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Original Poster
#1 Old 16th Sep 2020 at 8:07 PM Last edited by vegan_kaktus : 16th Sep 2020 at 8:52 PM.
Default Easiest/quickest way to "separate" vertexes?
I've been re-mapping the dollhouse ever since I found high-resolution "leftover" textures in SimPE, but I have a problem: I'm trying to separate the outer walls and inner walls (which is one group) into two groups so they can use different textures. Their vertexes are in the exact same place (xyz) and I have absolutely no idea on how to separate them easily. I really don't have the motivation to select one vertex (which is two, since one for the inner wall and one for the outer), edit one of the vertexes' xyz numbers to make it "pop out" so I can delete it - and then do it all over once again (since there are both an inner wall and an outer one).

In the texture coordinate editor, the outer and inner walls are separate, like this:

(white = outer walls, blue = inner walls)
so I was thinking: is there any way to delete selected vertexes in the texture coordinate editor? Because when I select the outer vertexes and hit delete, I end up deleting the whole group (which is selected, since it has to be selected to be able to view the UV-mapping). I assume the answer to this is no, and if that's the case, is there any other way to do this? I've come so far with this project and it would feel like such a shame to give up now (I've already re-mapped all the floors and furniture).

Any help is appreciated! I'm really not good at explaining, so if anythings unclear, let me know and I'll try again. I attached a picture of the dollhouse in Milkshape, hopefully that could be of help to show what I mean.
Screenshots
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Mad Poster
#2 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 12:20 AM Last edited by simmer22 : 17th Sep 2020 at 12:51 AM.
Can't you just mark the outer walls (or inner walls, whichever works best) and map them separately (regrouping could work)? You'd just have to mark whichever wall you needed and deselect any parts you didn't need, then choose "regroup" instead of deleting them. The middle/upper part of the wall could be left with whichever part of the dollhouse has everything else.

Have "face" selected, and "by vertex" ticked. That makes it easier to mark boxed shapes.
Left+shift-mark to add to a selection
Right+shift-mark to remove something from a selection.
You can also hide and unhide mesh parts via the menu or shortcuts (Ctrl+H) which is super useful.

Not sure if you can delete anything in the Texture coordinator. Yyou can mark something and have it show up on the mesh, but it's not much more advanced than that. Blender would be a better bet for any advanced stuff with the UVmap or selections (selection can take forever in Milkshape and 5 mi nutes in Blender...)
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Original Poster
#3 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:15 AM
Thank you! Unfortunately, since both the outer walls and inner walls have their vertexes in the exact same place, I select both of them when using the settings you mentioned :-( that’s my problem, I can’t select them individually. I’m not on my pc right now, but I can show you later what happens when I try and select them.
Mad Poster
#4 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 12:42 PM Last edited by simmer22 : 17th Sep 2020 at 1:03 PM.
You can select faces on the mesh via the UV view - but it isn't perfect by any means (it's by vertex, I don't think you can set it to face), and it also selects vertices in the UV view connected to them even if they're on the other side of the UV view, so if there's any of that, you have a problem (it's really awful - Blender doesn't do that, at least not unless you tell it to).

If you have front- and backfaces that overlap and that somehow managed to combine vertices, you can mark individual faces by unticking the "by vertex" box (most of the time I have this one ticked) and selecting the faces from the middle where the dividing line is (you get the two correct ones by choosing the proper dividing line between two coupled triangular faces that form a square, if that makes sense?), but it's quite fiddly and takes a bit of patience to get right.

If you can't figure it out, can you upload the file you have so far, so I can have a look? I think I know what you mean, but it's a bit easier to show through pictures on the actual file (Milkshape is really awful for these kinds of separation acts, but it's not entirely impossible... usually...)
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Original Poster
#5 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 1:51 PM Last edited by vegan_kaktus : 17th Sep 2020 at 6:15 PM.
I'm a bit slow when it comes to things like this and I find Milkshape pretty darn confusing haha, but I'll try and re-read your answer again :-) and absolutely! I'll attach my .ms3d file so you can have a look if you'd like (thank you)! It contains only the walls (to make it less confusing since my full file is pretty messy atm). I've successfully removed the roof (the outer side) and the top face of the floors (the underside is still there, I'll fix that later - just so you know).

Edit: also, on the short side of the dollhouse some walls are "separate", it's mainly just in the back the outer and inner walls are "merged".

Edit #2: removed file.
Mad Poster
#6 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 2:18 PM
Just needed to test a couple theories, and the easiest one fortunately worked - it looks like if you select everything that's left in the mesh, then mark the inner walls on the UV view (looks to be everything to the right in your picture, but not the square in the middle - no idea where that one belongs, but it doesn't quite fit the mapping with the walls), it also marks the inner walls (and only them) in the mesh view. Then you can regroup the inner walls just fine.

The outer walls are going to be a bit more difficult, but at least they'll be separated from the inner walls.
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Original Poster
#7 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 2:52 PM
Oh! I did not expect that :-D may I ask how you did it? Because when I select the group, open the texture coordinate editor + select the inner walls' in the UV view, click on "edit - duplicate selection" it duplicates everything. Where do I click to regroup the selection made in texture coordinate editor only?
Mad Poster
#8 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 3:25 PM
You make sure the right group is showing (select it from the dropdown list if not), then mark/select the parts you want with the mouse, go to the Group menu (not in the Texture coordinator!) and regroup.

I don't think it works to duplicate, because technically the whole mesh is still selected when you work via the UVmap - but if you first duplicate the whole part of the mesh you're working on, then regroup parts of it, that would essentially do the same trick as duplicating each separate piece (just working in a different order, and perhaps a bit less buggy?).

I normally keep a full mesh as a reference, duplicate it, and regroup everything from the duplicated mesh into pieces. That way I know I'm not accidentally using parts twice, and it's also easier to go back to a piece and fix up mistakes if I've regrouped something wrong.
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Original Poster
#9 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 5:15 PM
Excuse my brain malfunctioning haha, but I don't see how this is going to help me unfortunately :-( my problem is that the outer and inner walls are "merged", and I need to separate them - which I can do by doing this:

(I have no idea which row is outer/inner, so I just try some until the one I want pops out) it would take me so long to do this on the whole dollhouse, plus, I would have to do it twice (outer and inner walls).

When doing what you wrote, it doesn't help me separate them (if I'm doing it right that is?) because I still end up with both the "back" face and "front" face, like this:

Sorry if I'm unclear, I'm really bad at explaining haha. Basically though, what I want is an easier way for me to do what I showed in the first picture.

Also, I realised now that the .ms3d file I uploaded was the full one - sorry for that! It's very messy (I'm very messy haha) + some groups were in Swedish, apologize if it confused you.
Screenshots
Mad Poster
#10 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 5:58 PM
Do you have backfaces turned on in the settings? If you do, turn that setting off. It messes with your head, because the backfaces aren't actually there (they're auto-generated by Milkshape, you only need to worry about backfaces if they actually exist in the mesh (hairs, etc.), and I can't see any for this mesh - all the backsides of the walls seem empty with the setting turned off).
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Original Poster
#11 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:02 PM
Oh! Where do I see if I have them turned on? Couldn't find anything in preferences.
Mad Poster
#12 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:02 PM
Right-click the view, untick "Draw Backfaces".

Make sure "Wireframe Overlay" is still ticked, because then you see the wireframe faces from the back but don't see the auto-backfaces.
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Original Poster
#13 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:05 PM
Ah I see! Unfortunately, I did not have it ticked, so the back faces are "real" :-(
Mad Poster
#14 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:11 PM
There could be some actual backfaces here and there, though (maxis meshing/mapping used to be literally all over the place). Could even be some overlapping faces. The dollhouse is morphed/animated, so there could be some weird things going on in it.
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Original Poster
#15 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:14 PM
I see :-( I guess I will have to put this on the shelf once again for a while. Thank you for all the help though! Really appreciate it :-)
Mad Poster
#16 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:18 PM
You can select faces by clicking on them (with "by vertex" unticked), not just by click-drag, so that could be an alternative.
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Original Poster
#17 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:21 PM
Ah yes, but their vertexes are still in the exact same place so I'd have to make them "pop out" (like shown) for me to be able to delete them, and then have to do that for all walls + all over once again :-(
Mad Poster
#18 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:28 PM Last edited by simmer22 : 17th Sep 2020 at 6:38 PM.
I separated out the inner walls from the outer ones in the file you uploaded (last two groups) - see if you get the same issues there. I added the file under.

I'm almost thinking it could be an issue from when you're duplicating. That would in some cases create extra sets of overlapping faces, if you're accidentally marking two meshes and duplicating these together. That's why I prefer regrouping instead of duplicating, and being very careful to deselect before selecting something new (I've had the duplicating/overlaying issue a few times and it annoys me - it can happen with regrouping too, but it's a bit easier to keep it under control, because as long as you split the same core group up, you don't add identical pieces together).
Attached files:
File Type: zip  innerouterwalls.zip (120.3 KB, 3 downloads)
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Original Poster
#19 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:33 PM
Oh really? Darn, I did not know that. I've always duplicated (since I tbh didn't know you could use the regroup button like that). I'll take a look at your file! :-D

Edit: holy mother of god, that is exactly what I wanted. I have absolutely no idea how you did that but THANK YOU, yikes! Thank you so very much!!
Mad Poster
#20 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:49 PM Last edited by simmer22 : 17th Sep 2020 at 7:01 PM.
I did exactly what I said in post 6, just a tiny bit modified. And it probably sounds a bit complicated, but really wasn't.

I duplicated the group so I had two to work with (didn't work with just one, and yes - duplicating does come in handy for some things - sometimes regrouping doesn't work, so you need multiple identical groups and just have to delete everything you don't want in them. This was one of the times regrouping just didn't want to work. But of course, make sure you're not duplicating more than one item at a time). Named the groups "inner" and "outer" walls.

I then chose the "innerwalls" group, marked the left part of the UVs plus the square in the middle (still don't know what that one is for), went to the mesh view, moved the faces away from the rest of the mesh, deselected everything, then selected the moved parts again in the mesh view, and deleted them. This left the inner part of the walls.

Did the same for the "outerwalls" group, but with the right side of the UVs, which left the outer walls in that group.

---

Another very handy way of separating difficult items in Milkshape is to mark as much as possible up to the point where it gets difficult to mark, and just drag it away (faces "by vertex"), then mark the line of vertices/faces, drag this away, and keep going until the part separates, then delete the offending blob of faces that now looks like a big shard. If the vertices are separated at some point, that is. Doesn't work for everything... But it does work several ways, so if you have a bunch of duplicates you can separate out all the various parts like this. Very handy for some items (clothes, hairs, some objects), and can be useful here and there, especially if you're working on big projects.
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Original Poster
#21 Old 17th Sep 2020 at 6:57 PM
I see! Then it must have been me not doing it right (like usual lol). When I'm done with this mesh, I have to do it all over again for the broken dollhouse mesh, so I'll have to give it a try again then and read it more carefully. Anyway, thank you so much for the help!!
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