MakeHuman Community Wiki - User contributions [en]

Documentation:Index

2021-05-29T09:26:31Z

Punkduck:

== Introduction ==

* [[Documentation:What is MakeHuman?|What is MakeHuman?]]: A quick introduction to MakeHuman.
* [[Documentation:Short and Long Pipeline|Short and Long Pipeline ]]: The goal of Makehuman is to see it used in 2 different professional pipelines.
* [[Documentation:Professional mesh topology|Professional mesh topology ]]: An overview of the professional topology provided by MakeHuman
* [[Documentation:Legal|Legal ]]: The various licenses that apply to MakeHuman and External tools

== General overview ==

* [[Documentation:Installing MakeHuman|Installing MakeHuman]]
* [[Documentation:Running MakeHuman from source|Running MakeHuman from source]]
* [[Documentation:Configuration and settings|Configuration and settings]]
* [[Documentation:The interface and its basic functions|The interface and its basic functions]]
* [[Documentation:The toolbar|The toolbar]]
* [[Documentation:The tabs|The tabs]]
* [[Documentation:The sliders|The sliders]]
* [[Documentation:Loading and saving|Loading and saving]]
* [[Documentation:Zoom, pan and rotate using the orbital camera|Zoom, pan and rotate using the orbital camera]]

== Working with the human ==

* [[Documentation:Gender, Random, Measure and Custom|Gender, Random, Measure and Custom]]
* [[Documentation:Hairstyles and Clothes|Hairstyles and Clothes]]
* [[Documentation:Modeling the body|Modeling the body]]
* [[Documentation:Alternative topologies|Alternative topologies]]
* [[Documentation:Skin and other materials|Skin and other materials]]
* [[Documentation:Rendering your work|Rendering your work]]

== Exporting your work to another application ==

* [[Documentation:Exports and file formats|Exports and file formats]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Blender and how to import them there|Saving models for Blender and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Maya and how to import them there|Saving models for Maya and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for 3ds MAX and how to import them there|Saving models for 3ds MAX and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Unreal Engine and how to import them there|Saving models for Unreal Engine and how to import them there]] / [[Documentation:MH4UE|MH4UE]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Unity and how to import them there|Saving models for Unity and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for OpenSim / Second Life and how to import them there|Saving models for OpenSim / Second Life and how to import them there]]

== Working with MakeHuman models in Blender ==

* [[Documentation:Corrective shape keys|Corrective shape keys]]
* [[Documentation:MHBlenderTools: MakeShapes|MakeShapes a tool for adding more MH shapes in blender]]

== Downloading or creating new assets ==

* [[Documentation:What is an asset?|What is an asset?]]
* [[Documentation:Finding and downloading more assets|Finding and downloading more assets]]
* [[Documentation:Getting and installing BlenderTools|Getting and installing BlenderTools]]
* [[Documentation:TargetsV2|Targets]]
* [[Documentation:ClothesV2|Clothes]]
* [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|Materials]] (Materials for clothes and other assets)
* [[Documentation:Texture painting a skin in blender|Texture painting a skin in blender]]

== MakeWalk: General Background ==

* [[Documentation:MakeWalk|MakeWalk]]

== MakeWalk: In Depth Tutorials ==

* [[Documentation:Running feet|Running feet]]
* [[Documentation:Automatic animation|Automatic animation]]

== Interacting with the community ==

* [[Documentation:Asking for help|Asking for help]]
* [[Documentation:Reporting a bug|Reporting a bug]]

== MakeHuman for developers ==

* [[Documentation: Plugin System|Plugin System]]
* [[Documentation: OpenGL Notes|OpenGL Notes]]
* [[Documentation: Basemesh|Basemesh and standard skeleton]]
* [[Documentation: Directory structure and core modules|Directory structure and core modules]]
* [[Documentation: File formats and extensions|File formats and extensions]]
* [[Documentation: Libraries and build procedures|Libraries and build procedures]]
* [[Documentation: Development infrastructure|Development infrastructure]]
* [[Documentation: Application design and Code overview|Application design and Code overview]]
* [[Documentation: Getting started with MakeHuman code|Getting started with MakeHuman code]]
* [[Technical notes on MakeHuman]]

== Other / unsorted ==

* [[Documentation:Translation|Translation]]
* [[Documentation:Installing MHX2|Installing MHX2]]

== Meta ==

* [[Documentation:Planning on how to restructure the documentation]]

== Old documentation ==

* [[ Documentation:Collection of old documents|Previous versions of documentation]] are still available.

Documentation:Basemesh

2021-05-29T09:21:54Z

Punkduck:

In this chapter the base mesh is explained. The base mesh is the standard body mesh used in MakeHuman.

MakeHuman displays a visible mesh on the screen but inside it works with additional geometry to allow a better handling of clothes, to have helping geometry for bones etc.

[[File:Basemesh1.png]]

The complete mesh has an exact number of vertices and each vertex has a number, starting with number 0 to 13379 for the body and then continues to 19157 for the helper-geometry.

These are current number ranges:
{|class="wikitable"
!colspan="4"|Vertex numbers
|-
!name !! start !! end || purpose
|-
|body || 0 || 13379 || visible mesh
|-
|helper-tongue || 13380 || 13605 || weighting and deforming the tongue
|-
|joints || 13606 || 14597 || used to connect bones to
|-
|helper-x-eye || 14598 || 14741 || weighting and deforming the eyes
|-
|helper-x-eyelashes-y || 14742 || 14991 || weighting and deforming the eyelashes
|-
|helper-lower-teeth || 14992 || 15059 || weighting and deforming the lower teeth
|-
|helper-upper-teeth || 15060 || 15127 || weighting and deforming the upper teeth
|-
|helper-genital || 15128 || 15327 || weighting and deforming the male genitals
|-
|helper-tights || 15328 || 18001 || weigthing and deforming clothes near the body
|-
|helper-skirt || 18002 || 18721 || weighting and deforming a skirt
|-
|helper-hair || 18722 || 19149 || weighting and deforming the hair
|-
|ground || 19150 || 19157 || calculation of difference between root-bone and ground
|}

Internally that means: when a target e.g. resizes an arm, then also the tight-helper must be deformed. If the arm will be longer, some of the cubes for the joints will also be moved.

For a better overview: these are the components of the helper.

[[File:Basemesh2.png]]

The joints are a special helper. These are tiny cubes placed (mostly) inside the body. Each cube has 8 vertices, the median is used e.g. as a start- or end-point for a bone. This allows to determine the bone position inside the body. The following overview shows the joints of the upper body

[[File:Basemesh3.png]]

Some bones do not end in such a cube. The reason: bones can use each vertex available in helper-geometry or body. For the default skeleton there are two different other methods used:

(1) red dots: for e.g. the lowerarm01 and -02 bone the connecting point in the middle is calculated by simply summarizing the start and the end point of the complete lower arm. So this is a special case where rotation only is allowed in radial direction like in reality (simulating the bones ulna and radius of the lower arm).

(2) blue and yellow dots: The bones end directly on a vertex of the skin. Especially for facial expressions the face-bones (simulating muscles) use vertices on the skin directly. The yellow dots are use for the tongue, they end on the tongue helper.

[[File:Facebones.png]]

A few sentences for the standard skeleton here. For most bones the purpose in MakeHuman is simple to understand. The root bone is used to place character and it does not deform parts of the skin. Most of the other bones do. They can rotate and will influence the skin. A little more complicated is the facial region. Here some bones can be rotated and also translated to another location (painted in yellow in the demo picture). All "helper bones" have no own weight groups, they are only used to guide the other bones. And we have four bones which should be left untouched. These I call constant bones.

So in theory when using this in e.g. Blender, the face could be reduced to less bones, but then the location of the yellow bones must be part of the parameters saved. This could be an optimization when you do an animation later.

File:Facebones.png

2021-05-29T09:03:37Z

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Documentation:TargetsV2

2020-11-29T12:07:48Z

Punkduck: Created page with "=== Before using the program === MakeTarget Version 2 is created to work with new Blender. It is used to create custom targets for the body. A target is also called a morph o..."

=== Before using the program ===

MakeTarget Version 2 is created to work with new Blender. It is used to create custom targets for the body. A target is also called a morph or morphing which normally means the change of a shape in 3d. So it is used to create morphes or target of the basemesh. This program can also be used to correct targets made before.

The result of this target in MakeHuman is a table of changed vertices. It is an ASCII file containing 3 values how each vertex should be moved. It is obviously derived from Blender shape keys. So the workflow includes to create a new shape key in Blender as well.

There is a difference: Blender internally creates a copy of the complete mesh, even when you only change one vertex, the target of MakeHuman only contains the changed vertices.

Before a new target is created, the following questions should be answered:

* Should the target only change parts of the body like ears or lips not covered by clothes and where bones will not be stretched or located different?

In this case is sufficient to work only with the body

* Does the target also change part clothes and bones?

In this case body + helper mesh must be used

* Which mesh should be most likely used?

You should decide between male or female mesh or the standard mesh used in MakeHuman, when started.

=== Load the mesh ===

Best way is to load a human mesh using MPFB (MakeHuman Plugin for Blender). It has some presets which have to be used if you work with MakeTarget and it has a special help to work with the helper. You need to have MakeHuman in parallel using the socket connector (see image below).

In Blender, set MPFB "Settings" to "MakeTarget" and load settings. After that import the mesh.

[[File:MTG LoadMesh.png]]

To switch on the helper a modifier is added, just press the marked symbol and the helper will appear or disappear.

[[File:MTG ToggleHelper.png]]

If you don't use MPFB, you can also load a human mesh with Makeclothes2. This will not include the toggle for the helper.

There are a few additional methods, you can load it via mhx2 .. but be careful the scale must be the same otherwise your target will either use 1/10 of the movement or 10 times as much later in MakeHuman (mhx2 export: use decimeter). So easiest way is either to use MPFB or MakeClothes

=== Create a new target ===

As an example a target named lower-eyesbrows (should look a bit like an early human) should be created. It does not involve clothes and also no bones are changed. So in this case a mesh without
helpers would be sufficient.

The name lower-eyebrows is used to create the target. The result are two shape keys. An initial one "Basis" and the shape key which has to be changed.

[[File:MTG CreateTarget.png]]

Now the mesh is changed (make sure lower-eyebrows is selected in shape keys) so that the eyebrows are lowered. Best is to use proportional edit for your work. Be aware not to influence the eyelash region, otherwise the helper mesh must be changed for the eyelashes also.

Lets only change one eyebrow like in the picture.

The other side will be created by mirroring the target, here "copy +x to -x" is used. The copy command symmetrizes left and right side. A vertex in the middle will be set to x=0, so the mesh will stay totally symmetrical.

[[File:MTG SymmetrizeTarget.png]]

''Hint: symmetrizing is done with a table, so it will not fail as long as the table matches the mesh you load.''

=== Save the target ===

The last step is to save the target. Search for your target path of MakeHuman (custom targets). You can create a sub-folder if you work with a lot of own targets, like in the picture.

In MakeHuman these folders must be scanned again. So press the rescan-button. Then a subfolder will be detected and the target is ready to use.

[[File:MTG SaveTarget.png]]

=== Load a target ===

You can reload this target into MakeTarget2. As an example it is also easy to load a target made by someone else and change it or to load the official targets (only available on GitHub, the targets of the distribution are compressed). Especially if the helper was not changed, something that is sometimes neglected: load the mesh with helper, load the target, do the corrections and save it again.

[[File:MTG LoadTarget.png]]

File:MTG LoadTarget.png

2020-11-29T11:24:47Z

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File:MTG SaveTarget.png

2020-11-29T11:23:52Z

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File:MTG SymmetrizeTarget.png

2020-11-29T11:23:07Z

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File:MTG CreateTarget.png

2020-11-29T11:22:11Z

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File:MTG ToggleHelper.png

2020-11-29T11:21:09Z

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File:MTG LoadMesh.png

2020-11-29T11:18:38Z

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Documentation:Index

2020-11-29T11:17:44Z

Punkduck:

== Introduction ==

* [[Documentation:What is MakeHuman?|What is MakeHuman?]]: A quick introduction to MakeHuman.
* [[Documentation:Short and Long Pipeline|Short and Long Pipeline ]]: The goal of Makehuman is to see it used in 2 different professional pipelines.
* [[Documentation:Professional mesh topology|Professional mesh topology ]]: An overview of the professional topology provided by MakeHuman
* [[Documentation:Legal|Legal ]]: The various licenses that apply to MakeHuman and External tools

== General overview ==

* [[Documentation:Installing MakeHuman|Installing MakeHuman]]
* [[Documentation:Running MakeHuman from source|Running MakeHuman from source]]
* [[Documentation:Configuration and settings|Configuration and settings]]
* [[Documentation:The interface and its basic functions|The interface and its basic functions]]
* [[Documentation:The toolbar|The toolbar]]
* [[Documentation:The tabs|The tabs]]
* [[Documentation:The sliders|The sliders]]
* [[Documentation:Loading and saving|Loading and saving]]
* [[Documentation:Zoom, pan and rotate using the orbital camera|Zoom, pan and rotate using the orbital camera]]

== Working with the human ==

* [[Documentation:Gender, Random, Measure and Custom|Gender, Random, Measure and Custom]]
* [[Documentation:Hairstyles and Clothes|Hairstyles and Clothes]]
* [[Documentation:Modeling the body|Modeling the body]]
* [[Documentation:Alternative topologies|Alternative topologies]]
* [[Documentation:Skin and other materials|Skin and other materials]]
* [[Documentation:Rendering your work|Rendering your work]]

== Exporting your work to another application ==

* [[Documentation:Exports and file formats|Exports and file formats]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Blender and how to import them there|Saving models for Blender and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Maya and how to import them there|Saving models for Maya and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for 3ds MAX and how to import them there|Saving models for 3ds MAX and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Unreal Engine and how to import them there|Saving models for Unreal Engine and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for Unity and how to import them there|Saving models for Unity and how to import them there]]
* [[Documentation:Saving models for OpenSim / Second Life and how to import them there|Saving models for OpenSim / Second Life and how to import them there]]

== Working with MakeHuman models in Blender ==

* [[Documentation:Corrective shape keys|Corrective shape keys]]

== Downloading or creating new assets ==

* [[Documentation:What is an asset?|What is an asset?]]
* [[Documentation:Finding and downloading more assets|Finding and downloading more assets]]
* [[Documentation:Getting and installing BlenderTools|Getting and installing BlenderTools]]
* [[Documentation:TargetsV2|Targets]]
* [[Documentation:ClothesV2|Clothes]]
* [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|Materials]] (Materials for clothes and other assets)
* [[Documentation:Texture painting a skin in blender|Texture painting a skin in blender]]

== MakeWalk: General Background ==

* [[Documentation:MakeWalk|MakeWalk]]

== MakeWalk: In Depth Tutorials ==

* [[Documentation:Running feet|Running feet]]
* [[Documentation:Automatic animation|Automatic animation]]

== Interacting with the community ==

* [[Documentation:Asking for help|Asking for help]]
* [[Documentation:Reporting a bug|Reporting a bug]]

== MakeHuman for developers ==

* [[Documentation: Plugin System|Plugin System]]
* [[Documentation: OpenGL Notes|OpenGL Notes]]
* [[Documentation: Basemesh|Basemesh]]
* [[Documentation: Directory structure and core modules|Directory structure and core modules]]
* [[Documentation: File formats and extensions|File formats and extensions]]
* [[Documentation: Libraries and build procedures|Libraries and build procedures]]
* [[Documentation: Development infrastructure|Development infrastructure]]
* [[Documentation: Application design and Code overview|Application design and Code overview]]
* [[Documentation: Getting started with MakeHuman code|Getting started with MakeHuman code]]
* [[Technical notes on MakeHuman]]

== Other / unsorted ==

* [[Documentation:Translation|Translation]]
* [[Documentation:Installing MHX2|Installing MHX2]]

== Meta ==

* [[Documentation:Planning on how to restructure the documentation]]

== Old documentation ==

* [[ Documentation:Collection of old documents|Previous versions of documentation]] are still available.

Documentation:Collection of old documents

2020-11-29T11:15:09Z

Punkduck:

== MakeClothes: old version ==

* [[Documentation:Clothes|MakeClothes V1]] (documentation replaced '''MHBlenderTools: MakeClothes''', see below)
* [[Documentation:Making a simple dress|Making a simple dress]]
* [[Documentation:Making diapers for a baby|Making diapers for a baby]]
* [[Documentation:Controlling the result with vertex groups|Controlling the result with vertex groups]]
* [[Documentation:Modeling a sword|Modeling a sword]]

== MakeTarget: old version ==

* [[Documentation:Targets|MakeTarget V1]]

== Old blender plugins ==

The following have been merged in other pages, but they are left here if something got lost in the translation:

* [[ Documentation:MHBlenderTools: Download and installation|MHBlenderTools: Download and installation ]]: How to download and install the addons for Blender
* [[ Documentation:MHBlenderTools: MakeTarget|MHBlenderTools: MakeTarget ]]: Description of the MakeTarget™ tool, to create custom morphings for MakeHuman.
* [[ Documentation:MHBlenderTools:MakeClothes|MHBlenderTools: MakeClothes ]]: Description of the MakeClothes™ tool, to create custom clothes for MakeHuman.

== Documentation from Drupal ==

[[Documentation:Big dump from drupal]]

(most of this should now have been ported to separate pages as per above)

Documentation:Basemesh

2020-11-29T11:11:07Z

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Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-11-15T14:45:32Z

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= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new topology for the skin. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin. Typically used for e.g. a different resolution or to add genitals.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one item of clothing is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of an item of clothing uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of an item of clothing needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one item of clothing with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

The easiest way directly supported by MakeClothes is to work with the predefined meshes. MakeClothes contains 2 Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the plugin (male.blend and female.blend). When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. To work with it, select a mesh and press "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use alternative topologies in MakeHuman. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. It can be done easily by doing these steps:

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

The default preset of MakeClothes inside MPFB will mask the helper. It is possible, to switch the masking on or off. To do that, press the button marked in the illustration:

[[File:Mc2_togglehelper.png]]

Typically the helper will be switched off, when the clothes are modelled. When you assign the vertex groups you should switch it on, because it makes sense to use groups on the helper for the weighting. It is possible to extract clothes from the helper (even when masked) as long as it is not deleted.

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no alternative topology such as male muscled mesh, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no alternative topology, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will hold this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

If a helper mesh is available it is possible to use this helper as a basis for the clothes. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

[[File:MC2_extract_helpers.png]]

The normal way would be to extract either "Tights" or "Skirt". Extract means that a copy of a helper part is prepared for your work. The second step would then be to modify this geometry for your own purposes.

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on an item of clothing. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "clothing" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "clothing" on your item of clothing
* assign all vertices of the item of clothing to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the item of clothing is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the item of clothing, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underwear at 31; normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. The best way is to create seams in Blender where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

[[Documentation:Modeling Clothes#Texturing the clothes|Some methods to texture clothes you will find here]].

== Create the clothes ==

The last step to create clothes is to select the item of clothing and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

This is not the documentation of how to model geometries for clothes and not every one will be happy with simple way to copy the helper meshes and create clothes directly.

[[Documentation:Modeling Clothes|Some different methods to create clothes you will find here.]]

== Usage of shape keys and targets, create heels ==

A special female body with shape keys is added as a predefined mesh to allow creation of heels. For advanced users: [[Documentation:CreateHeels|this is the way it works]]

== Importing existing clothes ==

It is possible to load an existing mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. It's best to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body they were made for. But the advantage is that, e.g., clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a human is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new item of clothing.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

Documentation:Modeling Clothes

2020-11-15T14:22:59Z

Punkduck:

== Creating a dress from the scratch ==

There are a lot of ways to model a piece of cloth. There is also 3rd party software available, where it is possible to model clothes like a tailor does. Here is one way to create it with simple elements and then use Blender cloth simulation.
To show an easy way, the work is done with a t-pose female mesh (with and without helper), so this time not the standard MakeHuman pose is used. These t-posed meshes are included in MakeClothes.

We only use cylinders, inset faces, extruding, loop cuts and edge bridging. Therefore we will have quads in the end. Furthermore this dress is made without lose geometry (all vertices are connected). So it can be used in a cloth simulation directly. This is not necessarily needed, at the end of this document I added an example with a mesh using lose geometry

[[File:Dress-example-geometry.png|none]]

Now the mesh must be UV-unwrapped. For some tips and tricks just read the next chapter about texturing.

After modeling the dress the vertex groups must be assigned. Therefore the female mesh without helper is deleted and the predefined one with helpers is loaded with MakeClothes.

[[File:Dress-example-vgroups.png|none]]

Then all missing parameters are supplied and the dress is ready to go, but without texture.

[[File:Dress-example-save.png|none]]

=== Maximum number of poles ===

The newest version of MakeHuman is able to handle also bigger number of poles. But especially quad-meshes with a high number of poles are not very good for subdivision. A high number of poles often appears, when a disc (with even number of vertices) must be filled.

This can be easily avoided. The example shows 3 methods of a 32 vertices circle to do it:

# left: select the yellow circle, use checker deselect to select every second vertex, extrude to center and press CTRL m to connect all vertices. This results is a pole of 16, which is not good.
# middle: do it manually by connecting some of them according to the pattern. This results in a regular pattern of only 8 poles in the middle
# right: use grid fill, the easiest method which will not have more then 4 poles. Only one tiny disadvantage: if you need the middle (e.g. to be elevated) this might be less accurate

[[File:Dress-example-poles.png|none]]

=== Sharp edges ===

MakeHuman normally saves files with smooth faces for import in Blender. When smoothing in MakeHuman or Blender is switched on, all geometry is smoothed. For most of the geometry (for clothes) this works as desired. But there are some exceptions where a sharp edge is needed. The demo-picture shows one example for a smooth surface (the button) and one for a sharp edge. For the sharp edge tiny faces at the edges are needed. Further information: be aware that both geometries in this example should have an own vertex group made from 3 vertices on body or helper not to be distorted. Very small geometry will be distorted when two vertices, which are very near, correspond to different vertex-combinations on the base mesh.

[[File:Dress-example-smoothing.jpg|none]]

Further hint: MakeHuman's algorithm for subdivision-surface does not work correctly for textures. The geometry is smoothed but the texture coordinates are also distributed in the same ratio. This results in a wrong representation of the texture especially when small and large faces join a common edge. Blender is able to use a mode with correct UV representation.

[[File:Dress-example-smooth-mh.jpg|none]]

== Texturing the clothes ==

For the example we use a texture which is not created inside Blender with e.g. perspective painting. We use GIMP (or any other paint program) to create png-Files.

When the dress appears in MakeHuman it looked like the one on the left side. Result should be the one of the right side.

[[File:Dress-example-texturedchar.png|frame|none|hair CC-BY Elvaerwyn]]

To have a base for a paint program the layout of the UV-Map must be exported. Depending on the details and to get a visible structure a minimum size of 2048x2048 is chosen.
When you create parts which are used multiple times (like buttons), you should UV-unwrap this geometry before you copy it. The copy of the texture will then be on the same position.

Sometimes it makes sense to align some of the unwrapped geometry, in the example we do that for the edges and sleeves. There are Blender tools to support this in the UV-map.

In the paint program we need a seamless texture (which can be repeated without visible seams). This can be created by a function inside the paint program or by mirroring.

In the example mirroring was used. The texture is inserted in an extra layer. The plane was simply filled with the pattern, the black mask is added in a third layer for clarification. Side effect of the black mask is that the file becomes a little shorter.

[[File:Dress-example-gimtex.png|none]]

In the end we will supply a normalmap, which is created by the paint program and not in Blender. In this case we need to do a height map first. If we use a black and white image white means low and black means high. If the software works the other way round, just the inverted image is needed. This following steps are done for the edges of the dress.

[[File:Dress-example-manual-normalmap.png|none]]

=== Lose geometry and transparent textures ===

Finally I will add an example how a simple mesh (657 vertices) will create a rather realistic looking piece of cloth. This mesh stays close to the body and because of lose geometry cannot be used for a cloth simulation directly (it will fall apart). Furthermode the rims intersect with the body to simulate a close fit. For a cloth simulation with the body as a collision object this will give unpredictable results.

I marked the elements of the lingerie with 3 colors:

# blue for the main part
# orange for the rims
# green for the bow tie

The blue part was modeled directly on the body (one half) and then mirrored. The rims were separated and then extruded in z direction. Second extrude was made so that the resulting vertices are inside the body. The bow tie was "painted" with a single vertex by extruding a "curve" in x-z plane. Then this was extruded in y direction and changed to a u-shape.

All 3 elements use different parts of the texture. It makes sense to align the rim and put the texture on a special part which then is repeated. Same for the bow tie. The rest is a normal UV-unwrap. Seams are at the sides and in crotch area (identical to reality). To get the very fine structure I manually created a hexagon mesh, used it as a fill pattern and combined that with the rest of the texture.

[[File:Dress-example-lose-geom1.png|none]]

This is the result (using a diffuse and normal map):

[[File:Dress-example-lose-geom2.png|none]]

Documentation:Modeling Clothes

2020-11-15T13:49:22Z

Punkduck:

== Creating a dress from the scratch ==

There are a lot of ways to model a piece of cloth. There is also 3rd party software available, where it is possible to model clothes like a tailor does. Here is one way to create it with simple elements and then use Blender cloth simulation.
To show an easy way, the work is done with a t-pose female mesh (with and without helper), so this time not the standard MakeHuman pose is used. These t-posed meshes are included in MakeClothes.

We only use cylinders, inset faces, extruding, loop cuts and edge bridging. Therefore we will have quads in the end.

[[File:Dress-example-geometry.png|none]]

Now the mesh must be UV-unwrapped. For some tips and tricks just read the next chapter about texturing.

After modeling the dress the vertex groups must be assigned. Therefore the female mesh without helper is deleted and the predefined one with helpers is loaded with MakeClothes.

[[File:Dress-example-vgroups.png|none]]

Then all missing parameters are supplied and the dress is ready to go, but without texture.

[[File:Dress-example-save.png|none]]

=== Maximum number of poles ===

The newest version of MakeHuman is able to handle also bigger number of poles. But especially quad-meshes with a high number of poles are not very good for subdivision. A high number of poles often appears, when a disc (with even number of vertices) must be filled.

This can be easily avoided. The example shows 3 methods of a 32 vertices circle to do it:

# left: select the yellow circle, use checker deselect to select every second vertex, extrude to center and press CTRL m to connect all vertices. This results is a pole of 16, which is not good.
# middle: do it manually by connecting some of them according to the pattern. This results in a regular pattern of only 8 poles in the middle
# right: use grid fill, the easiest method which will not have more then 4 poles. Only one tiny disadvantage: if you need the middle (e.g. to be elevated) this might be less accurate

[[File:Dress-example-poles.png|none]]

=== Sharp edges ===

MakeHuman normally saves files with smooth faces for import in Blender. When smoothing in MakeHuman or Blender is switched on, all geometry is smoothed. For most of the geometry (for clothes) this works as desired. But there are some exceptions where a sharp edge is needed. The demo-picture shows one example for a smooth surface (the button) and one for a sharp edge. For the sharp edge tiny faces at the edges are needed. Further information: be aware that both geometries in this example should have an own vertex group made from 3 vertices on body or helper not to be distorted. Very small geometry will be distorted when two vertices, which are very near correspond with different vertex-combinations on the base mesh.

[[File:Dress-example-smoothing.jpg|none]]

Further hint: MakeHuman's algorithm for subdivision-surface does not work correctly for textures. The geometry is smoothed but the texture coordinates are also distributed in the same ration. This results in a wrong representation of the texture especially when small and large faces join a common edge.

[[File:Dress-example-smooth-mh.jpg|none]]

== Texturing the clothes ==

For the example we use a texture which is not created inside Blender with e.g. perspective painting. We use GIMP (or any other paint program) to create png-Files.

When the dress appears in MakeHuman it looked like the one on the left side. Result should be the one of the right side.

[[File:Dress-example-texturedchar.png|frame|none|hair CC-BY Elvaerwyn]]

To have a base for a paint program the layout of the UV-Map must be exported. Depending on the details and to get a visible structure a minimum size of 2048x2048 is chosen.
When you create parts which are used multiple times (like buttons), you should UV-unwrap this geometry before you copy it. The copy of the texture will then be on the same position.

Sometimes it makes sense to align some of the unwrapped geometry, in the example we do that for the edges and sleeves. There are Blender tools to support this in the UV-map.

In the paint program we need a seamless texture (which can be repeated without visible seams). This can be created by a function inside the paint program or by mirroring.

In the example mirroring was used. The texture is inserted in an extra layer. The plane was simply filled with the pattern, the black mask is added in a third layer for clarification. Side effect of the black mask is that the file becomes a little shorter.

[[File:Dress-example-gimtex.png|none]]

In the end we will supply a normalmap, which is created by the paint program and not in Blender. In this case we need to do a height map first. If we use a black and white image white means low and black means high. If the software works the other way round, just the inverted image is needed. This following steps are done for the edges of the dress.

[[File:Dress-example-manual-normalmap.png|none]]

(do be continued and improved :) )

Documentation:Modeling Clothes

2020-11-15T13:29:55Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-poles.png

2020-11-15T13:10:56Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-lose-geom2.png

2020-11-15T13:10:21Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-lose-geom1.png

2020-11-15T13:09:45Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-smooth-mh.jpg

2020-11-15T13:09:11Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-smoothing.jpg

2020-11-15T13:08:32Z

Punkduck:

Documentation:Modeling Clothes

2020-11-14T21:16:18Z

Punkduck: Created page with " == Creating a dress from the scratch == There are a lot of ways to model a piece of cloth. There is also 3rd party software available, where it is possible to model clothes..."

File:Dress-example-manual-normalmap.png

2020-11-14T20:00:36Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-gimtex.png

2020-11-14T19:59:53Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-save.png

2020-11-14T19:59:10Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-texturedchar.png

2020-11-14T19:57:49Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-geometry.png

2020-11-14T19:57:04Z

Punkduck:

File:Dress-example-vgroups.png

2020-11-14T19:56:11Z

Punkduck:

Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-11-14T19:55:28Z

Punkduck:

Caution: this file is still under construction :)

= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new topology for the skin. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin. Typically used for e.g. a different resolution or to add genitals.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one item of clothing is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of an item of clothing uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of an item of clothing needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one item of clothing with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

The easiest way directly supported by MakeClothes is to work with the predefined meshes. MakeClothes contains 2 Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the plugin (male.blend and female.blend). When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. To work with it, select a mesh and press "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use alternative topologies in MakeHuman. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. It can be done easily by doing these steps:

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

The default preset of MakeClothes inside MPFB will mask the helper. It is possible, to switch the masking on or off. To do that, press the button marked in the illustration:

[[File:Mc2_togglehelper.png]]

Typically the helper will be switched off, when the clothes are modelled. When you assign the vertex groups you should switch it on, because it makes sense to use groups on the helper for the weighting. It is possible to extract clothes from the helper (even when masked) as long as it is not deleted.

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no alternative topology such as male muscled mesh, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no alternative topology, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will hold this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

If a helper mesh is available it is possible to use this helper as a basis for the clothes. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

[[File:MC2_extract_helpers.png]]

The normal way would be to extract either "Tights" or "Skirt". Extract means that a copy of a helper part is prepared for your work. The second step would then be to modify this geometry for your own purposes.

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on an item of clothing. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "clothing" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "clothing" on your item of clothing
* assign all vertices of the item of clothing to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the item of clothing is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the item of clothing, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underwear at 31; normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. The best way is to create seams in Blender where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

<will be changed later with some advice how to do good textures etc.>

== Create the clothes ==

One of simplest ways is to copy the helper meshes and create clothes directly. Of course there are more possibilities to do it, [[Documentation:Modeling Clothes|here are some methods you can use]].

The last step to create clothes is to select the item of clothing and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

== Usage of shape keys and targets, create heels ==

A special female body with shape keys is added as a predefined mesh to allow creation of heels. For advanced users: [[Documentation:CreateHeels|this is the way it works]]

== Importing existing clothes ==

It is possible to load an existing mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. It's best to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body they were made for. But the advantage is that, e.g., clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a human is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new item of clothing.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

Releases:120

2020-10-26T23:05:20Z

Punkduck:

These are the release notes for 1.2.0, which is not yet released.

This is the final and stable release. It is what we now recommend everyone to use. See also [[FAQ: Which version of MakeHuman should I download?]]

If you are already using a recent nightly build however, there is no particular need to switch to the stable release, as there have only been minor bug fixes lately.

== General ==

In most cases, there should be no problem running versions 1.1.1 and 1.2.0 on the same system. They will not interfere with each other's files. You can find download links for 1.2.0 at the bottom of this page.

"MakeHuman Community 1.2.0" is a major update of the underlying code, where the focus has been to replace outdated dependencies and modernize the system.
Further, a shift in focus has been made to position MakeHuman as a shared tool serving the larger community through integrated access to third party assets and extended functionality.

== Changes since 1.1.1 ==

These are the main themes of the changes since 1.1.1. See further down for more details.

* The codebase has received a major overhaul to bring it up to date with modern versions of Python and Qt.
* There is a completely new Blender integration, MPFB, with support for socket transfers, IK and Kinect.
* The license has changed to (hopefully) be more clear and permissive.
* The toolset for creating assets (MakeClothes and MakeTarget) has been rewritten from scratch.
* There is a new tool "MakeSkin" for creating materials.
* Third party assets can be downloaded from within MakeHuman with a simple point and click procedure.
* There is a new Mass production functionality for generating large sets of randomized characters.
* Improved internationalization support for non-ASCII characters (backported).
* Plugins in user space.
* Plugins activation at runtime.
* Improved tag sorting capabilities (Hotkey: ALT-F), including sticky tag provisions.
* Tags for models (with configurable tag count).
* Show Name Tags instead of file names in the file loader.
* Saving model as target.
* Real weight estimation.
* Configurable location for the home folder.
* MHX2 is bundled in the default installation.
* Save thumbnails directly from the internal render engine.
* There is a new installer for windows.
* There is a new PPA for ubuntu. This PPA also offers builds of plugins.
* Using Jupyter for the shell utility, if available on the system (currently not working for MakeHuman windows builds).

=== The upgraded codebase ===

The main focus of this release has been to modernize the code. In the prior version, large parts were written more than ten years ago, and relied on libraries and code structures which are no longer functional in a modern context. More in detail:

* The system was written for python 2.6 and then upgraded when needed to python 2.7. The final end of life for python 2.7 was january 1, 2020.
* The user interface was implemented in Qt4, via PyQt4. Both Qt4 and PyQt4 got deprecated years ago, and Riverside (the authors of PyQt) removed all PyQt4 windows binaries, meaning we could no longer provide windows builds.

Thus, the need to bring the code up to modern times became critical. We realized that the system would soon not be possible to run or develop on several platforms.

Going through the code to update it has taken some considerable time (years actually), but it has had the added benefit that we have also reviewed almost all sections of the code and fixed a lot of minor
bugs and glitches.

Most users will probably not notice much difference: the user interfaces in 1.2.0 and 1.1.1 are almost identical. But it was work that needed to be done before we could move forward with implementing new features.

=== The new Blender integration, Makehuman plugin for Blender or *MPFB* ===

[[File:Mpfbeevee.png|300px|thumb|right|One click import directly from MakeHuman, with improved skin shader]]

In blender it is now possible to fetch a character directly from a running instance of MakeHuman, without having to first save/export the character to a file.

The importer will talk with the makehuman instance and fetch all meshes (such as the body, hair clothes...), materials, rigs and poses.
The process is almost instantaneous (a character with a lot of clothes might take a few seconds to import).

The importer UI supports a wide range of settings and presets. By using a preset you can, for example, import a body mesh suitable for using together with MakeClothes. This will make it significantly easier
to develop assets aimed at a specific body type.

Further, the importer supports improved skin features such as skin pores and SSS.

Note that for the importer to work, you will have to go to the Community -> Socket tab in MakeHuman and enable "Accept connections". Otherwise MakeHuman won't answer, and you will get an error in Blender.

=== License change ===

The license has changed to be more comprehensive and permissive. The full text of the new license can be found here: https://github.com/makehumancommunity/makehuman/blob/master/LICENSE.md

In summary, it has been made clear that assets included with and produced by makehuman are CC0 no matter how you got hold of them.

There is a description of the license change here: http://www.makehumancommunity.org/wiki/FAQ:What_changed_regarding_the_license_in_2020%3F

=== Assets can now be downloaded from within MakeHuman ===

[[File:12x-assetdownloader.png|400px|thumb|right|The asset downloader]]

This version of MakeHuman bundles the asset downloader plugin. By using this you can access all the hundreds of user contributed assets that are available via the MakeHuman Community.

Within the UI you can search for assets, show screenshots, read about details, see author publishing and license information and download. Downloaded assets are automatically placed in your local asset directory so that you can
immediately go to the geometries tabs and, for example, equip the newly downloaded clothes.

=== Mass produce ===

There is now functionality available for randomizing large sets of characters. This includes varying body shape and gender, as well as randomizing which clothes the characters are equiped with.

An introduction to this functionality can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRHnJX-TdT4 (in the video it is stated that the plugin can be downloaded separately, but it is now included in the MakeHuman distribution).

=== Upgraded toolset for creating assets ===

The toolchain for creating MakeHuman assets have been upgraded:

* MakeClothes and MakeTarget have been rewritten from scratch and been made compatible with Blender 2.80 and later. They are now called MakeClothes 2 and MakeTarget 2, in order to separate them from the old versions that work with Blender 2.79 and earlier.
* A new tool MakeSkin has been added. This allows creating more advanced materials than what MakeClothes can do alone. There is a video introducing this functionality at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0amcxq4Ik60

=== A new windows installer ===

The windows version is now distributed as an executable installer that supports uninstall. After installing MakeHuman, it can now be found on the start menu like all other normal windows application.

Note that it is no longer recommended to go to the installation folder and start MakeHuman manually there. In order to do so, you would have to manually set up an environment for python, something
which is handled automatically by the start menu entry.

 

== Known issues ==

* While most of the graphics card incompatibilities should now be fixed, there may still be still parts of the program that cause problems with some integrated graphics cards. For potential remedies if you run into problems, see [[FAQ:MakeHuman_does_not_start]] and [[FAQ:The_interface_looks_broken]]
* MakeHuman is not compatible with PyQt later than 5.12. If you have a later version than 5.12 installed, scrolling will not work. Since Ubuntu 20.10 has shipped with 5.14 (which is incompatible), we have chosen to not provide a build for Ubuntu 20.10.
* There is no mac build. See http://www.makehumancommunity.org/wiki/FAQ:Is_there_a_mac_build%3F
* On Mint you need to explicitly install the plugins as they will not be automatically installed. With the ppa enabled, run "sudo apt-get install makehuman-community-plugins-assetdownload makehuman-community-plugins-socket makehuman-community-plugins-massproduce mhx2-makehuman-exchange"
* Toolset support for Blender 2.79 has been dropped. Tools such as MPFB, MakeClothes and MakeTarget are built for and tested with Blender 2.83 and later.

== Upgrading ==

This version uses the same file formats as 1.1.x in almost all cases. The only exception is MHM files (which are produced when clicking "save model" in MakeHuman). 1.2.x is able to open MHM files produced in 1.1.x, and the result will look exactly the same as in 1.1.x. However, 1.1.x will not be able to open MHM files saved by 1.2.x.

For all other assets, things should work the same and look the same in both versions, using the same files.

== Where to download ==

The following are links to where you can download beta 2:

You can download (link to page for windows download)

For linux, [https://launchpad.net/~makehuman-official/+archive/ubuntu/makehuman-community there is a new PPA].

== Providing feedback and bug reports ==

As always with a beta release, the important part is getting feedback and bug reports.

If in doubt, feedback and bug reports can always be posted on the forums http://www.makehumancommunity.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=3. But more formal information about bug trackers can be found here: http://www.makehumancommunity.org/content/bugtracker.html

Documentation:CreateHeels

2020-09-26T14:58:28Z

Punkduck: Created page with " === Methods to create heels === To create heels or especially heel sandals is something what MakeHuman was not really made for. But there are some methods to create rather..."

=== Methods to create heels ===

To create heels or especially heel sandals is something what MakeHuman was not really made for. But there are some methods to create rather good results, these are:

* for shoes where you can't see the feet (like boots) it is possible to delete the feet and create boots directly. This method is recommended for closed shoes, because it is easier to handle.
* it is also possible to duplicate feet, then change the shape so that they fit inside the heels and use a delete group for the vertices on the body. The problem would be that the skin texture must be part of the shoes and there is a visible small gap when subdivision surface algorithm is used between the feet with the shoes and the rest of the body.
* it is possible to model the shoes slanted and later rotate the feet-bones. These shoes will look a bit clumsy because the toebox has to fit to the normal feet. In reality a narrow toebox is used for heels.
* the method described in this documentation uses a special body with a shape key and needs at least one appropriate target in MakeHuman. It needs no own feet and can be used on heel sandals.

So load '''female-heels_shapekey''' from the predefined meshes and set value of shape key so that it fits to the angle you need for the shoes.

[[File:Mc2_heels1.png]]

=== Model the shoes ===

Now model your shoes. I took the peep toe slingbacks1 from Elvaerwyn as a demonstration. Usually one side is created and then mirrored.

[[File:Mc2_heels2.png]]

=== Usage of vertex groups ===

Shoes (especially heels) have parts which are not flexible. Not to have deformed parts, one should use rigid groups (groups with only 3 vertices) on the body as a base for the clothes.

There are two predefined groups for each side supplied. One can be used directly on sole of foot, the other is placed near the ankle. One should decide for one group (and test what looks better in the end).

''Hint: The group near the ankle is not deformed by the shape key and should be used when one create e.g. a combination of a roman sandal and high heels. For the lower part (foot + ankle) this rigid group would be used, for the upper part a "flexible" group containing the vertices of the lower leg without foot would be a solution.''

So for these shoes the leftAnkleRigid was used for left shoe and rightAnkleRigid for right shoe. That means that corresponding vertex groups with the same names must be created for the shoes and must be assigned.

[[File:Mc2_heels3.png]]

=== Inside MakeHuman ===

After loading the shoes into MakeHuman the shoes don't look correct. In case of the ankle vertex group the character will hover above the shoes and in case of the other one at the sole of feet shoes will be slanted.

There are some custom targets in the assets of MakeHuman to change this. Minimum ist the '''heels angle target'''. All other targets used in the illustration can be used if the shoes do not fit the character a 100%.

''Hint: For the sake of clarity I created a folder called "shoes" inside the custom target folder and moved all targets into this folder. That is the reason that "heels toebox" now is displayed as "Shoes heels toebox".''

[[File:Mc2_heels4.png]]

File:Mc2 heels4.png

2020-09-26T13:58:15Z

Punkduck:

File:Mc2 heels3.png

2020-09-26T13:57:39Z

Punkduck:

File:Mc2 heels2.png

2020-09-26T13:57:07Z

Punkduck:

File:Mc2 heels1.png

2020-09-26T13:56:18Z

Punkduck:

Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-09-26T13:55:10Z

Punkduck:

Caution: this file is still under construction :)

= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new topology for the skin. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin. Typically used for e.g. a different resolution or to add genitals.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one piece of cloth is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one piece of cloth with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

The easiest way directly supported by MakeClothes is to work with the predefined meshes. MakeClothes contains 2 Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the plugin (male.blend and female.blend). When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. To work with it, select a mesh and press "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use alternative topologies in MakeHuman. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. It can be done easily by doing these steps:

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

The default preset of MakeClothes inside MPFB will mask the helper. Masking means, that it is possible, to switch the masking on or off. To do that, press the button marked in the illustration:

[[File:Mc2_togglehelper.png]]

Typically the helper will be switched off, when the clothes are modelled. When you assign the vertex groups you should switch it on, because it makes sense to use groups on the helper for the weighting. It is possible to extract clothes from the helper (even when masked) as long as it is not deleted.

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no alternative topology such as male muscled mesh, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no alternative topology, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will held this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

In case a helper mesh is available it is possible to use this helper as a basis for the clothes. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

[[File:MC2_extract_helpers.png]]

The normal way would be to extract either "Tights" or "Skirt". Extract means, that a copy of a helper part is prepared for your work. The second step would then be to modify this geometry for your own purposes.

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on a piece of cloth. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "cloth" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "cloth" on your piece of cloth
* assign all vertices of the piece of cloth to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the piece of cloth is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the piece of cloth, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underware at 31, normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. Best way is to create seams in Blender, where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

<will be changed later with some advice how to do good textures etc.>

== Creating of own clothes ==

To create clothes select the piece of cloth and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

<will contain a lot of tips & tricks later>

== Usage of shape keys and targets, create heels ==

A special female body with shape keys is added as a predefined mesh to allow creation of heels. For advanced users: [[Documentation:CreateHeels|this is the way it works]]

== Importing existent clothes ==

It is possible to load an existent mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. Best is to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body, they were made for. But the advantage is, that e.g. clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, Most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a humans is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new piece of cloth.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-09-13T15:53:33Z

Punkduck:

Caution: this file is still under construction :)

= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new topology for the skin. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin. Typically used for e.g. a different resolution or to add genitals.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one piece of cloth is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one piece of cloth with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the makeclothes plugin can be used directly. When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. The selected mesh is appended by pressing the "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

{| style="color:green; background-color:#ffffcc;"
|-
|The files of the pre-defined humans are not yet included in the repository, this will happen soon, different meshes will be provided, also t-posed ones. If you want to work with that already:
|-
|create folder humans in Blender directory scripts/addons/makeclothes
|-
|unzip this file [http://www.makehumancommunity.org/forum/download/file.php?id=8095 Zip-File with male and female meshes]
|-
|move both blend files into this folder.
|-
|}

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use alternative topologies in MakeHuman. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. It can be done easily by doing these steps:

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

The default preset of MakeClothes inside MPFB will mask the helper. Masking means, that it is possible, to switch the masking on or off. To do that, press the button marked in the illustration:

[[File:Mc2_togglehelper.png]]

Typically the helper will be switched off, when the clothes are modelled. When you assign the vertex groups you should switch it on, because it makes sense to use groups on the helper for the weighting. It is possible to extract clothes from the helper (even when masked) as long as it is not deleted.

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no alternative topology such as male muscled mesh, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no alternative topology, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will held this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

In case a helper mesh is available it is possible to use this helper as a basis for the clothes. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

[[File:MC2_extract_helpers.png]]

The normal way would be to extract either "Tights" or "Skirt". Extract means, that a copy of a helper part is prepared for your work. The second step would then be to modify this geometry for your own purposes.

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on a piece of cloth. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "cloth" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "cloth" on your piece of cloth
* assign all vertices of the piece of cloth to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the piece of cloth is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the piece of cloth, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underware at 31, normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. Best way is to create seams in Blender, where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

<will be changed later with some advice how to do good textures etc.>

== Creating of own clothes ==

To create clothes select the piece of cloth and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

<will contain a lot of tips & tricks later>

== Special poses, heels etc. ==

<works with a special target in MakeHuman and a pose changed with shape key in MakeClothes>

== Importing existent clothes ==

It is possible to load an existent mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. Best is to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body, they were made for. But the advantage is, that e.g. clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, Most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a humans is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new piece of cloth.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

File:Mc2 togglehelper.png

2020-09-13T15:45:35Z

Punkduck:

File:Mc2 loadhumanmfb.png

2020-09-13T15:27:49Z

Punkduck: Punkduck uploaded a new version of File:Mc2 loadhumanmfb.png

File:MC2 extract helpers.png

2020-09-13T14:59:09Z

Punkduck:

File:Mc2 makeclothes2.png

2020-09-13T14:51:01Z

Punkduck: Punkduck uploaded a new version of File:Mc2 makeclothes2.png

Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-09-13T14:49:56Z

Punkduck:

Caution: this file is still under construction :)

= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new topology for the skin. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin. Typically used for e.g. a different resolution or to add genitals.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one piece of cloth is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one piece of cloth with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the makeclothes plugin can be used directly. When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. The selected mesh is appended by pressing the "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

{| style="color:green; background-color:#ffffcc;"
|-
|The files of the pre-defined humans are not yet included in the repository, this will happen soon, different meshes will be provided, also t-posed ones. If you want to work with that already:
|-
|create folder humans in Blender directory scripts/addons/makeclothes
|-
|unzip this file [http://www.makehumancommunity.org/forum/download/file.php?id=8095 Zip-File with male and female meshes]
|-
|move both blend files into this folder.
|-
|}

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use alternative topologies. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. If you need the helpers, change settings according to the illustration and import the mesh. Instead of "don't modify" you can also use "Mask".

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no alternative topology such as male muscled mesh, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no alternative topology, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will held this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

In case a helper mesh is available it is possible to use the helpers as a first try. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

<more text to be written>

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on a piece of cloth. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "cloth" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "cloth" on your piece of cloth
* assign all vertices of the piece of cloth to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the piece of cloth is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the piece of cloth, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underware at 31, normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. Best way is to create seams in Blender, where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

<will be changed later with some advice how to do good textures etc.>

== Creating of own clothes ==

To create clothes select the piece of cloth and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

<will contain a lot of tips & tricks later>

== Special poses, heels etc. ==

<works with a special target in MakeHuman and a pose changed with shape key in MakeClothes>

== Importing existent clothes ==

It is possible to load an existent mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. Best is to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body, they were made for. But the advantage is, that e.g. clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, Most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a humans is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new piece of cloth.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

File:Mc2 meshes to use.png

2020-09-13T14:29:31Z

Punkduck: Punkduck uploaded a new version of File:Mc2 meshes to use.png

File:Mc2 meshes to use.png

2020-09-13T14:29:14Z

Punkduck: Punkduck uploaded a new version of File:Mc2 meshes to use.png

Documentation:ClothesV2

2020-09-13T14:22:50Z

Punkduck: /* Notation */

Caution: this file is still under construction :)

= Makeclothes Version 2 =

[[File:makeclothestitle.jpg]]

MakeClothes2 is used to create clothes for MakeHuman characters. It could be installed as a single plugin, but at least MakeSkin should be used, if the creation of material is also part of your work. Furthermore it is able to work with the human base mesh provided by MPFB.

The term "clothes" is not really correct, the program creates any kind of mesh which can be used for a character generated by MakeHuman. This also includes hair and different tongue or a new proxy. To use MakeClothes in Blender knowledge of Blender itself is needed.

== Notation ==

To understand the process, a short summary of terms used in MakeHuman:

* '''base mesh''' and '''helper mesh''': The base mesh is the standard body mesh including a helper-mesh used in MakeHuman. ([[Documentation:Basemesh|detailed information]])

* '''proxies''': in a way all meshes projected on the body are proxies. Do differentiate between a piece of cloth and an alternative mesh for the skin, the alternative mesh is called a '''topology'''.

* '''topologies''': special case for a proxy used as a mesh for the skin.

* '''smoothing''': MakeHuman may use smoothing on a base mesh. This results in a mesh with 4 times as many vertices. This mesh cannot be used for MakeClothes.

* '''clothes''': clothes will be all meshes MakeClothes is able to create. Hair and body proxies included.

* '''posing''': the standard "unposed" base mesh is presented in an A-Pose. Other poses are T-Pose or a pose which is user generated. Typically these poses are created with the standard skeleton. Shapekeys can be used as a special pose too.

* '''weighting''': when a character is posed the skin but also the clothes should follow the bones. So weights are added to each vertex. These weights determine how much a bone will be followed. MakeClothes uses a similar construction, since the clothes follow vertices on the helper or base mesh.

[[File:Mc2_meshes_to_use.png]]

Only base mesh and helper can be used to create clothes.

== Limits ==

Makeclothes has certain limits according to the internal structure of MakeHuman

* The mesh for the clothes can either be done with quads or with triangles. No mixture allowed. Advantage for quads is a smoother design with a later usage of subdivision surface algorithm (smoothing). Triangles are normally used for e.g. sculpting or when you work with 3rd party meshes.

* only one material for one piece of cloth is allowed in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth uses 3 vertices on body or helper to find its position according to the human created in MakeHuman

* each vertex of a piece of cloth needs to be in one (and only one) vertex group. A group of the same name must be created on the human

* it is possible to create more than one piece of cloth with one human

* only one human is allowed when clothes are created. So only one object is "marked as human". However, if you need more than one base mesh, all others can be marked as clothes

[[File:Mc2_makeclothes2.png|right]]

== How to load a human ==

MakeHuman uses a mesh called hm08. Makeclothes is prepared to deal with other meshes as well for future versions. When the mesh is changed it must be changed in MakeHuman as well. So this documentation will only consider the hm08 base mesh.

To create clothes you can create them directly on the body or on the helper mesh. For underwear the nude body is best choice, but for a coat the helper mesh will be used. A good method for e.g. a skirt or coat is to design the piece of cloth on the nude body and then use the helper mesh for weighting in the end.

There are currently a few possibilities to load a human. The simplest way is to load a predefined one or to use MPFB, both have some vertex-groups assigned:

* '''Load a predefined human'''

Blend-files which are placed in the "humans" sub-directory of the makeclothes plugin can be used directly. When MakeClothes starts, these blend-files are scanned once and names of the objects starting with "mh_" are presented in a menu. The selected mesh is appended by pressing the "Import predefined human" button.

[[File:Mc2_loadpredef.png]]

In case of a helper mesh, the parts of the mesh are assigned to different vertex-groups to allow an easy selection and use different colors.

After the mesh is loaded these buttons disappear, because one human is already loaded. The loaded mesh is automatically marked as a human. To load another human either delete the human or mark your human as clothes.

{| style="color:green; background-color:#ffffcc;"
|-
|The files of the pre-defined humans are not yet included in the repository, this will happen soon, different meshes will be provided, also t-posed ones. If you want to work with that already:
|-
|create folder humans in Blender directory scripts/addons/makeclothes
|-
|unzip this file [http://www.makehumancommunity.org/forum/download/file.php?id=8095 Zip-File with male and female meshes]
|-
|move both blend files into this folder.
|-
|}

* '''Load the human via MPFB'''

Makehuman Plugin for Blender also can provide a base mesh. Be aware that the best base is an unmodified male or female mesh, because the clothes will fit most of the characters. Do not use proxies. If you import an human this is already the base mesh. If you need the helpers, change settings according to the illustration and import the mesh. Instead of "don't modify" you can also use "Mask".

[[File:Mc2_loadhumanmfb.png]]

* '''Load normal base.obj file'''
This is the way using the predefined base.obj file which can be downloaded from github. MakeClothes reads the wavefront file. Vertex groups are created according to the .obj file. Disadvantage: this mesh is neither male nor female.

An exported wavefront mesh made by MakeHuman can be used as well (no proxy, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes). It is possible to export it including the helpers. Unfortunately it has no vertex groups assigned. This must be done in Blender later.

* '''Load an mhx2 file'''
The body (no proxy, do not use smoothing and delete the extra eyes) used by mhx2 export can also be used as a base mesh. When you load it you have to select Override Exported Data and the mark Helper Geometry before importing it.

* '''Delete helpers'''

If a mesh is loaded and the helpers are not needed, the helpers can be deleted. In this case a vertex-group "body" is expected, all vertices belonging to other groups are deleted. If body is not available, nothing will be done.

== Tell MakeClothes the type of the object ==
[[File:Mc2_customprops.png|right]]

To create clothes, one object must be marked as human and at least one as clothes. If you work with more than one human, all others must be marked as clothes temporarily. When you mark one object as human a previously marked human will automatically be marked as clothes. The custom properties of the object will held this information.

== Create simple clothes (extract from helper) ==

In case a helper mesh is available it is possible to use the helpers as a first try. Especially for beginners (but also for the advanced for a good weighting) this could be helpful.

<more text to be written>

== Assign vertex-groups ==

Vertex-groups are a number of vertices of a mesh forming a group with vertex-group name. These groups are used to determine relations between e.g. vertices on the body and vertices on a piece of cloth. The simplest way would be:

* create a group "cloth" on the human
* assign all vertices of the human to this group
* create a group "cloth" on your piece of cloth
* assign all vertices of the piece of cloth to this group

This might work, but it is not a good way. There are many risks.

So here are examples from some of the assets I did: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Vertex-Groups|Create vertex-groups]]

== Test the human mesh ==

The human loaded with one of the methods usually should not have problems. Nevertheless there is a small test available to check the human. This test is also automatically done when clothes are created.

* the number of human objects must be one
* there must be one vertex group on the human
* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

[[File:Mc2_checkhuman.png]]

== Test the clothes ==

Clothes need a bit more testing.

* clothes should not have stray geometry. These are single vertices or edges. If this problem appears, change into edit mode. The vertices are pre-selected. Simply delete them or change geometry otherwise.

* maximum number of vertices per face is 4. If you have more than this, these faces are selected and must be changed.

* clothes can be quad or triangle meshes. A mixture is not allowed. The process assumes a mesh type and selects the faces to be changed.

* the process tests if at least one vertex group is available

* all vertices must belong to one vertex group. Vertices belonging to no group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* all vertices must belong to only one vertex group. Vertices belonging to more than one group are selected and can be changed in edit mode.

* no vertex belongs to an non-existing group

* a test is done, how many edges belong to one vertex. Typically quad meshes with a low pole-count will have better geometric qualities. This is only a warning. The vertices with more than 8 neighbor vertices will be selected and can be changed in edit mode.

[[File:Mc2_checkclothes.png]]

== Common settings ==

The common settings will provide the '''license''' and the name of the '''author''', which will be used for all the clothes generated with this file.

* '''Overwrite existing files''' is switched off. The name of the piece of cloth is used as a filename. If it is necessary to overwrite an existing object, the box must be marked.

* '''Modifiers are allowed'''. Typically the mirror modifier may make sense. Be careful with e.g. subdivision surface, because it may produce a huge number of vertices. When the clothes should be designed with subdivision surface but created without, switch off "Allow Modifiers"

== Produce clothes ==

The main features of creating clothes are:

* '''name''': this is the name of the piece of cloth, also the filename

* '''comment''': a short optional description

* '''tags''': a list of predefined and own tags as a search criteria for MakeHuman

[[File:Mc2_tagselector.png]]

* '''zdepth''': determines the order of clothes. Lower values are used for clothes near the body, higher values for parts far away. This will be used to hide clothes near the body. A rule of thumb is to start with underware at 31, normal clothes (pants, t-shirt, shoes) use a default value of 50 and clothes like a coat usually use high values like 63. The following illustration shows the effect for a character equipped with ballet clothes. It also demonstrates what is happening when all values are equal.

[[File:Mc2_zdepth.png]]

* '''scaling''': select the part of the body which is important for the scaling. Most likely torso for a t-shirt, head for a hat etc.

* '''delete-group''': it is a good method to delete vertices on the body if clothes are not transparent. This avoids bleeding through, that is, that vertices that should be "inside" suddenly appear outside of the clothes (see: [[Documentation:MakeClothes Delete-Groups|use delete-groups]]). All vertices not to be displayed should be selected on the body (not helper) and assigned to a vertex on the human. The name of this group must be inserted in the box. If more than one piece of cloth is created, they all can have a different delete-group on the same human.

* '''use MakeSkin''': without MakeSkin a simple material is saved for the piece of cloth (white base color). Otherwise the material file of the plugin [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]] is used. See "Materials" below.

* '''subdir''': the directory inside where the clothes will be created.

== Materials ==

Most of the clothes will need a texture. Before the texture can be used the piece of cloth must be unwrapped. Best way is to create seams in Blender, where the real seams are.

Unwrap the clothes in any case. The output of this process is a UV-Map, which will be used to determine the coordinates of each vertex on the texture.

If the simple standard material should not be used for export, a material can be attached with [[Documentation:MaterialsMakeSkin|MakeSkin]]

<will be changed later with some advice how to do good textures etc.>

== Creating of own clothes ==

To create clothes select the piece of cloth and press produce clothes. The tests "check clothes" and "check human" are processed and also an additional test about matching vertex groups is done. If everything is okay, the clothes can be loaded in MakeHuman.

<will contain a lot of tips & tricks later>

== Special poses, heels etc. ==

<works with a special target in MakeHuman and a pose changed with shape key in MakeClothes>

== Importing existent clothes ==

It is possible to load an existent mhclo-file from the data folder of MakeHuman. Best is to load the human mesh before, if you want to change geometry. The clothes will also fit to a different body, but in this case they will not look as good as on the body, they were made for. But the advantage is, that e.g. clothes created for males can be used as a base for a female version.

When clothes are imported, Most of fields are filled in by the process and the delete-group is marked on the human (in case a humans is available).

The material is also loaded, when MakeSkin is available. The illustration shows the result of the import of the "lace_up_blouse". A material called "lace_up_blouse" was created in blender. All available information is imported and displayed. This includes the special parameters only used in MakeHuman (Backface culling, Transparent, LitSphere etc.). So also the material setup could be used for a new piece of cloth.

[[File:Mc2_importclothes.png]]

Documentation:Basemesh

2020-09-13T14:06:50Z

Punkduck: Created page with " In this chapter the base mesh is explained. The base mesh is the standard body mesh used in MakeHuman. MakeHuman displays a visible mesh on the screen but inside it works wi..."

In this chapter the base mesh is explained. The base mesh is the standard body mesh used in MakeHuman.

MakeHuman displays a visible mesh on the screen but inside it works with additional geometry to allow a better handling of clothes, to have helping geometry for bones etc.

[[File:Basemesh1.png]]

The complete mesh has an exact number of vertices and each vertex has a number, starting with number 0 to 13379 for the body and then continues to 19157 for the helper-geometry.

These are current number ranges:
{|class="wikitable"
!colspan="4"|Vertex numbers
|-
!name !! start !! end || purpose
|-
|body || 0 || 13379 || visible mesh
|-
|helper-tongue || 13380 || 13605 || weighting and deforming the tongue
|-
|joints || 13606 || 14597 || used to connect bones to
|-
|helper-x-eye || 14598 || 14741 || weighting and deforming the eyes
|-
|helper-x-eyelashes-y || 14742 || 14991 || weighting and deforming the eyelashes
|-
|helper-lower-teeth || 14992 || 15059 || weighting and deforming the lower teeth
|-
|helper-upper-teeth || 15060 || 15127 || weighting and deforming the upper teeth
|-
|helper-genital || 15128 || 15327 || weighting and deforming the male genitals
|-
|helper-tights || 15328 || 18001 || weigthing and deforming clothes near the body
|-
|helper-skirt || 18002 || 18721 || weighting and deforming a skirt
|-
|helper-hair || 18722 || 19149 || weighting and deforming the hair
|-
|ground || 19150 || 19157 || calculation of difference between root-bone and ground
|}

Internally that means: when a target e.g. resizes an arm, then also the tight-helper must be deformed. If the arm will be longer, some of the cubes for the joints will also be moved.

For a better overview: these are the components of the helper.

[[File:Basemesh2.png]]

The joints are a special helper. These are tiny cubes placed (mostly) inside the body. Each cube has 8 vertices, the median is used e.g. as a start- or end-point for a bone. This allows to determine the bone position inside the body. The following overview shows the joints of the upper body

[[File:Basemesh3.png]]

Some bones do not end in such a cube. The reason: bones can use each vertex available in helper-geometry or body. For the default skeleton there are two different other methods used:

(1) red dots: for e.g. the lowerarm01 and -02 bone the connecting point in the middle is calculated buy simply summarizing the start and the end point of the complete lower arm. So this is a special case where rotation only is allowed in radial direction like in reality (simulating the bones ulna and radius of the lower arm).

(2) blue and yellow dots: The bones end directly on a vertex of the skin. Especially for facial expressions the face-bones (simulating muscles) use vertices on the skin directly. The yellow dots are use for the tongue, they end on the tongue helper.

File:Basemesh3.png

2020-09-13T12:49:35Z

Punkduck:

File:Basemesh2.png

2020-09-13T12:49:01Z

Punkduck:

File:Basemesh1.png

2020-09-13T12:48:01Z

Punkduck: