Fixing Uneven Topology in Marvelous Designer ( 4 – Latest Version ) and reducing polycount in Blender
( turn on English subtitles )
- Blender ( method 1 ) - best for garments made of geometrically simple, straight-edged patterns;
- Blender ( method 2 ) - best for garments made of symmetrical, geometrically complex patterns;
- Blender ( method 3 ) - universal, but is best for garments with folds/wrinkles;
- Blender ( method 4 ) - universal, but is best for people whose version of MD precedes 4.
Hello. In this tutorial, I will explain how to fix uneven topology in Marvelous Designer using internal lines and, if needed, manually reduce polycount in Blender.
WRITTEN TUTORIAL:
PLEASE DO NOT REPOST
Here is a simple garment laid out in a way that makes it easier to visualize.
The keys to uniform and clean topology in MD lie in:
- Geometrically simple and predominantly straight edged patterns;
- All lengths of segments must be divisible by the same double figure, which, in my case, is 25 ( 1 ). Ideally, segments that are being sewn should be of the same length, too ( 2 ).
As shown, sometimes the difference in length and number of internal lines may result in even topology, other times it may not.
You can “shrink” or “loosen” a segment by turning on Property Editor - Selected Line - Elastic ( 1 ). The same can be done to a pattern by adjusting Property Editor - Shrinkage Weft ( 2 ) and Shrinkage Warp ( 3 );
- Quads. Switch to wireframe mode ( Alt + 5 ) ( 1 ). Select all patterns. To quadrangulate your mesh, right-click on it and choose Quadrangulate ( 2 ). Alternately, set Mesh Type to Quads in Property Editor - Miscellaneous ( 3 ). You can set the default mesh type in Settings ( 4 ) - User Settings - Others ( 5 ) Mesh ( 6 );
- Particle distance. To change it, select all patterns and type your desired value in Property Editor - Simulation properties - Particle Distance ( 1 ). If your garment has no wrinkles or folds, you can leave it at the default value. Dropping it below 20 mm tends to give clearer, albeit denser, topology. Manually removing unwanted edge loops in a different 3d modeling software gives you more control over the final result.
Once everything is adjusted, run the simulation.
A couple of tips:
- If wrinkles lack volume or have “dark edges”, make them bigger or smoother by adjusting Bending-Weft ( 4 ), Bending-Warp ( 5 ) and Thickness ( 6 ) values in Physical Property - Detail ( 3 ) of the assigned fabric ( 2 );
To preserve the shape of the mesh, right-click on it and choose Solidify
- ( 1 ).
Now, there is a number of ways to create internal lines:
- Offset as Internal Line ( 1 ). Right-click on the segment(s), choose Offset as Internal Line. Set the distance, number of offsets, direction, and length. Repeat in the perpendicular direction. As you see, the topology is uniform and almost perfect;
- Offset as Internal Line along Curve ( 2 ). This feature was introduced in MD7 and is especially useful with curved edged patterns;
- Line ( 3d pattern) ( 1 ). Draw the line on your mesh ( 2 ). Remove Linked Editing by right-clicking on selected patterns ( 3 ). In 3D window right-click on the line and choose Convert to Internal Line ( 4 ). Right-click on points and choose Convert to Curve Point ( 5 ) to make the line smoother. Right-click on the line and choose Extend/Trim to Pattern Outline;
- Internal Polygon/Line. Works exactly like the previous one, but you draw in 2D window.
To remove all internal lines from the pattern, select one of them, go to Scene ( 1 ) tab, select the rest ( 2 ), press delete button.
Export the file. Uncheck Select All Avatars and Include Internal Shape. Check Single Object, Weld, Thin, Unified UV coordinates, m (for The Sims 4).
Import your mesh in Blender. Some people use Decimate modifier to reduce polycount. While the shape is more-or-less preserved, the resulting topology is very bad. It has to be done manually.
Switch to Edit mode ( 1 ). Make sure to open UV Editor in a separate panel, you’ll need it. Enable Keep UV and Edit mode selection in sync ( 2 ). I’m going to show a few useful features, but, of course, you don’t have to use all of them in the process of retopology. Holding Ctrl, Lasso-select all vertices you want to merge ( 3 ). In Tools tab ( 4 ) choose Remove doubles ( 5 ). Adjust Merge Distance ( 6 ). Shift-select desired edges or vertices. Press Alt M and choose one of the options in the drop-down list ( 7 ). Check or uncheck UVs ( 8 ).To remove edges, press Delete and choose Dissolve Edges ( 9 ).
To edit UVs, press A ( 1 ) to select everything, disable Keep UV and Edit mode selection in sync ( 2 ), disable sticky selection mode ( 3 ), enable Snap during transform ( 4 ).
There is a couple of ways to remove edge loops uniformly.
- Alt Right-click on an edge loop ( 1 ). Go to Select - Checker Deselect ( 2 ). Increase Nth Selection to 2 ( 3 ). Go to Select - Edge rings ( 4 ). Ctrl Alt Right-click to select additional edge rings, Shift Ctrl Alt Right-click to deselect unwanted. Alt M - Collapse to collapse selected edge rings ( 5 ). Make sure UVs are checked.
- Ctrl Alt Right-click to select an edge ring ( 1 ). Select - Checker Deselect ( 2 ). Adjust Offset ( 3 ) to ensure no border edge is selected or deselect manually (Shift Right-click). Select - Edge loops ( 4 ). Delete - Dissolve Edges ( 5 ).
Ctrl V - Smooth vertex to smooth an edge loop or certain areas.
THANK YOU FOR READING.
If you have any questions or suggestions to improve this workflow, please leave them under the video / in replies to this post / in the ask box or message them privately on tumblr / via e-mail ( [email protected] ).