Moho Forum

Ok, related to but not exactly related to my most recent topic, here's another. I've searched the forum but haven't found anything quite like this. Let's say, instead of using a repeating texture on clothes, I make a distinct design. How 'bout a flower, for instance? To create this flower, I simply draw it using however many shapes I need (on the torso layer), and position it where I want on top of a character's shirt. This is all well and good for that character standing still, but what about when the torso bends? Now we have to decide to which bones in the torso the flower's points should be bound so that as the body bends, the flower deforms "correctly." I've been getting by so far by putting these designs on parts of the body that don't deform when the torso bends, or finding a passable solution to where the design doesn't quite look right, but not so horrible that I vomit when I watch it bend. I'm wondering if there's an easier way? My only idea so far is to add little bones just for those points, controlled by the motion of the torso bones, and just find the right combination of bone position, amount of control, angle, etc.

Of course you could do it like that ... but you shouldn't.

In traditional animation anything more complicated than polka dots or stripes gets shunned like hell. The result isn't worth the additional huge amount of work. If you really need characters in hawaii shirts, use 3D and texture mapping.

So I've created my own private hell, have I? Ok, is it possible to make a texture map that isn't resolution based? Could it still be vector based so it's not prone to problems from scaling?

For a design on a shirt I would use an image. An image texture can be distorted by bones. It won't be perfect but it will at least be simpler that trying to figure out how all the points are assigned to bones.

Another option to try if you don't want to use an image would be overlapping bones with high strength.

For example, the torso bend. A shirt of dress or whatever without a "design" has no interior points to worry about. What I do sometimes is to add additional bones with overlapping strength that "blends" the point control over the design smoothly.

This image uses bones inside the chest area to control... uh... the t-shirt design as well as... er... other attributes. . There are specific bones that overlap to control the "design" that are children of the spine bones. This ensures a smooth distortion and bending.



-vern

By image you mean an imported texture of a certain resolution, right? Pixel based instead of vector? I'm trying to avoid this for now. Your other idea sounds good. How are the bones in the chest arranged in relation to the spine?

Something that's making the hell I've created for myself more hellish is that a particular design is close to the edge of the shirt, so on the 3/4 view, due to the forshortening, I have it actually meeting the edge. So now I have to make my body bend, and the design bend with it, without it straying outside the border of the character's shirt. I'm going to play around a bit, and if it proves too frustrating, I'll change the way the design is distributed so the whole thing ends up on the chest area, which on my character doesn't move and solves the problem.

Vern,

Totally OT (and because of my style probably something I'll never use/need) but I'm curious as to how you did your shading for that character -- if vector (which I assume) did you use built in shading styles (with shapes to take advantage of this) or simply draw your own shading shapes?

It's lovely, no matter how.

The shading looks great!

Bass, I'd do like Vern said and use overlapping bone regions. But I'd go ahead and use vectors. You probably need to mask the design to keep it within the shirt.

The "peace sign" design is pretty simple. There are just 3 or 4 bones in the upper chest area that... control the breasts and the shirt design.

Think of this for a moment, the design is made up of many points in different locations with different "densities" of points. It's impossible to have a completely "flat" distortion "matrix". Obviously a design like this is going to have some difficulty maintaining a smooth motion. The key is to try to keep the points evenly spaced, make sure the bone strength overlaps so that you have complete, equal coverage over the design. As for turns and foreshortening, you should use masking to keep the design inside the shirt area. You may even need to directly key points.

The shading is done using soft edge fill effect and masking on overlapping shapes. Yes, the shapes are drawn. The highlighting/shadows are not "automatic". It is done with drawn shapes. I used a lot of masking due to soft edge effects bleeding past the "edges" (the face, arms etc). This is a pretty old character file so if I were to do this now, or revise it, I might tend to go with simpler shading or instead of using soft edge extensively use some halo. Halo creates a soft edge "look" but is contained within the shapes edges.


-vern