Shakes' recipe for full body models

Shakes' recipe for full body models


Remember to save a blend file before each step just in case.

- Get the original model, clean it by having the textures merged as you'd do with a head blender and join everything into one mesh.

- Open the medical_staff blend into another window, copy your model into it.

- Crucial part: 'Pose' your model to align it to the shape of the medic model.
*If your model has a skeleton (pmx or dae files): you can do it by moving and resizing its bones using posing mode on the armature.
*Otherwise (obj files): you'll have to do it by hand using edit mode on the mesh itself.

- Now you need to get the weights:
*If your model has a skeleton (pmx or dae files):  The model already has weights. You should unparent it from the armature with ctrl-p (keeping deformation), then use apply modifier from the modifiers tab to stabilize it. Now just rename its bones to the suitable bone names of the medic model (e.g. R_hi_arm to dsk_upperarm_r).
*Otherwise (obj files): You can either paint by hand (good fucking luck) or click on the medic model, shift-click on your model, go to weight paint mode, press T and use Transfer Weights, and finally from the panel that opens up below it scroll down and choose Source: By Name. This does a decent job on copying the default pes weights, but you might want to tweak some weights later depending on your model's shape (e.g. an armor plate shouldn't bend as the default shirt, you'd need to fully paint it to the chest bone).

- You're almost done, now move the medic suit away while in edit mode, and join your model into it. I recommend scrolling the weights list while in weight paint mode to check the end result. Then delete the original medical suit in edit mode.

- Your model is done, time to export it. First get a face folder ready with the model's texture and a clean copy of the medical_staff model and its mtl (which you might need to edit by writing the texture's actual filename), and add both to the face xml with the type set to "parts" (read up on APC).

- Open a new blender window, load this model file into the arms slot, and click the black arrow next to the list of bones and select Delete All Groups. This is very important since if you don't do it you'll end up with double the amount of bones when combining the renamed bones of your model with the original bones of this model, and the exported file will be corrupted.

- Finally, move this medic suit away while in edit mode (again), copy your model into this window, join it to the suit's model and delete the original suit while in edit mode.

- Export and you're done. Cross your fingers and learn from your mistakes.