Possible to parent a mesh to armature without it getting deformed?

[RayRobert]

So I am very very new to mesh. I am trying rigging out. The method I used is laid out here  http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/tutorials/80156-rigging-models-blender-2-64-a.html

 

When I right click the mesh, right click the armature. Use ctrl + P to parent them with armature deform the mesh kind of deforms a bit. It kind of sticks to the armature. So say my mesh has shoulder pads, the should pads kind of slump down onto the armature. Is there a way to make it so when I parent the mesh,it leaves the mesh as is and just moves with the armature like that?

[Nalates Urriah]

I suggest you go over to Machinimatrix.com and look through the tutorials there.

Mesh does not currently deform in SL. It will follow the avatar and animate. But, when you change avatar shape the attached mesh does not deform to follow shape changes.

Fitted Mesh is an  in-beta-way to have rigged mesh deform to follow shape change. We expect to see that come into current use in the first half of 2014.

 

[Medhue Simoni]

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RayRobert wrote:

So I am very very new to mesh. I am trying rigging out. The method I used is laid out here 

http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/tutorials/80156-rigging-models-blender-2-64-a.html

 

When I right click the mesh, right click the armature. Use ctrl + P to parent them with armature deform the mesh kind of deforms a bit. It kind of sticks to the armature. So say my mesh has shoulder pads, the should pads kind of slump down onto the armature. Is there a way to make it so when I parent the mesh,it leaves the mesh as is and just moves with the armature like that?

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It's just a matter of playing around with your weighting to get the results that you want. For instance, I made some shoulder pads for my Lycan avatar. When I rigged them and bent the arm down, it would cling too much to the arm, and not enough to the top of the shoulder. So, I reduces the weight intensity for the arm, and increased the intensity of the collar bone and shoulders with a gradual decline in intensity.

Another suggestion I would make, is to invest in the Avastar addon for Blender. It gives you the whole SL avatar with every option possible to match a specific shape in SL. It also allows you to copy the default weights from the avatar, as a starting point for your touch up of the weights. You can also use your now perfectly weighted mesh, to copy it's weights to any other clothing item you want. It also has all the collision bones that you will need to make the clothing Fitted Mesh.

Avastar doesn't employ me, I just love the addon, so I can advertise for them all I want. It's more than worth the cost.

[RayRobert]

Yeah i've been looking at that, and once I get some spare cash I think i'll definitely have to pick that up. One last question and I think I am set. Do Armatures and Mesh have to be parented in the T pose? Is there a way for me to pose the armature, and get it to look the same in edit mode, then parent it that way? So far if I pose the armature in pose mode, it just reverts to the T pose in blender.

[Medhue Simoni]

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RayRobert wrote:

Yeah i've been looking at that, and once I get some spare cash I think i'll definitely have to pick that up. One last question and I think I am set. Do Armatures and Mesh have to be parented in the T pose? Is there a way for me to pose the armature, and get it to look the same in edit mode, then parent it that way? So far if I pose the armature in pose mode, it just reverts to the T pose in blender.

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I'm not totally sure, but I think I have done this once before. You parent the mesh to the armature in Object mode, so it should work, meaning you don't have to have a mesh in the TPose. In Edit Mode, everything will snap back to zero, but that shouldn't matter with weighting, as you don't parent in Edit Mode. It will always snap back to the default in Edit Mode, but Edit Mode is only be editting the meshes geometry, or editting the bones. Edit Mode has nothing to do with posing or weighting.