Mesh self-intersecting

I have a Jumper mesh that is intersecting with itself in the arm pit area when the arms are lowered. is there a technique to prevent mesh intersection…or is it a case of detangling it and using corrective key shapes???

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Thanks

This kind of thing is one of the real bugaboos in human figure modeling (or modeling clothes for human figures), as it cannot really be properly treated with collision solutions. The three principal methods of dealing with it are 1) ignore it, possible in some situations, 2) corrective shape keys, laborious and not always applicable to all deformations, and 3) “helper bones,” which can modulate deformation automatically using Transformation constraints, but can also be manually adjusted when necessary. I tend to use #3.

Thanks Chipmasque,

I assume helper bones are additional bones on the armature or clothing mesh!?? This figure is intended to be printed (as well as use for CG animation purposes) so i’m guessing ‘ignoring’ intersecting meshes is not an option??

Yes, helper bones are either added to an existing armature to deal with the troublesome situations, or in some cases even a complete armature for the garment alone, both of which I have done depending on the specific problem to be solved. Kata used both – a separate armature to help deformation of the character’s top, which was also deformed by the main rig, and additional bones in the main rig to help with certain parts of the costume’s bottom. In that case I used no self-intersection for the cloth (it was a new feature and a little hard to control at the time) but instead converted every cloth sequence for the pants to shape keys that I sculpted into final form (yes, it took forever!).

I can’t comment intelligently on the requirements for 3D printing as I have no experience in that tech, but it seems to me that unless you are printing a specific sequence, you can treat the requirements for printing and animation quite separately, and perhaps more efficiently with separate models.