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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 27, 2019 17:04:41 GMT -5
Ever since Island Living came out, I was inspired to create mermaid tails for TS4. So, I decided to start out by converting a tail I used for my Oblivion mod -- Melusine - A Merfolk Race Mod -- to The Sim's male body. The tail is almost done -- at least for males -- but there are two major problems getting in the way of completion, and I cannot seem to figure them out on my own. Any assistance will be greatly appreciated! 1. The dreaded uv_1 On average or slim-bodied sims the tail looks alright, but the tail does not properly scale on plus-sized sims, making their bodies below the waist 'implode' into it. Not only that, but the dorsal and side fins also sink into the tail itself. Also, the dorsal fin stretches with the tail. Example photos:    And the above examples were the result of tweaking the tail's uv_1 to the best of my knowledge, using the uv_1 of the default tail and the human lower body as examples. My tail's uv_1 currently looks like this:  2. The fluke/fin As you can see above, the fin of my tail clips with the ground, while the default tail avoids this. Despite copying the weights from the default tail to my tail, the fin does not seem to follow the toe bones, which is odd because my tail has those weights in Blender:  Any advice and/or assistance will be greatly appreciated, and you will be credited for your help when this tail gets released! Thank you for reading, and good fortune to you in your current and future endeavors! |
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 28, 2019 3:14:23 GMT -5
Hi. We need to actually see the blend to be able to tell what's wrong. The only thing i can guess is that your tail is longer than the default ea one so it clips in the ground
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 28, 2019 9:33:52 GMT -5
Hi. We need to actually see the blend to be able to tell what's wrong. The only thing i can guess is that your tail is longer than the default ea one so it clips in the ground Thank you for your reply! The .blend can be downloaded here. |
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 28, 2019 13:56:19 GMT -5
The vertex groups of your mesh differ from that of ea tails. Delete b__R_ThighTwist__, b__R_Thigh__, b__R_Calf__. Your b__L_ThighTwist__ is not assigned anywhere, look at the reference where it should be.
About uv_1, your uv islands should match with that of the reference mesh 1). Select these edge loops by Shift-Alt-clicking on them and mark them as seams; 2). Switch to face select, select one face on the bottom part of the tail and one on the top part; 3-4). Select - Linked- Seam; 5). Make sure you are in orthographic ( 5 key ) front ( 1 key ) view, Unwrap - Project from view. Press 9 to switch to the opposite view, Ctrl I to invert the selection, Project from view again. In UV editor press G to move your back UV islands to the side; 6-7). Press A to select everything, choose Base texture. Your uvs will become stretched, get them to their normal size by pressing S Y .5; 8). Select the reference, choose its uv_1 map, switch to Edit mode, select everything with A, choose the same background image, Shift-select your tail, switch to edit mode, View - Draw other objects. Now you can see the uvs of the reference and need to match yours to them; 9). Switch to vertex select and Alt-click on one border edge loop, press W and straighten it with Align X ( for vertical loops) or Y ( for horizontal ). Once straightened, move it with G X to the side like in the pic. Do this for all until you have rectangular uv islands for tops parts; 10). Adjust the size of bottom parts. Select all border edges and that bottom parts and UVs - Pin it; 11). UVs - unwrap. You can adjust the spacing between vertices on the borders with S X but i think it wont make much difference; 12). Once done, adjust the width of your uv islands to those of the reference's;
About vertex paint 13).Vertex paint dictates what variation(s)( skin-tight or robe-like) of deformations maps ( age, gender, body mass) the mesh will use during body customisation. For example, we would paint the bottom of the dress with 03FFF0 ( robe-like) and the rest with 00FF00 ( skin-tight), then we will smooth the transition with Paint - smooth vertex colors. The skirt part of it will have smoother animation in between the legs and will not be affected by certain sliders (thighs, calves width). Here, I assumed, the tail was painted on the same principle, but while I could find the right hex code for the bottom, the top was painted by many different ones...... No idea what to do about it
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 28, 2019 16:09:45 GMT -5
Thank you very much for your thorough tutorial, mauvemorn! Unfortunately, while certain aspects have certainly improved after I followed your tutorial, the hips are now sunken, and all of the fins, except the bottom one, are distorted to some degree. Examples:   Can you please tell me what I did wrong? The new .blend can be downloaded here. |
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 29, 2019 3:54:41 GMT -5
Ugggh, so the horizontal placement affects things after all.
I can't check right now, but you can try this to fix the abdominal issue:
1). Unfold rig and make top selectable (cursor icon next to eye icon);
1). Choose its uv_1 map, switch to edit mode, select everything, set the same background texture, shift-select your tail, switch to edit mode, try to align vertices in the horizontal top loop of your tail to the ones in the top's bottom loop.
As for spikes, the only thing i can think of is to just select ,say, all spikes on the front right side, and align them by X, do the same for the right back side and check in game
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 29, 2019 6:35:54 GMT -5
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 29, 2019 12:26:38 GMT -5
Exciting news! The only thing that caused the distortion above is the far left UV island of uv_1 being inverted. I just flipped it horizontally, and this is the result:   We are so close now! All that's left is to find out how to straighten out the dorsal fin! The edited .blend can be downloaded here. I also smoothed the weight paints for a less crooked fin. How did you fix the weight paints in your previous edit, by the way? |
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 29, 2019 12:46:03 GMT -5
LMAO so that what it was
I just deleted and re-transferred the weights
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 29, 2019 13:10:22 GMT -5
LMAO so that what it was I just deleted and re-transferred the weights I see. And what did you do differently this time to create the UV's? |
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Post by mauvemorn on Jun 29, 2019 13:52:51 GMT -5
This Ugggh, so the horizontal placement affects things after all. I can't check right now, but you can try this to fix the abdominal issue: 1). Unfold rig and make top selectable (cursor icon next to eye icon); 1). Choose its uv_1 map, switch to edit mode, select everything, set the same background texture, shift-select your tail, switch to edit mode, try to align vertices in the horizontal top loop of your tail to the ones in the top's bottom loop. As for spikes, the only thing i can think of is to just select ,say, all spikes on the front right side, and align them by X, do the same for the right back side and check in game |
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 29, 2019 14:21:28 GMT -5
This Ugggh, so the horizontal placement affects things after all. I can't check right now, but you can try this to fix the abdominal issue: 1). Unfold rig and make top selectable (cursor icon next to eye icon); 1). Choose its uv_1 map, switch to edit mode, select everything, set the same background texture, shift-select your tail, switch to edit mode, try to align vertices in the horizontal top loop of your tail to the ones in the top's bottom loop. As for spikes, the only thing i can think of is to just select ,say, all spikes on the front right side, and align them by X, do the same for the right back side and check in game I'm terribly sorry, I didn't realize you already provided the answer. I will now experiment on the dorsal fin, and will update this thread with my findings. |
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Post by Neverwinter Pinata on Jun 29, 2019 22:59:47 GMT -5
It turns out the distortion of the dorsal fin was caused by its UV data being on the far left UV island, so I simply moved it to the center of the middle island, and this is the result:  Not a perfect result, as the dorsal fin does lose some detail the heavier the sim becomes, but I don't think it can get much better than this, so I am willing to accept it. With that, I consider this case closed! mauvemorn, thank you so much for your wonderful help! This conversion would not have come this far without it! You will be credited when this tail gets released!  |
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Post by satisim on Jun 30, 2019 4:27:05 GMT -5
Oh! I actually posted a problem with my mermaid tail too, i have to try if this will fix mine too  |
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