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Original Poster
#1 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 3:51 PM Last edited by Anubis360 : 19th Jan 2013 at 4:42 PM.
Default Tutorial: How to convert clothes for teens
Hello there! It has always been a tedious chore to convert any of my clothes for teens, but after many trials, I've found a way to do so without so many effort. It is not probably the only way to do it, but this is my way to do it.

What you need:
- Milkshape 3D. I guess you can use other programs, like Blender, but I wrote this tuto for MS3D as it is the program I use.
- Extended Manual Edit plugin by demon432.
- TSR Workshop and .wso plugins
- Cmar's Mesh Toolkit
- A medium knowledge of meshing tools (either Milkshape or Blender or any other program) and custom content creating.

What this tutorial WON'T teach you:
- How to use Milkshape3D
- How to make clothes
- How to work with meshes
- How to franken-mesh
- How to use TSR Workshop
- How to use Cmar's Mesh Toolkit

NOTE: In this tutorial I work with a mix of simgeom and wso files. This is because wso files tend to get glitchy if you touch them too much. I recommend to work around with simgeom's first, and export as .wso files when you're finished.
Also, I'm working with a female body in this tutorial, but the technique also works for male teens.

So let's begin!

Step 1
Open Milkshape and import the adult body you want to convert. You don't have to import the morphs, just the "base" mesh. Name it "group_base" if you haven't already. Hide it.


Step 2
Import any teen body you can use as base. In this case, I have used tfBodyCheerleader (you can download it at the bottom of this tutorial) Now, click on GEOM-01 like I've done, and press "Up" to move it above youre base mesh. This is very important so don't miss it!


Step 3
Select and zoom in to the neck seams. You'll see here that the vertices don't match perfectly each other, and they don't have the same normals, so we have to fix that or the head won't match with our neck.


To begin, select the same vertices from your base and the teen body, like in the following picture:


Step 4
Now, go to "Vertex/Extended Manual Edit"


And the following window will open.


Step 5
Make sure you have the "XYZ" and "Normals" button pressed down. Select the first box under "X", and the number will autoselect. Press "CTRL+C" to copy that number.


Step 6
Now, click on the box below, and paste the number using "CTRL+V".


Step 7
Repeat steps 5 and 6 with the rest of the columns, until you get something like this:


Once you're done, repeat the steps from 4 to 7 for the rest of the vertices.


Note: You will see something like this eventually:


Don't worry! This means you have selected the seams vertices, where the back and the front of the body joint and two vertices are in the exact same place. The first two are the ones you have to copy for the bottom two.

Step 8
You'll notice that the rest of the neck doesn't match too well either


You can use Extended Manual Edit, or just scale by X and Z to get it to look alike, as it isn't really important if this matches perfectly.



Step 9
Another important thing to fix are the ankle seams.


Here, repeat the steps from 4 to 7 again, with both ankles.


Step 10
You have already finished matching the most important things, but now you have to make that adult body look more like the teen bodies from the game.
Starting with the legs, select one like in the picture below and scale it by X and Z until it looks like the teen leg. Pretty much like in step 8.


Note: You could also remove the adult legs and replace them with teen legs, but that requires some franken mesh experience, and also fixing the bone assignments, UV map and matching the legs with your mesh. That's up to you!

Now it's time to adjust the breasts. You'll notice that teens have smaller breasts.


So scaling down by Z and then moving it backwards will do the trick. Remember to fix the belly to match. Notice in my picture there is a "lump" right below the selection that needs to be moved backwards as well.


Teens don't have hourglass waists, so you must make them a tad wider. In my case, the waist wasn't too thin, so it is not as noticeable as it would be on a high waisted dress, for example.


Last but not least, we have to make the whole body a little thinner. Do a selection similar to the picture below and scale down a little by X. Then unselect the first and last rows or vertices and scale down a little bit more, to make it look harmonic. Also if you wish, you can make their rear flatter.


We're done! So it's time to save and export as a .wso file with a name like "Body_teen"


Step 11
We're now off to create the morph states. Open Cmar's Mesh Toolkit and go to "Auto tools for WSO" tab and then "Auto-create Morphs"


On "Wso mesh to morph" we'll select our "Body_teen" file using the "Select file" option on the right. And on "Reference WSO mesh" we'll select a .wso file of a teen body exported from TSR Workshop. I can't tell you what file to choose, as you have to pick a body that looks like the mesh you are converting. If you're converting a dress, then clone a teen dress with TSRW and export the file to use it. In my case I'm converting an outfit with tight shorts, so I'll be using the basic naked teen body.


Now just press "Create Morph Meshgroups" and let the Mesh Toolkit do its magic! Save the file as "Body_teen_ MORPHED"

Step 12
Go back to Milkshape, start a new file and import your "Body_teen_morphed" file. Delete the "group_special" group if you're not using it, to save some space, as it is the pregnant morphs and teens don't use it unless you use mods to get them pregnant.


We have to look around, because even though the Mesh Toolkit does a great work, you'll find some iffy details specially on the fat and fit morphs




Once you're done fixing those, export the file and override the "Body_teen_morphed" you've created later. Or if you don't like doing that, just re name it.

Step 13
Go back to the Mesh Toolkit, and on "Reference WSO mesh" select your "Body_teen_morphed" file. Press "Create Morph Meshgroups" and save it as "Body_teen_FINAL". I do this because, I've explained before, working over .wso files is risky, so the best is to not to import touched .wso files on TSRW.


Step 14
To finish, open TSRW and clone a teen body and import your new and shiny converted mesh! Here you have a comparison of a teen using the adult body and the teen body, to see how the seams and morphs don't match correctly:


Note: I use Extended Manual edit instead of Merge tools to match the seams, because I like having control over everything so I don't miss any detail. BUT if you want to learn how to use them (since it's quickier) you can learn about them here and aply those steps instead.

And the tutorial has finished! I hope you find it useful, and please comment below if there's anything you don't understand, so I can help you out or improve my tutorial
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Inventor
Original Poster
#2 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 4:01 PM
Download the basic teen body tfBodyCheerleader here
Sockpuppet
#3 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 4:10 PM
You can do this alot quicker using Wes his merge tools:
http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=398865

Inventor
Original Poster
#4 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 4:39 PM
Quote: Originally posted by BloomsBase
You can do this alot quicker using Wes his merge tools:
http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=398865


I know that there are other ways to do it, that's why said on my post that this my way to do it because I like to control everything. Of course that if someone wants to learn and use those steps, that's on their will ^_^
Fus Ro Dah!
retired moderator
#5 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 5:15 PM
Also, on some teen meshes breast assignments need to be adjusted to have less "weight" on l_breast and r_breast bones. This isn't required, but some meshes will make teens look more large breasted using breast slider than EA teen meshes normally would.

For more Sims 3 stuff by me - visit Ace Creators
My FB Fan page - Elexis's Sims Stuff
My Simblr - ElexisSims
Lab Assistant
#6 Old 18th Jan 2013 at 9:59 PM
Great tutorial! Easy to follow and with lots of pictures, that's always nice

It didn't even occur to me that you can use the extended manual edit plugin to match seams. It's probably a bit more tedious than Bloom's method with the unimesh vertex data and normal data merge shortcuts - that's the method I also use. The merge tools copy the exact vertex and normal values from one vertex to another, so you get the same result, but you only have to push the shortcut button for the vertex placement and then the one for the normals and you can move right to the next pair of vertices, select them and press the buttons again. I love how quick and easy that is

Both ways will work fine, of course! It really is a question of personal preference.
Test Subject
#7 Old 18th Feb 2013 at 3:24 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Anubis360
Hello there! It has always been a tedious chore to convert any of my clothes for teens, but after many trials, I've found a way to do so without so many effort. It is not probably the only way to do it, but this is my way to do it.

......................

......................

And the tutorial has finished! I hope you find it useful, and please comment below if there's anything you don't understand, so I can help you out or improve my tutorial


Okay so how do we make our bodies in Milkshape look black and flat like that? Are they affected when selecting parts of the mesh?here
Inventor
Original Poster
#8 Old 25th Feb 2013 at 12:27 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MisterLuvsFilm
Okay so how do we make our bodies in Milkshape look black and flat like that? Are they affected when selecting parts of the mesh?here

On the Materials tab, there's an option to Ignore Alpha, wich will make the texture opaque.
Test Subject
#9 Old 3rd Mar 2013 at 11:18 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Anubis360
On the Materials tab, there's an option to Ignore Alpha, wich will make the texture opaque.
I tried that and it does nothing. What am I doing wrong?
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#10 Old 4th Mar 2013 at 12:09 AM
Did you remember to assign the material to the correct group, and select the Textured option in the right-click menu for the viewport?

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Test Subject
#11 Old 9th Mar 2013 at 6:00 PM
Yes I did all of that. Assigned the texture and changed to Textured view. Still not looking like that
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