Retopology Question

Support Modeling
1

Hi everyone,

I posted in the Animation & Rigging forum earlier regarding a model I’m working on; basically, because I created a character mesh with multiple pieces, Automatic Weights won’t apply properly. Here’s the mesh (all shapes are grouped into one object):

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Figure Iso.PNG383×820 11.8 KB

I’m going to need to remake the figure, as I’d really like to get automatic weights working (just creating something simple to use in Unreal). Here’s the heart of the question: Is there a way to do a complete retopology of this mesh? I.e., take all faces which are visible and create a new mesh out of that, as if I had wrapped this figure in a plaster cast? I do know about the Shrink Wrap modifier, but it doesn’t seem suitable for what I’m referring to. If not, oh well, I’ll create a new figure from scratch, but if there’s a simple way to do this I’d love to hear about it. Any input is appreciated!

Attachments

Figure Iso.PNG383×820 11.8 KB

2

  1. Did you try to join the parts into a single mesh and use auto weights ?

  2. You can quickly weight parts / elements from the edit mode. Use “Armature Deform with Empty Groups” while parenting. Then in Edit mode select a face then the part by pressing " L" . Then in “Vertex groups” tab choose the vertex group for the correct bone; set weight to 1.0 and click assign.

  3. If you prefer to weight paint you can do something similar like in step 2; press “Face selection masking” in the header (cube icon with red checkers). The model will have some outline like mask, deselect everything by pressing “a” twice. then hover over to the part you want to mask and press " L ". This will create a mask on that part ; now you can paint with a big brush with 1.0 strength without touching other parts…

  4. There is the 4th option to parent the part only to the bone (without weights). But that wont deform the model on UE or Unity.

3

Thanks for the reply! I’ve been trying some of these methods and they weren’t working out too well for me, so I just decided to buckle down and create a new one-piece mesh with the sculpt tools. It was about time I learned to work with those anyways. Appreciate the help!

4

you can separate all loose parts and parent the individual pieces to their corresponding bones easily, then use automatic weighting for the torso. then only the torso is rubbery and the rest moves like a machine.
(edit) probably some weight painting would be needed for the torso