Seam Caused By UV Map?

[slar]

The seam has returned! This time, although everything looks fine in the smooth-shaded setting, a seam appears when I apply a texture. Also everything below the seam of the skirt looks darker than above. This leads me to believe that I haven't adjusted the normals correctly, yet the problem only materializes when I apply a texture, so perhaps my UV map causes the seam to appear.

http://i41.tinypic.com/xfri2s.png

I separated my pleats into groups and individually aligned the normals after doing a vertex data merge to each vertex along the seam. Before that I joined the bottom half of the skirt to the middle half with the extended manual edit in order to elongate it. My mesh looked great after doing the former in conjunction with the latter, but only in smooth shaded mode.

[fakepeeps7]

Yeah, that definitely looks like a problem with the UV map.

How did you make the piece to elongate the skirt? Did you duplicate part of the original mesh and move it down? If so, you might have an overlapping problem with your UV map, too.

Did you save a version of your project before regrouping the two sections into one? If so, go back to that, then look at the individual UV maps separately. If the elongated piece is in the same place on the UV map as the rest of your skirt, you'll need to move it (down to the bottom of the main skirt piece) before you regroup. Otherwise, it's going to be difficult to make the UV map behave properly.

[slar]

The thing is that my elongated skirt piece seems to be already the bottom of the skirt. I'll tell you exactly what I did:

1. I selected the faces of each of the pleats starting from where the pleats began and regrouped them into separate groups
2. I decided to consolidate my various groups. I selected the elongated region of each group and merged it into one
3. Then I merged the middle of my pleats into one group.
4. A forth group, called body, is the modesty cap
5. The last group, called bottom, consists of two parts: the top, or waist of the skirt, and the legs with the boots.

I can upload an msd3 file of my consolidated skirt and the disorganized forty-plus group copy, least you need me to explain my "process" more adequately.

*I should note one last fact: Before I even merged the pleats together (or back when I had the forty-plus groups) the seam appeared when I applied the texture. For example, I selected one pleat, put a texture on it with the materials tab, and there said seam was. I had not yet divided the pleats into middle and bottom regions.

[fakepeeps7]

Now I'm confused! :lol:

Out of curiosity, what mesh did you use as a base? Yeah, it might help if I could see your files. I'm really not sure what's going on, but if I could have a look in MilkShape I might be able to be a little more helpful.

[slar]

Okay, here it is! To answer your question, I did this:

http://www.mediafire.com/?nmdjebgmn4a

1. Converted the base game teen cheerleader outfit into the adult age group
2. Separated the converted mesh into a bottom

Note: I tested my converted and separated mesh in-game before hacking off pieces. Everything worked well.

And I almost forgot the texture that goes with my mesh. It's in bmp format already so you simply need to load it via the materials tab.

http://www.mediafire.com/?zmzmyyz3oft

[fakepeeps7]

Sorry it's taken a while for me to get back to you. I've been sick. :(

I can't really figure out what's going on here. I think it's definitely something with the UV map, but I'm really not sure how to fix it.

Here's your middle piece:

http://www.modyourpanties.com/hosting/17593_100323113603middle.jpg

And here's your elongated piece.

http://www.modyourpanties.com/hosting/17594_100323113625elongatedpiece.jpg

See how they both take up the same space on your UV map? That's going to cause problems (especially since you're working with triangle bits here). I did manage to get rid of much of the seam along the back (where it's a nice solid block... no triangles):

http://www.modyourpanties.com/hosting/17596_100323115149noseam.jpg

But, as you can see, the seam is still visible around the sides (where all that pointy triangle stuff begins).

Something may have gotten regrouped at some point that's causing a problem. It's hard to tell with all those triangles. That may have worked for sorting out the normals, but it's going to make the UV map more difficult.

I noticed one other thing. I selected one vertex along the seam and opened up Extended Manual Edit. For a pleat, I'm guessing there should be just two sets of normals. But you've got three (the errant one is highlighted in blue). I'm not sure if this could be causing an issue, but it's something else to look at.

http://www.modyourpanties.com/hosting/17595_100323114423normals.jpg

[slar]

I'm quite grateful for your skills and generosity. :) Plus you don't have to apologize for your sickness; sims comes second to many things. As for the 3rd set of normals, I noticed that with a few vertexes along the sides even before I used the extended manual edit to merge the parts together. I think it's just apart of the mesh.

P.S. If you're getting tired of trying to figure out what's wrong, just send me what you have and I'll try to go from there.

[fakepeeps7]

You know, I wonder if we're overthinking this... If you were doing a skirt that came down over the knees, then it would probably be best to create a new piece and stick it on the bottom of the skirt. But since this skirt only comes to the tops of the knees, I wonder if we really need to do that. Would simply pulling down the bottom edge of the skirt, removing the upper thighs, and then reattaching (or replacing) the legs work? If so, it would be a lot easier...

I just got back on the computer today, so I'll try a couple of these things and quickly let you know how they work.

EDIT:

Okay, I tried two different methods. With the first, I just pulled down the existing skirt and made it longer. Then I reattached it at the knees (you can switch the shoes, of course).

I also tried adding a piece to the bottom of the skirt. And I then separated out each pleat and adjusted the normals (well, I only did a couple pleats, just to get an idea). Really, it seems like more trouble than it's worth. If your skirt came down below the knees, sure, you might want to do it this way. But since you're just looking for a longer skirt, I'd use the existing skirt shape and just make it longer. It's the UV map that you might have to play with (so the texture doesn't look too stretched).

http://www.modyourpanties.com/hosting/17714_100327192344teentest.jpg

She moves okay in the game. Her legs will poke through the skirt when she bends them a lot (as you can see in the middle picture). And you can see that I didn't quite get the modesty cap right on the UV map! It's obviously sticking down past the rest of the skirt, which is why you can see the skintone. :lol:

[slar]

Thank you so much! I was originally thinking that perhaps I shouldn't simply pull down the skirt because I figured it would interfere with the sim's animations.

[fakepeeps7]

You do have to worry about animations when you pull things like skirts or sleeves, but only in certain areas. The upper legs and arms are usually pretty safe, especially if you're nowhere near the hips or shoulders.

[slar]

For the most part, thanks to your help, I'm done! There's just a dark spot on the leg where I adjusted the normals that's distorting my fishnet texture. I alternated between doing a vertex data merge and an align normals edit on said vertex but the problem remained. It's not really a big deal; in fact with the texture it looks somewhat like a hole in the fishnets.

http://i40.tinypic.com/f2vq7d.png

http://i44.tinypic.com/jqg8ef.png

And my apologies for the crappy body shop pictures. I won't have access to my game for probably another two months.

[fakepeeps7]

Looks good so far!

Actually, I think that distortion on the fishnets is due to the UV map. Normals don't cause actual distortions of the texture, but UV maps do it all the time. It's probably a matter of moving one leg vertex just a little bit to the right or left.

[slar]

It's done! I'm much obliged for all your efforts. I learned a lot. :)

Here's a picture of the finished product.

http://i44.tinypic.com/1zzknyh.png

By the way, does MTS2 have a board where users can take pictures for other users?