Creating LODs 0,1,2,3 For Your Clothing
May 19, 2018 21:30:52 GMT -5
inabadromance, MahoCreations, and 7 more like this
Post by jwofles on May 19, 2018 21:30:52 GMT -5
LOD means ‘Level Of Detail’ and clothing meshes have 0-3 of them (found in the mesh section of s4studio). They are helpful for slower PCs as it optimises your content so that it can decrease its detail when the camera is at far distances.
This tutorial will show you how to make the LODs for your own clothing meshes.
If you just use your LOD0 mesh for all LODs, it’s lazy and not good for performance. The performance loss is negligible on a single piece of CC but if everybody didn’t do it then it would slow down the game majorly… so let’s learn how to make LODs!!!!!!
This mini-tutorial requires Blender, s4studio, and my LOD pack.
You can download my LOD pack here - simfileshare.net/download/550026/
It includes all the bottom and top nude meshes for the sims 4 men and women bodies. You can export these using s4studio yourself but there are 16 .blends so this should save you some time 
THE TUTORIAL
STEP 1
This main tutorial will mostly talk about how to deal with Marvelous Designer style meshes, but I will talk about Maxis Match meshes later.
You'll want to create your LODs once your mesh is completely done (weight transferred, uv_1 transferred, holes fixed etc), this is because the weights and uv_1 that the EA body meshes already have are perfect and if you do a weight transfer or uv_1 transfer it may not be as well as they defaulted.
If you've already appended the top/bottom to your mesh, jump to step 2.
The first LOD you make is LOD0, and that's just the normal mesh you've created so far with the LOD0 arms top or legs at the end of your creation (or both if it's a fullbody outfit). You can use the LOD pack linked above to append the LOD0 top/bottom to your mesh.
Here's my LOD0 -
STEP 2
Duplicate your blend and call it 'LOD1'. Next, go into edit mode and delete any body parts (hover your mouse over them and press L, then delete).
You should just be left with your clothing mesh. Append in the LOD1 top or bottom from the LOD pack and again like you did before join it with your mesh.
Do not join the clothing mesh and the body yet!! Do delete any rig.001 or bone shapes.
If you had to delete faces from the body mesh on the LOD0 mesh because they are under the clothing mesh and would stick through, you'll have to do this again for LOD1 (and the other LODs).
STEP 3
This main tutorial will mostly talk about how to deal with Marvelous Designer style meshes, but I will talk about Maxis Match meshes later.
You'll want to create your LODs once your mesh is completely done (weight transferred, uv_1 transferred, holes fixed etc), this is because the weights and uv_1 that the EA body meshes already have are perfect and if you do a weight transfer or uv_1 transfer it may not be as well as they defaulted.
If you've already appended the top/bottom to your mesh, jump to step 2.
The first LOD you make is LOD0, and that's just the normal mesh you've created so far with the LOD0 arms top or legs at the end of your creation (or both if it's a fullbody outfit). You can use the LOD pack linked above to append the LOD0 top/bottom to your mesh.
Here's my LOD0 -
STEP 2
Duplicate your blend and call it 'LOD1'. Next, go into edit mode and delete any body parts (hover your mouse over them and press L, then delete).
You should just be left with your clothing mesh. Append in the LOD1 top or bottom from the LOD pack and again like you did before join it with your mesh.
Do not join the clothing mesh and the body yet!! Do delete any rig.001 or bone shapes.
If you had to delete faces from the body mesh on the LOD0 mesh because they are under the clothing mesh and would stick through, you'll have to do this again for LOD1 (and the other LODs).
STEP 3
When you have hit a polycount/facecount you're happy with, apply the modifier, and then join the body mesh with the clothing mesh (ctrl + j). You may want to save before you apply the modifier so that if you ever come back to the .blend you can adjust the decimation level.
STEP 4 (optional/conditional)
If there are any issues with your clothing mesh after you decimated, you should fix them now. Don't take too much time doing this because these meshes won't be seen up close (that's LOD0), so you can have some imperfections. Examples of this may be clipping with the body mesh or the UV and texture being messed up by the decimation.
Most of the time you won't need to fix anything because your mesh should look fine (especially at a distance).
STEP 5
Go in s4studio, and then select LOD 1 on the 'Meshes' tab. Then import your LOD1.blend and that's your LOD 1 done!!! NICE.
STEP 6
Repeat steps 2-5 for LOD2 and LOD3. It's pretty straightforward, and once you've done this process you'll know how to do it again and for future projects.
Make sure for each LOD you duplicate the LOD0 .blend, and re-decimate it from scratch (if that makes sense).
All the meshes that need to be appended can be found in the LOD pack.
*** FOR MAXIS MATCH CC, you either painted it onto the body mesh, or edited the body mesh to make a new mesh.
- If you painted it on, making LODs is easy, just import the lower LOD nude top or bottom into s4studio and it should look fine. EA have made their lower LODs have a similar UV maps so that textures will look the same.
- If you edited the mesh, then you'll have to re-edit the mesh for each LOD. It's tedious, yes but it will be so much better than just decimating it. Also, it doesn't have to be perfect, as the lower LODs (1-3) will be seen from a distance and not up close.
Hopefully this has given you a bit of insight about LODs, how to make them and why you need to make them. Also I hope that the LOD pack is helpful and saves some of your time.
Feel free to ask any questions if something doesn't make sense, or if you need some m
Lastly if you like the jumper in the pictures, you can download it here