re thin edges cloth - yay or nay ?

Ruz

so i am getting myself in to a  terrible stew with cloth in that if  you add  thickness to the cloth , then your retopo will have to have thickness

this quite frankly is a real pain in the bum, trying to match curves edges with your low poly takes ages. is there

anyway to avoid this.

the thickness of  cloth is generally very thin, do having all these extra thin adges can not be good surely?

there again paper thin cloth would also look weird I guess.

it would be nicer if you could bake from the thin version then somehow add tihickness after the bake, maybe with a shell modifier?

then you would just get the edges of the stretched pixel padding ?

Any suggestions for this as its really putting ne off continuing with this

DavidCruz

i dont know if you have access to maya but i just found this looking around it seems very useful, especially if you can take that flat version real quick and unwrap it unless it comes unwrapped i also don't know if this was imported from M.D. to maya and then run this script.  It looks like it is taken apart like MD sets things up, hopefully it works and its free so idk hope it helps:

from here:
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/yb0Jwn

Ruz

looks pretty nice. I can do the same thing in max or blender, but it does not weld the edges( does couture do this?)

still does not address the thickness issue though

EDIT

so i am thnking that the best way is to add the thickness after I finished the sculpt, because sculpting on a mesh with the extra thickness sucks , need to keep it manageable( ie not double sided.)

when it's finsihed I can add a shell modifier to both low and high poly in max . in this case the cloth is very thin and the edges contain next to no details so its purely to give the mesh a little volume so it not paper thin

let me know if anyone has any better suggestions or if you even kinow what the hell i am on about

Kanni3d

I imagine just doing a simple shell modifier and collapsing it is all you would need. You can select the fresh thickness geometry and UV it quick and easy as it could easily be unwrapped into perfect strips especially since the shell modifier gave your thickness perfect quads.

birb

I apologize if I misunderstood your question, but can't you create the edges through a Blender-like solidify modifier?

My MD to Blender retopo method uses three meshes (Posed high poly, flat high poly and flat retopo) and goes like this:

- Create clothing and do a quick retopo in MD just to get the silhouette and edge flow right.
- Export thin versions of posed high poly clothing and its flat version after resetting it to 2D. Also export thin flat retopo.
- Import everything into Blender. Transfer HQ posed mesh to flat version as a shape key. Fix and improve flat retopo using vertex and edge snapping tools.
- Bind retopo to flat HQ mesh through Surface Deform modifier and use shape key containing posed version to transform all flat clothing into posed clothing. At this point you can bind/unbind and pose/flatten the patterns to further improve the retopo.
- Select edges requiring thickness, add to a vertex group and add a Solidify modifier targeting it. Enable Fill Rim and Only Rim.
- When in need of real rounded edges I add a Bevel modifier on top of it, again using vertex groups to control it.

Result:
 
Depending on how you organized your patterns in MD it's a painless, straightforward process. Planning ahead how you'll retopo and texture it will save you a lot of grief.

Ruz

@Kanni3d - yes i think that probablly the way to go. i didn't do myself any favours by making the mesh very wrinkled BTW, but columbo does have quite a wrinkly mac

@birb - thanks for that, will look through that technique, but I may have found something cool also I have to have time to digest new info

 I had a great idea to easily retopo the whole thing. I basically export 2 versions of the highest res mesh from Marvelous designer( particle distance 3 or 4), one with a leather material, one with a really wrinkly material

you can see in the pic what i mean

Then i just skinwrap the retopo to the smooth version and then morph it in to the right shape.

It's kind of like the technique where you morph from a flat verison of the mesh, but with mine there are no non welded edges and you get to make  a more sensible choice re polyflow

Also the version with the non wrinkly material( leather) pops in to a totally symmetrical pose, which is ideal

if you are doing jeans or a simple tshirt there are no real issues, it's when you have upturned collars or cuffs or awkward shapes where you could use this technique

Ruz

so it works ok. still have to fiddle around a bit to get nice results, but as a process its bot too bad

collar is still a pain as it's inside out. will have to separate it now

rollin

Folowing this with interest ...

Ruz

the problem with these typre of techniques overall is that you get a grid like retopo, which does n't follow the flow of the high poly MD mesh, so you get that stepped effect where the mesh changes direction

there is no substitute for manually placing, but this does at least give a relatively quick way of blocking out and means you do not have to manually weld the edges of the different sections

since the jacket I have done is quite crinkly, i am thinking it would be nice to have a neutral version and a crinkled version for better rigging etc

I am sure MD could add somehting like this in future but they are still developing the remesh aspect so i look forward to that

birb

That's interesting, thanks for sharing! The non-welded edges are really a weakness of the shape key method, it's always necessary to merge doubles in the end of the process. That's also why I start the retopo on MD. It's a way to make sure the vertices will line up in the end and the edge flow is okay (well, as okay as my limited topo skill allows. I'm super green, tell no one!).

Shape keys work beautifully with patterns that fit together, but once you start to mix differently shaped patterns like straight hems and welts it becomes harder to line up vertices without unbinding the retopo and doing a bit of manual snapping. I do it near the end, turning the modifier into a shape key on the retopo pattern and turning on the vertex/edge snapping, making the internal vertices snap to the other retopo patterns and the external ones to the original mesh edges so it doesn't lose shape. It's kinda like manually fine-tuning a shrinkwrap, but faster and with a smaller error margin.

It's nothing too hard to accomplish, however all time spent pushing vertices like this is time you're not spending doing the actual retopo. This waste of time is annoying enough I might write a script to at least take care of the inner vertices in the future.

I still didn't encounter any issues with the keys method when doing complex arrangements though. Turned cuffs, wrinkled fabrics, overlapping layers? Bring it on! As long the retopo has the proper geometry to follow the original pattern I found it superior to shrinkwrapping. A bound retopo never projects itself onto the wrong surface like with shrinkwrap may. It'll follow the original mesh without fail.

The back of that top I showed earlier, overlaid with the original patterns on the intermediate steps:



Each subtle gray variation is an independent pattern, I just aligned what I could in MD without overlapping.

Note the misaligned edges of the welt (? I'm not sure of the proper English term) in the back. In this case I didn't bother to retopo such narrow stripes of fabric in MD, doing this just to the body of the top. I duplicated the straight patterns instead, dissolved the edges, cut new straight ones, got rid of any superfluous vertices and bound them to the original. It's a faster way to get the barebones of the retopo, but creates more misaligned loops from the beginning. I'm still ironing out the kinks in this workflow.

Ruz

@birb seems like we are on the same path re the reserch on this. will have a look at your methods this week sometime.

still for most cloth i can get away with a manual retopo, it's just the odd awkward item i have to contend with

I am also thinking its best to start with the bare minimum retopo, ie to blcok it out first with even quads. I just like stuff to look tidyish

Ruz

@birb looking through yuo answer above ie adding thickness to both high and low poly in blender or whatever is a good solution. the only problem was the uv's at the edges when yuo add the thickness. will look in to that again in the new year

birb

Ruz said:

@birb looking through yuo answer above ie adding thickness to both high and low poly in blender or whatever is a good solution. the only problem was the uv's at the edges when yuo add the thickness. will look in to that again in the new year

You mean unwrap the edges?

1. Create two new materials and name them "back" (if part of the cloth must have inner faces) and "edges".
2. Set the the Material Index Offset in the Solidify modifier to the back material index and Rim to the edges' index.
3. Apply the Solidify modifier.
4. (If there are inner faces) In Edit Mode, deselect everything and select the inner faces—which should be using the back material—by using the Select operator in the Material Properties panel. Hide the selection.
5. Select the edges material using the same method, invert the selection to select the original UVs and Pin the vertices in the UV Editor.
6. Select everything and unwrap.

The edges will get unwrapped around the original UV islands. The inner faces, if any, are overlapping the original islands. Depending on your needs you can move them, mark proper seams at the boundaries and even get straight UVs for the edges using the same material index offset method with the help of a couple of handy UV Editor add-ons.

Eric Chadwick

In 3ds Max the Shell modifier has four uv options for the new edge, basically: none, smear the edge uv, extend and stitch to main uv, or make a separate uv strip. It's pretty nice, just used this.