Mannequin tutorial

[deedee_sims]

I got an ask about writing a tutorial about making mannequins! Well, I think I drifted away and made a too long tutorial, but well. At least it covers every version. (except the child ones, but these work just as the adult ones)
Note that this is not a beginner tutorial, so if you've never meshed anything before, I recommend looking at some simple meshing tutorials (at least about how milkshape's tools work, and how to clone an object and give it a new guid).



Firstly, there are three types of mannequins: the sleeveless dress, the dress with sleeves, and the fullbody one. We'll put the three together differently in milkshape, but the SimPe work will be the same.

We'll need:
- Milkshape
- SimPe
- A clothing that we convert to mannequin. This method works the best with converted (3t2, 4t2) clothes, that originally have the clothing, and the sim body on a different alpha group (because I made the mannequin shinier, and the clothing normal, so it needs to be in a different group). In other cases, we would have to separate them (which is a lot of work, so I recommend the first).
- Bases and anims that I made to make things easier, I uploaded them here



Firstly, open the clothing mesh in SimPe, and extract the model (it's the GMDC line).

Okay, let's start with the sleeveless dress one!
Import it to Milkshape (we don’t want to import blend groups).



First, we have to chop off the legs, and fill the gap (if there's any).



Then chop off the arms (one vertex longer than it's needed), and snap the outer ones together. Then move it a bit inner.
Select the whole arm part and align normals.



Then we have to import the female neck that I included in the download. Select the neck part and align normals.
And we have to import the dress-stand as well.



Now, regroup the body parts: the body, the neck and the base. The name doesn't matter, but I named it base.
Export it as an obj, and the meshing is done!

Now, to the dress with sleeves!
Open the dress-pose milkshape file, then delete the groups it has (don't worry, the skeleton is still here). Import the dress we want to use.



As previously, chop off the legs, and the arms (until the sleeves), and fill in the gaps.



Import the female neck, select that part and align normals. Then import the dress-stand as well. Regroup the body parts: the body, the neck and the base. The name doesn't matter, but I named it base.



Then the trick! Hit the anim button, and the dress will change to this.
Select Animate…/Rotate All, and hit OK. Then click the anim button again.
Export it as an obj, and the meshing is done!

And now the fullbody one!
Open the fullbody-pose milkshape file, then delete the groups it has. Import the body mesh we want to use.



Import the female or the male neck (depending on the gender of the outfit), select the neck part and align normals.



Hit the anim button, and it'll change to this. Select Rotate All and hit OK. Then click the anim button again.



Import the fullbody base. Now, you see it clips with the body, so move the whole thing up a bit, so it stands on the base.



Regroup the body parts: the body, the neck and the base. The name doesn't matter, but I named it base.
Export it as an obj, and the meshing is done!

Now we're done with the meshing part, and it's time to put the object together!
Firstly, open a recolor of our clothing, and export it as a png. We'll need a recolor for our mesh.
Clone an appropriate mannequin of mine (honestly, this is the easiest thing, it already has the body textures and the shinyness applied). I won't go into details with this one (about what to select when cloning and how to give it a new guid).



Select the gmdc line, click import, and import the obj we made. Make sure the groups replace the appropriate groups, then click OK. Commit and save.



Search for the clothing texture, and replace it with the new clothing's texture. Then commit and save.
Test it ingame, and be happy! ^^
And if you have any questions, feel free to ask here, or on my simblr :)