[3Ds Max] Detach part of a skinned mesh

voronov.art

I have a skinned mesh which I need to split on a few separate objects. But the problem is that mesh is already rigged and animated. How do you do that in 3ds Max without breaking skin wheights and animations?

Eric Chadwick

Quickest way would be to duplicate the mesh, add an Edit Poly modifier on top, delete everything but the segment you want. Repeat for each segment. Export and test.

Optionally, you can smooth the seams between segments by selecting all the segments, and adding an Edit Normals modifier to tweak the edge normals.

voronov.art

Eric Chadwick

I'm going to try this method. Actually I don't need to modify topology, just detach one mesh element (so it would be a separate model).

Eric Chadwick

Just make sure not to use Detach, because this won't copy the weights to the new mesh. That's why you copy the existing model, add Edit Poly on top, and delete what you don't want.

monster

I've got a script that takes a skinned model and detaches all elements into separate skinned models. It also has the reverse function to combine a bunch of skinned models into one skinned model.

So the workflow would be to select your model, run the script and press "Detach Skin". Then select all the parts you want to combine back and press "Combine Skin".

But if your model is one continuous mesh, it won't work.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2904948/MaxScript/Rigging_CombineSkin.ms

voronov.art

Hey monster, thanks for sharing the script! But I don't get how does it work. When I select my model and press Detach Skin it creates a copy of the mesh but it's still one-piece model. Combine Skin works perfect.

thomasp

you could also copy the mesh, remove the skinning, modify the pieces as needed and then bind that with the skinwrap modifier to your original, skinned mesh. finally convert the skinwrap to skin and presto.

downside is that you will introduce ever so slight skin value differences this way but they should not be noticeable for the majority of cases.
upside - you stay well clear of stack trickery which in my experience has a tendency to explode the scene or app.

poopipe

Deleting stuff under a skin modifier is perfectly safe.

Duplicate mesh, delete the bits you don't want under the skin modifier, move on..