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Post by captainslow on Oct 24, 2022 7:39:47 GMT -5
Hi,
Like many here I am very new to 3D programs and getting anything done in them. I found some free 3D models online that I'm trying to turn into accessories. Among them are some pairs of headphones. I have two projects where I try to make them for the 'hat' and 'earring' categories. I've followed the tutorial for the earring creation, but my low skill on understanding what everything is and to figure out how the blender 2.7 tutorial translatens to blender 3.3.
Everytime I import the new mesh it just turns into human skin colour with parts missing. I tried checking the textures and placing the 3D model texturure file, but it still ends up the same. Absolutely no idea what I'm doing and need some help.
Perhaps some people have experience with importing existing models into the sims?
Thanks in advance!
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Post by mauvemorn on Oct 24, 2022 7:45:49 GMT -5
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Post by captainslow on Oct 24, 2022 8:02:50 GMT -5
Thank you for the quick response, but most of that went over my head. I don't understand what rebake means. The headphones are way bigger than earring, but I'm using the earring slot so they can be used with hats. The image of all the regions, the earring section is really tiny, do I need to fit the original texture in there?
EDIT: Okay, so I think I understand the method in the video, but I can't seem to translate it to the imported 3D model and its mapping and textures, which is a single image file.
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Post by mauvemorn on Oct 24, 2022 8:30:03 GMT -5
If you will try to fit the headphone's texture in the area for earrings, it will be destroyed beyond recognition, so you need to choose some other category. You can clone earrings and recategorize them as glasses(do not clone glasses, they are made of two meshgroups), then put the uvs and textures in the area meant for glasses. In short, baking is a process of creating a texture using a rendering engine and re-baking is a process of, well, re-doing it. It would make sense if you will watch the linked video first. Basically the author takes the flower texture that was in the hair area and moves it elsewhere.
All of this said, i would advice you to start your cc making journey from editing or combining existing maxis meshes, so that you would have less things to worry about. The problem with assets you can find online is that they are generally made for rendering nice pictures, not to be used in games, basically they are very high poly. Another thing i would advice to not do is start said journey from creating things that do not already exist in-game. For example, there are no accessory headphones in-game because they will clip into hats/hair/necklaces/clothing.
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Post by captainslow on Oct 24, 2022 8:39:46 GMT -5
Wow, ok. So my mind is melting down trying to understand. My adhd monkey brain wanted to put the one thing in the other thing real quick. Is there a way I can share this blender project that anyone can make a clip or screenshots of the process? And if I understand correctly, I can turn a hat into a 'earrings' category and need to use that spot for it? I'm having a real hard time understanding the flower thing, because the image of their texture automatically moves where mine doesn't since its a picture to which the textures are mapped (I hope that combination of words made sense).
EDIT: This is the model I'm trying to work with to turn into and accessory:
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Post by mauvemorn on Oct 24, 2022 9:18:08 GMT -5
Well, yes, this is a detailed item and its polycount is 3 times higher than that of the most complex maxis meshes.
You should find a beginner-oriented tutorial for making any type of CAS item for the sims 4 and follow it step-by-step in the same version of blender just to learn the basics, otherwise you will create yourself obstacles that will make this process unnecessary hard. Then you can adapt this workflow to Blender 3.3. Then you can study an existing maxis item and create yours from scratch. And again, it is best to never make things that do not exist among maxis items because there is always a reason for that. No, you are meant to clone earring, recategorize them as glasses, and use the uv space meant for glasses. You will do all of that to find out that the headphones clip into every hat and many hairstyles. There is nothing you can do to fix it, this is just the limitation of the game.
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Post by captainslow on Oct 24, 2022 9:39:45 GMT -5
Okay, I'm going to goof around a bit more. I just seperated the headphones from the logitech cap and headphones. It didn't show up as earrings, and the hat version gives my sim a bald spot. I guess I need to let this project go until I have a basic understanding of blender. Only did this to make an accessory I wanted. Thanks for the help though!
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Post by captainslow on Nov 7, 2022 12:32:01 GMT -5
Okay! So I've managed to UV map the mesh and I'm using it in game! I used Paint 3D which isn't ideal and it doesn't line out properly but its working.
I made some other items either by re-skinning or getting a downloaded model to use in the sims.
Now I have made my own model, but I can't seem to understand how to get rid of the uv maps from all the cubes and cilinders I used and get a proper uv map so I can paint a texture and use it in-game. Anyone know how to do this? Most tutorials explain other things than I need.
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Post by Fwecka (Lolabellesims) on Nov 8, 2022 2:29:11 GMT -5
If you want to make accessories I would very much recommend that you start with this tutorial as it will introduce you to the overall process. I wrote this post three times explaining what you can do to make this mesh workable but honestly? I think it would just overwhelm you. CAS items are harder to make than objects. If you're brand new to Blender start small. Convert a Sims 2 item to Sims 4. Or use the accessory tutorial I linked. Or try this tutorial. To make the headphones work you'll have to reduce the polycount drastically and you'll have to bake a new diffuse texture from the old diffuse texture. And the mesh would not fit a sim's head easily and would take a lot of steps to get it shaped right. It can be done but it will require some work. It's better to start with easy projects and build your skills. Don't give up! But do start small.
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Post by captainslow on Nov 9, 2022 6:07:25 GMT -5
If you want to make accessories I would very much recommend that you start with this tutorial as it will introduce you to the overall process. I wrote this post three times explaining what you can do to make this mesh workable but honestly? I think it would just overwhelm you. CAS items are harder to make than objects. If you're brand new to Blender start small. Convert a Sims 2 item to Sims 4. Or use the accessory tutorial I linked. Or try this tutorial. To make the headphones work you'll have to reduce the polycount drastically and you'll have to bake a new diffuse texture from the old diffuse texture. And the mesh would not fit a sim's head easily and would take a lot of steps to get it shaped right. It can be done but it will require some work. It's better to start with easy projects and build your skills. Don't give up! But do start small. Thank you for the explanation. I feel like I have gotten quite far in my basic knowledge of Blender thanks to a donut creating tutorial. I can't seem to upload pictures here but I managed to get a pretty accurate headphones model to fit the sim head quite wel. When trying to unwrap, blender was complaining about something called seams. I have been slowly figuring out what that meant and have been toying around with that resulting in less of a jumbled mess when unwrapping. The thing I still need to figure out is how the baking process works. Can I colour the item in blender and somehow have it transferred to a texture map? Any tutorials on this would be awesome!
Also, I find that videos help me more than text and pictures.
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Post by mauvemorn on Nov 9, 2022 9:49:00 GMT -5
How to unwrap an item depends solemnly on its shape. You can plug in a blank image into the material and everything you paint on the 3d model will be projected onto the 2d image. This, however, is not something you need to do at all when making cc for games. You can just assign materials, create the environment, and bake all of this to texture. However, this is s4s-themed forum and all aforementioned topics - uv unwrapping, texture painting and baking - are not s4s or ts4-specific. You can find answers by watching introductory videos on these subjects or asking on Blender-themed forums. Also, you should have not watched a donut tutorial because, other than introduction to ui, pretty much nothing in it is relevant to us, cc makers.
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Post by captainslow on Nov 11, 2022 7:28:14 GMT -5
Indeed the donut tutorial was to train my basic knowledge on how blender works since I had no idea what everything did or what certain terms mean. It was really helpful because it was explained in great detail (go here, click this, use this key, and then this will happen). I must say I don't understand why my questions are not fully relevant to s4s, since the things I's like to know are going towards creating cc items and accessories for ts4. Most tutorials on blender are for 3D artists and some for game designers, but some insight in how these steps should be done so it works best with s4s would be helpful. And, in my personal opinion, relevant to these forums. Unless I misunderstood. I am still curious to what you mean by assigning materials, and bake all of this to texture. How do I take these steps so they are useable in ts4? Thank you for your insights.
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Post by mauvemorn on Nov 11, 2022 9:47:18 GMT -5
A few examples of topics specific to ts4/s4s: “My item in too shiny in-game” - a problem with a specular map that no one outside of ts4 modding community will be able to help you fix because they do not know how ts4 speculars work. This type of questions - “how to fix this” - goes into Creator help; “How ts4 specular works” - again, specific to ts4 but there is no problem to fix, so this type of questions goes into Creator Discussions; “Can you make this item shinier” - modding requests; “studio.exportall does not export the .mask” - bugs and errors thread.
Example of non-s4s/ts4-specific topic and why, instead of answering them, we direct people elsewhere: “How can I create a texture for diamonds” - is this task - making diamonds - unique to ts4 cc making? Has it ever been answered before? Does it make sense to write a detailed answer when the video tutorials on this subject already exist? can you explain to a beginner how to model and unwrap a diamond, create a material and proper environment, bake all of it to texture in the same amount of time it would take them to watch a tutorial? If you were to simply underline what buttons to click on a screenshot, then yes, but what would they learn from it and what would they be able to create in the future beside the same exact thing? If you were to spend hours if not days writing them detailed instructions with proper explanation, would the person, who had no idea what they were getting into, want to follow them? Do we know what shape of diamonds the person wants, realistic or stylized, what version of blender they use to give them a specific link? Are people on s4s-themed forum more knowledgeable on this subject than people on any blender-themed forum? And so on
Basically, we do not answer questions on general topics that are not unique to ts4 because a simple answer (“click here”) will not suffice and they need to find an introductory video that meets their needs the best and watch it to get a full picture.
Back to your question about baking, i can give you a link to a basic tutorial for baking textures for ts4 but it is for 2.7x versions and shows only how to bake ao. If you want your headphones to have a realistic texture, it will be of no use to you. Instead you would need to create an environment(source(s) of light and optionally something else to create reflections), then the material that behaves just like you need it to(so you need to learn how to set up materials in the node editor), then bake all of this to texture in Cycles ( and to do that you need to have a better understanding of settings in the rendering tab). If you want them to have a maxis match texture, it’s a whole different approach, and so on.
this tutorial is lacking in information but it shows a simpler way of baking semi-realistic textures in cycles than described above. For more information on this topics it is best to watch non-ts4-specific tutorials
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Post by Fwecka (Lolabellesims) on Nov 12, 2022 3:13:13 GMT -5
Indeed the donut tutorial was to train my basic knowledge on how blender works since I had no idea what everything did or what certain terms mean. It was really helpful because it was explained in great detail (go here, click this, use this key, and then this will happen). I must say I don't understand why my questions are not fully relevant to s4s, since the things I's like to know are going towards creating cc items and accessories for ts4. Most tutorials on blender are for 3D artists and some for game designers, but some insight in how these steps should be done so it works best with s4s would be helpful. And, in my personal opinion, relevant to these forums. Unless I misunderstood. I am still curious to what you mean by assigning materials, and bake all of this to texture. How do I take these steps so they are useable in ts4? Thank you for your insights. 100,000,000% you should do the accessories tutorial. I am dead serious on this. It will introduce you to (almost) everything you need to know. It won't teach all of the little Blender tricks that can speed up the process but that's something that comes with time and practice. As you work on different projects you pick up new skills. I know the earrings in that tutorial is not what you want to make but it's a very valuable tutorial, nonetheless. The thing is, if you want to learn you have to follow tutorials and make things you don't want to make just so you can practice and learn new skills. Watch videos. Work. Spend time. Read. Eventually, it will payoff. Fortunately, you have Mauvemorn willing to share her knowledge. I've been making stuff from the Sims 3 days but it was so hard to find tutorials--what I did find was for Milkshape and Milkshape makes me want to scream--or get answers to my questions. I'd ask a question on Mod the Sims or somewhere and never get an answer. It was maddening. I couldn't increase my skills very much at all. I have learned a ton from Mauvemorn. So, go do the earring tutorial. Once you've got the basics under your belt it's much easier to move to more complicated/specialized topics. It seems like you're eager to learn and that's good. Persistence pays off. Don't ever think you're being a pain in the neck. You want to learn and that means not giving up. Here are some basics to know. And you might want to bookmark this so you can refer back to it if necessary. *All games use a rig for animated meshes. A rig is a skeleton and you assign certain parts of the mesh to parts of the skeleton (rig). If you're making a shirt, for example, you'll assign the elbow of the shirt to the elbow of the skeleton. A hat will be 100% assigned to the head. The assignments are in the form of weights, joints, bones, vertex groups (all different names that mean the same thing). You must always have a rig with every mesh you make even if it's not animated. *If you clone a CAS item and look at the rig in Blender this is what it will look like. Each blue point is a "bone." Or weight or joint or vertex group. The bones are blue because I've selected them. Otherwise they'll be black. Note how many bones are in the face. The face does a lot of animation. *Weight paint refers to the colors of the weight assignments. Pure red means the weight is 100% assigned and will 100% influence that portion of the mesh the weight is assigned to. Pure blue means the weight is 0% assigned and will have no influence on that portion of the mesh. All other percentages are color coded, as well. *Non-animated meshes (static items) use the transformBone weight. If I'm not mistaken, you don't need to assign it yourself, however. Studio will do it for you. *Animated items--CAS items and some objects such as sofas, beds, and doors--will have a lot of weight assignments. The best way to do that is to transfer the weights from an EA item to your item. How you do this depends on what version of Blender you're using. Each vertex can have no more than four weights assigned to it (I believe this is a general rule in the gaming industry). Studio will delete weights if there are too many. *The uv_0 holds your basic texture. "uv_0" is case-sensitive. *The uv_1 works with the CAS sliders. "uv_1" is case-sensitive. *Vertex paint in TS4 works with the uv_1. It, too, affects the CAS sliders. The colors of vertex paint matter. Painting a mesh pure black means it won't respond to the CAS sliders at all. * Cut numbers are what Studio uses. It has to do with slot ray interactions which tells the game where each vertex is located in 3D space. You need to assign portions of your mesh the same cut numbers as whatever mesh you cloned. It's a little more complicated than this and dealing with multiple cut numbers is something you'll mostly encounter when making clothing. *Most people use Photoshop to make textures (Or GIMP). You will need a DDS plugin (this link is for Photoshop plugins. You can easily find the GIMP plugin online. *Adding a material in Blender means adding a texture to your mesh. You can color the material in one color or you can use a PNG or DDS image. Possibly even a JPG. *To utilize a texture your mesh must be unwrapped and put together into a UV map. Marking seams on your mesh determines where your mesh will be "cut" so it can be unfolded. *CAS items must have its UV islands in a specific place on the CAS map. The islands must not overlap into other areas or your item's texture will show up onto other items. *I don't know how to make a diffuse texture within Blender at this time, but any texture you make in Blender will have to be exported, edited in Photoshop (or another 2D software), and imported into Studio. *You can bake an ambient occlusion map in Blender which is an image file that adds shading and highlights so that your mesh appears 3D. You can use the ambient occlusion map with your texture to preserve the shadows and highlights. Here's an example of an ambient occlusion map: *The specular map determines how much and what kind of shine your object has. CAS speculars are a bit more complicated than object speculars. *A bump map is a texture that makes the mesh appear as if it has details the mesh doesn't actually have. You can bake a bump map in Blender.*CAS items have a shadow image which is used to make it appear that your item is casting a shadow onto the sim. You can make this texture in Blender, as well. *If you have a mesh that's already has a diffuse texture and you want the UV layout to be different you can bake a new diffuse texture from the original UV layout to your new UV layout. At this point, I'm sure you're overwhelmed but over time all of this will become second nature. Just don't give up! And feel free to ask questions.
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Post by captainslow on Nov 14, 2022 7:33:59 GMT -5
Thanks you two for the elaborate descriptions! I will start going through them once I have more time. I have gone through many of the steps shown in the earring tutorial with my custom model, so good to see I was on the right track with many of the steps. I will setup something I can use to share images so I can show rather then tell about my process. I will conitnue working on my skills. Thanks!
Also, I just managed to find a tutorial explaining EXACTLY what I needed, and judging from the comments in that video, this info is hard to find, so I thought I'd share it here:
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