to start with, and that you 'attach' you new mesh to. I strongly suggest trying this only AFTER you've done this tutorial at least once successfully with a single body mesh and fat morph. Getting all the bits right in this tutorial is a bit of a stretch already.

[rosaline_10]

Hi, I was wondering if someone could please help, ok I hope I can explain this and someone understands,
I have a mesh that has a top and jeans, I have deleted the top half of the mesh and then imported another mesh that is of a dress, I have shorten the dress so that way it looks like a long top, I have joined up the dress and jeans at the stomach area so that way some of the dress hangs over the jeans but when ever I try and export it comes up saying unassigned bones, so i went back and I checked that all the vertices where joined and everything seemed ok , but I think the problem is that I am not joining the correct vertices, does anyone know what I can do or what vertices I should be joining?
I have done stuff like this before but not as complex, I have added new shoes and new sleves to outfits and they worked ok, but I have never joined in anything in the stomach area. please help!

edit: all good I worked out the issue

[ReginaFalange]

Thank youuuuu!!!! You rock!!! I got through the whole tutorial, and nothing exploded except for my head, I really need an aspirin hahaha, The following step will be re-do this tutorial but making another combination, and I'll see how things come out :P
Thanks again, for these extremely detailed tutorials!

[milla184]

how to make a separate top? please

[HystericalParoxysm]

milla184 - Please post nonrelated questions in the main meshing area. This thread is for questions that relate directly to this tutorial.

[fiepijah]

I want boots on an outfit I'm making, does anyone know where I can download boots?:)

[HystericalParoxysm]

fiepijah - You don't need to download boots. Just find an outfit with a pair of boots you like and put them on.

[fiepijah]

yes, I know, but I want boots with heels, and I can't find anyone which exists;S

[tiggerypum]

fiepijah, well then find boots you like, and modify them to give them slight heels. You can't give them very high heels (or you'll get animation issues) but you can change the heels a shoe has. There's a little mini tutorial about that (it only involves moving vertices, you should be able to figure it out anyway) tucked in the tutorials area.

In the meantime, if you didn't already do this tutorial as written, that's what I'd recommend first - because there is a LOT covered here, and it's rare for someone to get it all the first time through anyway.

[sosliliom]

Note (if somebody is heedless like me):
The size of all uvmap punctually (the screenshot): 1024*1024
Because the size of alpha (for example in the Photoshop): 1024*1024
- when You make the recolours/retextures.

[janetspenceraz]

You are the bomb! I just finished #3 of this set and I must say how impressed with this series I am. I have never seen a series of tutorials quite so detailed. Just wanted to say thank you (also clicked the button). :D

[sleepingbeauty]

tiggerypum I must say all your tutes are so awesome and helpful. thank you so much.

[sleepingbeauty]

small problem tho. actually it's pretty big. i've done most of the basic tutes on this site without a problem or at least I could figure out the problems for myself but this tute has me thrown. Everytime I start it (which I've done at least a dozen times, no exaggeration) evidently I go wrong somewhere because it never works out and I never get farther than step 61. Either the shoes don't shoe up on the UV map at all. Or the mesh just looks completely the same in bodyshop as if I'd never modified it. I have no idea where I'm goin wrong everytime. Can anyone offer any help or explanation please?

[tristessa44]

hello,

this should be alpha top made from aftoplongsleevebustier (one of three alpha tops from NL EP - white, black, blue)
i´ve seen this mess before, but i can´t remember what it was. now i tried to fix everything that came on my mind, but nothing helped.

if you are familiar with this, please let me know what it is. i´m dying to know :blink:

(when i deleted morphed body with its alphas, it was okey then - but i want there that morphmod too :cry: )

[Feenkitty]

Hi, I was trying to do this with a different outfit and shoes. The problem I have is that the back half of the leg on the top has 4 faces and the bottom half only has 3 faces. Is there anything I can do to make this work or should I try to find a different pair of shoes?

ETA: I figured out a different way to do it and worked. I just changed the mesh at the shoes instead of part way up the leg. I'm still curious if it's possible to combine meshes that have a different number of faces so I'm leaving this in case someone has an answer.

[KuroAo]

I have three questions (and I'm sorry if that's a lot or anything else):
1. For replacing the shape and cres, when you say in the recolored file... Do you mean the one imported into the game?
2. Does the shape and cres refer to the ones in the original file, or the ones in the one imported into the game? Or, which file are they from?
3. Lastly, I replaced the shape and cres ones in the file in the saved sims folder, yet when I went to check in bodyshop, I had lost the custom content one, and the original dresses (that were used for this) have the high heeled shoes. I'm really confused. What did I do wrong? I've tried lots of different things. And I know it's not your tutorial, I'm just really really confused right now.

[KiaraRawks]

Thank you very much Tiggerypum, without you and the others I'd be nothing. This is a wonderful tutorial!

[HauntNightmare]

Hello and thanks for such an wonderful post! =)

:alarm: I have a small problem here. Even when I did the tutorial for the first time and and now I have the same 'error'. I must be missing something, but I tried to follow the tut a lot of times but I allways get this: in the UV part, my map is with some 'lines' connected to other lines in a wrong way. What this could be?

Here the SS:

http://i42.tinypic.com/11lmwwo.jpg

Thanks a lot for the help!

:!: :!: EEEDIIIIT D:!! :!: :!:

I found my dummy error!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, when I was adjusting the X, Y and Z values...I changed the U and V ones too xD! Wich gave me a lot of trouble and made me restart all my work! Teheeee!!! :rofl:

[Acorar]

I am haveing a little thing my mash comes up in bodyshop with 4 arms. I do not know what i did i see all the other stuff I did it looks good. It that it has 4 arms how do I fix this?

[Devon]

Hi, I need a little bit of help here...

I got up to step 61, where you see if the mesh has worked in Body Shop, and it's become invisible - there's only a floating head there. This has happened to the mesh that the dress was based on, too. Please can someone help me out, it's giving me a massive headache!

Thanks in advance

[DutchXfan]

I succesfully followed all 3 tutorials (everything well right away), and later this week, I'm gonna try to combine two custom meshes. *crosses fingers*

Thank you for all the detailed explanation, tiggerypum. It's so easy to follow.

I'm curious about this as well, though:

Hi, I was trying to do this with a different outfit and shoes. The problem I have is that the back half of the leg on the top has 4 faces and the bottom half only has 3 faces. Is there anything I can do to make this work or should I try to find a different pair of shoes?

ETA: I figured out a different way to do it and worked. I just changed the mesh at the shoes instead of part way up the leg. I'm still curious if it's possible to combine meshes that have a different number of faces so I'm leaving this in case someone has an answer.

[DutchXfan]

Never mind. I came up with a solution myself.

[mio0331]

Hello,
I have succesfully completed the first two tutorials and now on the third tutorial.
Despite of understanding the first two tutorials, there are couple of things which I have no clue what they are saying,both in Part1:

"Fix Integrity, save again, and save the modified shape and cres to TUTORIAL3TEENSHOES folder"

does this mean right click both shape and cres and choose extract, then save to your newly created folder?

"Put the modified shape and cres into the recolor file from your SAVED SIMS folder. Quit SimPE."

Does this mean
PJSE - body mesh tool - Extracting stage the recolour file and link shape and cres to the new ones?

Please help!

[Doons99P]

Hello,
I have succesfully completed the first two tutorials and now on the third tutorial.
Despite of understanding the first two tutorials, there are couple of things which I have no clue what they are saying,both in Part1:

"Fix Integrity, save again, and save the modified shape and cres to TUTORIAL3TEENSHOES folder"

does this mean right click both shape and cres and choose extract, then save to your newly created folder?

"Put the modified shape and cres into the recolor file from your SAVED SIMS folder. Quit SimPE."

Does this mean
PJSE - body mesh tool - Extracting stage the recolour file and link shape and cres to the new ones?

Please help!
I'd like the answer to this too! I seem to have completely stuffed up with these first few steps and now my dress has completely disappeared in body shop with only the head of the mannequin visible :help:

[mio0331]

I got the answer from other forum and it worked perfectly!!
Thank you for great tutoril tiggerypum.

I also found what I was doing wrong, in no.77 it says:

77) Then you’ll get another dialog box – “Do you want to EXCLUDE additional bone definitions?”

In my milkshape it said something like "Do you want to INCLUDE additional bone definitions?" Click OK.

I wasn't reading the dialog properly and was clicking OK to this and messed it all up.

Hope it went all right for you too Doons99P ;-)

[mepwn]

Thanks for yhis tut tig, it's a very good one even now it's a little outdated.
everyone who wants to do it now just has to link the files.

but still ty

[zampa321]

./,mnbv

[zampa321]

rtyuiolp;lokijhgfd

[zampa321]

ERR:No quaternion values stored

[jbeach34]

Wow, this thread is really old! I don't know if you still monitor this thread or not, but I have a problem and could really use some help. I managed to successfully make it all the way to step #97, and upon re-importing my mesh I get an "ERR: Too many joints defined in file." message. And it will not load in my project. :/ So, now I'm stumped! I've gone back couple times to my last save and readjusted the fat and preg morphs (I used the adult dress instead of teen). But that is really time comsuming!!! But every time I try to re-import, I get this same message?!? I don't think it matters, but I also used Al's shoes instead of Maxis. But like I said, the normal body works just fine! It's these goofy morphs! ;)
Oh, another question falls all the way back to step #30! The smoothing of the mesh. I have Milkshape 1.8.5 Beta1, and I can't find the 'align normals' command, and the 'weld together' isn't doing anything for me, I still have that seam on her leg! What can I do?
I want to give you a GREAT BIG THANK YOU!!!! Tiggerypum for this wonderful tut! :D

[neon53295]

I created this mr. big tsnk top, and gave him sum BIG muscles and maybe even create folks with the tank to put in my jails but the entire left arm goes wild... i duplicated his entire (working) right side in the middle, pasted it about 0.01 movement away and then snapped it together (i used the data merge thing when i duplicated just the hand before the entire side) and his enire torso and right arm are fine but his entire left arm is like a stretch skeleton cheat. i made it 1 layer, comments, group name, fixed underwheight bones, looked fo holes... this sux alot...

[porkypine]

Wow, this thread is really old! I don't know if you still monitor this thread or not, but I have a problem and could really use some help. I managed to successfully make it all the way to step #97, and upon re-importing my mesh I get an "ERR: Too many joints defined in file." message. And it will not load in my project. :/ So, now I'm stumped! I've gone back couple times to my last save and readjusted the fat and preg morphs (I used the adult dress instead of teen). But that is really time consuming!!! But every time I try to re-import, I get this same message?!? I don't think it matters, but I also used Al's shoes instead of Maxis. But like I said, the normal body works just fine! It's these goofy morphs! ;)
Oh, another question falls all the way back to step #30! The smoothing of the mesh. I have Milkshape 1.8.5 Beta1, and I can't find the 'align normals' command, and the 'weld together' isn't doing anything for me, I still have that seam on her leg! What can I do?
I want to give you a GREAT BIG THANK YOU!!!! Tiggerypum for this wonderful tut! :D

Hello jbeach34, Tig retired as moderator a while back and hasn't been online recently.

Try this: Delete your fat and preg morphs and only work on the BODY mesh. Make sure you've snapped vertices of the pieces you've added. If you've added parts that cover the original body mesh parts, assign the correct bone assignments to your new part, snap the vertices that line up and delete the hidden body polys that lie underneath.


Make sure that Milkshape's SMOOTHALL is turned off! Once you've imported a mesh with that turned on, it's broken. You can't fix the ridges. You have to start over.

You need to download and install Demon's tools [http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=139859 TESTERS WANTED: new GMDC-oriented plugins for MilkShape 1.77 and above] to get align normals to work.

There is a ceiling on the number of polys and vertices you can have in a mesh so keep your added parts to a minimum.

Once you get your mesh fixed, then duplicate it to make your fat and preg morphs. Read through the tutorials again. step by step. You probably missed a step. :) If you have further problems please go to this page and pick one of the sections on meshing - http://www.modthesims.info/forumdisplay.php?f=444 :beer:

[porkypine]

I created this mr. big tsnk top, and gave him sum BIG muscles and maybe even create folks with the tank to put in my jails but the entire left arm goes wild... i duplicated his entire (working) right side in the middle, pasted it about 0.01 movement away and then snapped it together (i used the data merge thing when i duplicated just the hand before the entire side) and his enire torso and right arm are fine but his entire left arm is like a stretch skeleton cheat. i made it 1 layer, comments, group name, fixed underwheight bones, looked fo holes... this sux alot...

When you duplicate a body mesh you have to fix every vertice's bone assignment. It's a tedious job. There is a left and right side and each dot/vertice has it's own bone assignment value. When you copied and flipped it, you have to clear the bone assignments on the flipped side and then assign them correctly so keep your original mesh until you've finished working on your new creation.

Please ask for help in the appropriate body shop help sections - http://www.modthesims.info/forumdisplay.php?f=444

[OfficialMonster]

It seems no matter how hard I try, I can't get this.

http://i930.photobucket.com/albums/ad146/carls4433/help_zpsd704e6ad.png

To show up in bodyshop.

http://i930.photobucket.com/albums/ad146/carls4433/helpppp_zps6189dc23.png

My goal was to combine a top and a bottom together to make a full outfit.

Ive tried twice and I still get these same results. I've data merged my vertex's where needed. I've also link it to a texture. I have no clue what I am doing wrong. I honestly don't. :(

[BloomsBase]

It seems no matter how hard I try, I can't get this.

http://i930.photobucket.com/albums/ad146/carls4433/help_zpsd704e6ad.png

To show up in bodyshop.

http://i930.photobucket.com/albums/ad146/carls4433/helpppp_zps6189dc23.png

My goal was to combine a top and a bottom together to make a full outfit.

Ive tried twice and I still get these same results. I've data merged my vertex's where needed. I've also link it to a texture. I have no clue what I am doing wrong. I honestly don't. :(

Did you link the meshpackage to the recolor file?

[OfficialMonster]

Did you link the meshpackage to the recolor file?

I linked it to texture that was in savesims folder in the 3D referencing ID thing. It should've shown up. :(

[fakepeeps7]

Did you fix the comments for your body group in MilkShape? If you combined a top and a bottom, your comments will have extra stuff that's not needed.

[BloomsBase]

Did you fix intigrity on the meshfile?