Creating Skyrim Armor in Blender Tutorial Series

[Cobaltios]

Hi, I'm rather new to modding in general, though I have messed around with textures since those were pretty easy to do. However, I figured I should learn to try modifying meshes, just as an actual learning process, if anything. I was thinking of altering an existing mod's armor mesh, so I sought out a tutorial to figure out the best way to go about doing so. Which... eventually... led me to your tutorial.

 

Now, the thing is, I've sort of followed it, mostly because I was trying to replicate the results of what was being displayed through Nifskope. So, my basic mindset was to achieve that end result... except it never seemed to work that way. So, I followed your tutorial... with a slight alteration under the assumption that it would work... which it doesn't. Basically, without a material on the mesh itself, the body works relatively well, and doesn't seem to have any issues. In fact, without a material, I practically succeeded.

 

Unfortunately, it wasn't quite that simple, and of course I had thought I had simply done something wrong in Nifskope for the material to not show up. Well... that wasn't the case for whatever reason. Now, whenever I add a material, for some reason, it causes it to muck up. 

 

For some background, in Nifskope, for the armor I'm trying to edit, the original one has the body BSD with 2 BP_TORSO's. Which led me to assume I had to do the same thing in Blender, since the armor itself is only 2 very small pieces. Of course, every time I add a texture, I get a third BP_TORSO. 

 

Now, I've been attempting this many, many times, and the only thing that's messed up, is the body. The armor itself (or what very little there is) is fine. The body either does some really random warping and skewing, and I've even had it not appear at all. I've considered, tried and looked into every possible alteration and change I can think of, with the possible exception of adding the arm and leg skin partitions, which I've been neglecting to do, since I assumed I didn't need to. Now... I'm not so sure. I'm going to try it again with those skin partitions and see if that has any noticeable change.

 

I've been at this for a week now, with many different versions of both Blender and Nif files of varying degree. And honestly, if I were to let you see what I have, I'm not exactly sure where I'd start to go with one that might actually work.

 

Your tutorial is great, and surprisingly easy to follow, but I see to just not be having any success with the body model. It's the only thing that's not working on my end. I suppose I should mention that the body I'm using, is the same type that was used for the original mod, called "7b", if that's familiar or not.

 

If you could provide me with any possible suggestions of what I could do, or something that might be amiss, please, let me know. I'm going to at least try and do the skin partitioning properly and see if that produces anything else. I really want to succeed at this, I really do.

[Hanaisse]

Hi, I'm rather new to modding in general, though I have messed around with textures since those were pretty easy to do. However, I figured I should learn to try modifying meshes, just as an actual learning process, if anything. I was thinking of altering an existing mod's armor mesh, so I sought out a tutorial to figure out the best way to go about doing so. Which... eventually... led me to your tutorial.

Actually, starting with armour is probably the hardest thing to do, heh. The rigging and skinning involved are more advanced skills. But if you've muddled through, that's great.

 

Unfortunately, it wasn't quite that simple, and of course I had thought I had simply done something wrong in Nifskope for the material to not show up. Well... that wasn't the case for whatever reason. Now, whenever I add a material, for some reason, it causes it to muck up.

You always need a material, and that would never be the reason for it to muck up. 

 

For some background, in Nifskope, for the armor I'm trying to edit, the original one has the body BSD with 2 BP_TORSO's. Which led me to assume I had to do the same thing in Blender, since the armor itself is only 2 very small pieces. Of course, every time I add a texture, I get a third BP_TORSO.

I've actually noticed this that body mods are not set up the same way vanilla bodies are. CBBE (that I use) is also set up with 2 BP_TORSO's and no arms and legs partitions. I can't exactly say it's wrong, as it works, but it wouldn't be my recommendation. Also not sure what you mean that adding a texture adds a new partition. The two have nothing to do with each other. You'll only ever need one texture for a body anyway.

 

Now, I've been attempting this many, many times, and the only thing that's messed up, is the body. The armor itself (or what very little there is) is fine. The body either does some really random warping and skewing, and I've even had it not appear at all. I've considered, tried and looked into every possible alteration and change I can think of, with the possible exception of adding the arm and leg skin partitions, which I've been neglecting to do, since I assumed I didn't need to. Now... I'm not so sure. I'm going to try it again with those skin partitions and see if that has any noticeable change.

The warping and skewing is a sign of improper weight painting. I assume you followed the Bone Weight Copy process? The only thing you can do is redo it. I know it's a pain in the butt to get all the way through the process only to test and find something askew.

 

Your tutorial is great, and surprisingly easy to follow...

Thanks!

 

If you could provide me with any possible suggestions of what I could do, or something that might be amiss, please, let me know. I'm going to at least try and do the skin partitioning properly and see if that produces anything else. I really want to succeed at this, I really do.

Well, as I said above, retry the weight painting on the body. You can bump the settings of it up to 1 or 2 if it's not working. And yes, try the skin partitioning, but that's not the crux of the issue. Have you even gotten as far as creating the morph _1.nif? That's the real test getting that right.

I know this can be frustrating for someone just starting out, but don't give up, it gets easier.

[Cobaltios]

Actually, starting with armour is probably the hardest thing to do, heh. The rigging and skinning involved are more advanced skills. But if you've muddled through, that's great.

 

Well, to be fair, I did just come out of an entire Game Dev program in college. And they did teach us the whole rigging and skinning stuff. Granted, it wasn't using Blender, and the process feels easier with 3DS Max, but I understand the gist of it.

 

I've actually noticed this that body mods are not set up the same way vanilla bodies are. CBBE (that I use) is also set up with 2 BP_TORSO's and no arms and legs partitions. I can't exactly say it's wrong, as it works, but it wouldn't be my recommendation. 

 

Oh, I was wondering what was up with that. Thanks for that information. So, I should probably stick with a vanilla body for now, as that's easier to manage? I don't mind, I'm just trying to get this to work. I'll try anything, really.

 

 

Also not sure what you mean that adding a texture adds a new partition. The two have nothing to do with each other. You'll only ever need one texture for a body anyway.

Basically, when I export it without adding a material, it's just 2 BP_TORSOs. When I add a material, it adds a third one, for some reason.

 

The warping and skewing is a sign of improper weight painting. I assume you followed the Bone Weight Copy process? The only thing you can do is redo it. I know it's a pain in the butt to get all the way through the process only to test and find something askew.

 

Well, at least I have a save before I started with it, so at least I don't have to completely restart. Modifying meshes in Blender is not as easy to do as it is in 3DS Max. Actually, while I'm on the thought, would it be possible to import .obj meshes from 3DS Max into blender? Or would it not work due to requiring something from the Nif meshes?

 

 

Well, as I said above, retry the weight painting on the body. You can bump the settings of it up to 1 or 2 if it's not working. And yes, try the skin partitioning, but that's not the crux of the issue. Have you even gotten as far as creating the morph _1.nif? That's the real test getting that right.

 

I'll try all those things. Thanks for the input, I'll do these first chance I get. I haven't done the _1.nif yet, but I am wondering if that might be part of the issue.

 

I know this can be frustrating for someone just starting out, but don't give up, it gets easier.

I look at this as a learning experience. Even if the results I get are not at all what I'm looking for, seeing the results tell me more about how it works, and why it's not working. 

 

Thanks for the reply, this is somewhat frustrating, but having a better idea of what to do helps to get on track to actually succeed.

 

[Hanaisse]

Aha, well, if you have the program understanding then that'll be easier. Just a curious little question then, if you learned on 3DS, why switch to Blender? My friends that use 3DS seem to find the program easier as well.

 

About the skin partitioning (I just remembered). Blender's export scripts have not been updated in some time, and the current logic seems to be that only so many bones can be included per partition, thus if there's more, it will create the extra partition. As I said, it'll still work, but it just looks messy. The NifTools guys are well aware of this and will be fixed in future builds. 3DS will export proper partitions.

 

If you want to, instead of importing an .obj from 3DS to Blender, Blender is capable of importing 3DS files. Might involve some clean-up. There's no need to work with a vanilla body if you don't want to. All the same priciples apply to all body mods, just some body mods aren't built the same way or use the same skeleton or weight painting techniques (you know, those jiggly bodies). Start with the basics first. Some types (like CBBE) include specific body meshes to create armour with. It's also a good idea to get your _0.nif working correctly first, before moving on to the morph. The fact you only have the _0.nif so far is not the problem here.

[Cobaltios]

Aha, well, if you have the program understanding then that'll be easier. Just a curious little question then, if you learned on 3DS, why switch to Blender? My friends that use 3DS seem to find the program easier as well.

Well, I did start on 3DS Max, the only problem being, it requires 2012, and I don't have 2012. I have 2013 and 2014. I might try and download the 2012 version though, and see if that helps, since all the Nif Scripts seem to be made for that one, as opposed to the 2013 and 2014 one. I did try with the 2013 one at first, but it kept giving me errors upon exporting, making the process far more difficult, and I really wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. Something about materials, as far as I know. Maybe I'll try later, since I have a bit more practice with this, even though I've been unsuccessful so far.

 

About the skin partitioning (I just remembered). Blender's export scripts have not been updated in some time, and the current logic seems to be that only so many bones can be included per partition, thus if there's more, it will create the extra partition. As I said, it'll still work, but it just looks messy. The NifTools guys are well aware of this and will be fixed in future builds. 3DS will export proper partitions.

 

Oh, thanks for this. That is very interesting. And it actually does make sense, especially since there are newer body types, so that would explain a lot. In that case, does the process for using something like Seven Base work the same as vanilla, or is there another step that goes along with it?

 

If you want to, instead of importing an .obj from 3DS to Blender, Blender is capable of importing 3DS files. Might involve some clean-up. There's no need to work with a vanilla body if you don't want to. All the same priciples apply to all body mods, just some body mods aren't built the same way or use the same skeleton or weight painting techniques (you know, those jiggly bodies). Start with the basics first. Some types (like CBBE) include specific body meshes to create armour with. It's also a good idea to get your _0.nif working correctly first, before moving on to the morph. The fact you only have the _0.nif so far is not the problem here.

Oh! This is actually fantastic news! If I were to find one of these meshes, how would I do so? I already have the default Seven Base body for this particular armor, and I got the UNP body just in case. I'll do some experimenting, actually.

 

I think I was able to modify stuff in 3DS Max, but was never able to actually export it properly. So, if I can bring it into 3DS Max for the actual editing, and use Blender for the weight painting/exporting, that might actually work a bit better, since I'm far more comfortable working in Max. Hmm... I'll give that process a try, actually. Thanks again . 

 

[Hanaisse]

The process would be the same. And I've not downloaded any other body mods so I'm not sure if they all have the same "build armour on this mesh" type of files. Look in the archives of the mod and see if there's any obvious labeled folder? Or read ReadMe's

[Zquad1]

Hey there Hanaisse, I have another question for ya, How con I convert armors without the body being attached, I have tried several things like once the armor was ready to export from Blender I would delete the body & leave the bone weight & Skeleton all intact But that just shows no Body what so ever in Game, & I tried deleting it via nifskope.... again no Body in game.

 

I know can be done because I see it all the time where the body was non existing from the armors in Nifskope but everything works as it should in game.??

 

do you know what I am saying???   I am not sure how to explain it.

Edited June 24, 2014 by Zquad1

[Hanaisse]

They could be using a different body part slot? As far as I know, anything using the body slot/partition swaps out the entire body, so requires a body in the armor.

[Zquad1]

So with Blender Basically I need the Body in the armor?  I get all kinds of distortions like a flake effect  or like when I use a Poser mod & the arm bends, the original Body Mesh pokes through the armors body Mesh & looks Horrible. 

[Hanaisse]

It has nothing to do with Blender, it's Skyrim. If you're getting distortions on armor you made in certain poses that could be an indication of weight paint issues. Extreme poses however will always clip no matter what.

 

Or maybe I don't understand the question.

[Zquad1]

It has nothing to do with Blender, it's Skyrim. If you're getting distortions on armor you made in certain poses that could be an indication of weight paint issues. Extreme poses however will always clip no matter what.

 

Or maybe I don't understand the question.

ok when I Export My newly converted armor, I have to export it with the Body intact with the armor, Is there a way to export "Just" the armor & still have it show up in-game...

 

This image is showing the original body mesh poking through the body from the converted armor in a poser shot, but I am not getting the distortion when I am not wearing armor at all.

 

 

 

This shot shows the Flake like effect when I put the armor on, Now sometimes I get this with some armors & sometimes I don't with other armors..

 

does that better explain it??....Perhaps

 

 

EDIT:

 

I sorta got the armors to work with out the body attached to the armor but it still doesn't fix the issue, I would go into nifskope & delete the Body from the _0 & _1 armor Then save it, BUT unfortunately the down fall is that the weight slider for the armor doesn't work like say when I adjust the weight slider from 100% down to 0%  My main body  will adjust just fine BUT the armor stays still at 100%.... so like I said it works but doesn't. 

 

here is the example of what I mean...

 

100%

 

0%

Edited June 26, 2014 by Zquad1

[Zquad1]

Hanaisse:

 

You are correct, I finally figured it out First I had to delete the Body Mesh from the outfit in nifskope, then I had noticed that certain Slots in the CK only work for certain pieces of an outfit so I had to play around with the slots till now every piece of the outfit moves smoothly on the weight slider. so it had nothing to do with Blender or my conversions it all boiled down to nifskope & the CK..

 

Oie... I sure feel Dumb...but a whole lot wiser now too.

[Hanaisse]

Aww, don't feel bad, we're all here to learn.

 

Have a

[Zquad1]

OK Hanaisse I have another question, I am wanting to convert long sleeve gloves How do I do the bone weight copy do I use the hands or the Body or both & if it's both.... HOW???

 

NSFW

Edited July 8, 2014 by Zquad1

[Hanaisse]

Yep, you'll need both, but that's easy enough to do. Bone weight copy from one first, then select the other and when you get to the Bone weight copy popup box, select the bottom button "Update Selected". It will add to what's already there.

[Zquad1]

OK I Bone Weighted the Body to the arm straps & the Sleeves 1st:

NSFW

 

then I bone weighted the Hands to just the sleeves 2nd,

NSFW

 

then I selected the Hands then pressed AA to select everything 3rd: 

NSFW

 

Then I added the Skeleton for the Hands:

NSFW

 

Then I pressed AA & selected Scale & rotation to ObData & made the .Nif

 

is that correct?

 

or do I also need to add the Body Skeleton But if I do that it gives me an error saying ("Multiple Bones with NPC L ForearmTwist2 [LLt2]': Probably you have Multiple Armatures, Please Parent all meshes to a single Armature & try again")

 

or Can I now delete the body?

 

EDIT: The Gloves _0 Exported just fine But when I do the exact same thing to the Gloves_1 as I export to make a .Nif It gives me an error saying Can Not Export with Unweighted Verticies... then it shows me the Verts Not weighted:

 

Any idea how I correct this??

Edited July 8, 2014 by Zquad1

[Zquad1]

Ok I tried converting a different Glove set from another armor & it worked flawlessly 

 

But the glove set you see in my pictures above seem, to have an issue I have converted them many times with the same out come it keeps telling me---> Multiple Bones with NPC L ForearmTwist2 [LLt2]': Probably you have Multiple Armatures, Please Parent all meshes to a single Armature & try again.

 

 

so I have no idea why I can't Export them into a .Nif

 

This is what I did to get the other Glove sets to work..

 

1. Bone weight the Body to the Gloves & any additional Meshes that go with it.

 

2. Bone Weight the Hands to the Glove Sleeves.

 

3. Select the Hands Then Press AA to select everything.

 

4. Import the Hand Skeleton.

 

5. Select The Body then Press AA again to Select everything.

 

6. Import The Body Skeleton.

 

7. Delete the Body.

 

8. Select the Hand again & Press AA then Press Ctrl+A & select "Scale & Rotation to ObData".

 

9. Export into a .Nif

 

that's how I got it to work.

 

I am not sure about your methods  & I not sure if the way I did it could work pretty much for any gloves.

 

But again do you know what might be the problem why these gloves are not exporting??

 

if ya like I could send you my .Blend file if you have the time but if not that's ok too.

[Hanaisse]

Why are you importing the body skeleton? That's what it's complaining about too many armatures. Once weighting is done, just import hand skeleton.

If it still doesn't work, yes, feel free to send me the .blend file.

[Zquad1]

OK hanaisse for some reason you seem to have a Magic touch I must have Only imported the Hand Bones more then a dozen times & it would tell me I either had to many armatures or verticies were not weighted.

 

so I tried it again like you said & it worked I am like "Really!!!!" LMAO

 

BUT I still have an issue every time I convert gloves that cover the hands I get this---->

 

 

 

& sometimes if it exports just fine it still has the same issue in game but it looks like Wolverine Claws

 

[Zquad1]

I am about to give up on this I have no idea what I am doing wrong, because when I finally get the gloves into game it's totally separated from the arms or it's separated from the hands I only got it to work with another glove set by importing the Hand Bones & the Body Bones  but I guess every mesh is different. & I know your time is valuable so I really hate to bug you about this but you seem to be the only one on the Net that I know of that uses Blender for Skyrim.
 
this is what it looks like once I did it the way you mentioned.

 
I am thinking of learning 3DSMAX Blender is becoming quite a pain & there is sooo much more I want to know like how to convert like open toe high heels.
 
anyways I seriously thank you soo much for your time.

 

Here are the files in question:

Latex Gloves

Edited July 10, 2014 by Zquad1

[Hanaisse]

The issue two posts up is weight painting. When it's not perfect it'll spike out like that. The only thing to do at that point is to redo weight painting until it works.

I'll take a look at your files anyway.

[Hanaisse]

Alrighty, after closer inspection ....

 

1. Dirty skeleton! Bad, bad, Zquad! Haven't I caught you on this before?

2. The "hands" object - delete the BP_Torso partition, should only have one - BP_Rightarm2 which translates to SBP_Hands.

3. The "mitts" object has two partitions, BP_Torso and BP_Rightarm, yet all the verts are partitioned to just BP_Torso ... redo the partitioning to move some verts into BP_Rightarm (SBP_Forearms), from the wrist down.
4. The "straps" object has two partitions, BP_Torso and BP_Rightarm - only needs one - BP_Torso. Along with this, the "straps" are way too high poly - 5k polys is unnecessary. Run the poly reducer script on them. I cut it down by half with no visual strangeness.
5. The "strapsmetal" object has two partitions, BP_Torso and BP_Rightarm - only needs one - BP_Torso.
6. Each of those 3 gloves objects are missing the actual Forearm bones that you would get from weight painting from a body, even though you keep saying you've done that. When I just tested it, it also captures some UpperArm and UpperArmTwists too that you should keep. Make sure to select the "mitts" first, then the body before you "Update Selected".

Using that CBBE body with the HDT physics as your source is a bad idea ... these meshes contain weight painting around the breasts to enable, ahem, movement. You can model around a CBBE body (there's actual body meshes included in CBBE specifically for creating armor without the other weighting), but there's no reason you shouldn't use the vanilla body to weight paint and for the skeleton. Just a suggestion to keep it clean and consistant.

[Zquad1]

Thanks Hanaisse, I am going through your tutorial again just to study up a bit more, because I was missing the connection somewhere, some of this stuff you were telling me wasn't clicking in my head.

 

I am obviously not doing this right that's my mess up.

 

as for the Body It's a custom made version of the Se7en Base Bombshell it's called Demon Fet.

 

why is it a bad idea to convert using a body with HDT physics???  I have had no issues.... well that I know of when I convert outfits especially lingerie.

 

 

 

I do thank you again for trying to help me. I won't be wasting any more of your time.

[Hanaisse]

Ah, the mesh had a ref to a CBBE behaviour file, that's why I assumed it was CBBE. If you need the physics, go ahead and use that body type. I did point out it was just a suggestion. Some armors may not look proper with the extra weight painting. It's up to you.

 

If you're just converting armors, have you tried Outfit Studio by Caliente? (can't link to it, search on Nexus) The program converts any body type to any body type in a few steps, without dealing with modeling. I'm not sure if it includes every body type out there, but has quite a few the last I looked at it.

 

And you're not wasting my time! I'm here to help! They didn't give me the fancy Scholar tags for nothing.

[Zquad1]

Ah Thank you Hanaisse for your discretion . 

 

You know... I have tried the Outfit Studio & I personally can't make heads or tails of it, meaning I can't understand the tutorials. it does say convert any armor to ANY body But I have found that to be false it wont recognize the Body type I use, therefore I haven't been able to advance further into the tutorials, I won't use any other body type, it's just my preference & a very dear friend made the Demon Fet. & yes it is equip with Physics & most people I have ran into love the Physics & as I do too..  

 

Like I said I am going to Study harder & try to understand your tutorial I just wished though there was a tutorial on specifically converting Gloves & boots, & there is absolutely nothing on the Net discussing these.