Tris to Quads using Autodesk Maya

[Zlyskritek1488315261]

Hello,

I am very new to Maya, as I am used to Blender for rigging meshes. I have found this thread, where there is a description on how to use a free script to turn tris mesh from Marvelous Designer to a quads mesh.

http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Mesh/Maya-Boolean-making-mesh-vanish/m-p/2461747/highlight/true#M25519

Acutally they are using this set of scripts, with some additional work (wrap and blendshape).

https://sites.google.com/site/adamvanner/scripts-and-tools/marvellous-designer-quad-mesh-in-maya

I have followed the thread and succesfully prepared a quads mesh, however the border edges are not sewed together, what then makes a huge problem in rigging.

I have tried to use another plug-in from the same source, that is said to be a solution. As I understand, it should make vertexes along the border edges that correspond with each other and it is possible then to merge them and sew the UV border edges.

https://sites.google.com/site/adamvanner/scripts-and-tools/avmergeedgescmd

But I am not able to make it work. Although the plug-in is listed in my plug-in manager, I am not able to load it. I keep getting this error:

avMergeEdgesCmd();
// Error: line 1: Cannot find procedure "avMergeEdgesCmd". //
// Error: line 1: Unable to dynamically load : C:/Program Files (x86)/Autodesk/Maya2013/bin/plug-ins/avMergeEdgesCmd.mll
//
// Error: line 1: //
// Error: line 1: (avMergeEdgesCmd) //

There are two files to be used: avMergeEdgesCmd.cpp and avMergeEdgesCmd.mll - yet I am lost in where to copy these and/or what to import.

Does anyone see what I am doing wrong, please? 

Or, is there any better way how to do this?

Thank you for help.

[Astrid Kaufmat]

Hi.

No need to use external scripts unless they make you life easier. This is basic workflow of making clothes also without that  tricky way to make clothes with marvelous designer there is the need after you made parts of your garnment to join edges or verteices.

To do this 1) be sure that the two parts are really one mesh to allow  next tools to work so just from polygons menu( set it left up corner) go to mesh menu then combine

2) now according to complexity of yourmesh you can select edges or vertices and use from edit mesh menu  merge vertices or merge edges.

keep this concept handy also in blender the name of tools change the workflow of making clothes more and less stays,that's why learning new programs you must approach like to an advanced math just making of what you need general concepts appliable everyehwere.

there is also an edge se w script in case you'd need or feel it better see here

 

[hibit Spad]

 

i thought the mesh uploader turned everything into triangles.   If that is so then why bother turning triangles into quads just to have them turn back into triangles again?

[Zlyskritek1488315261]

Because the rigging of the mesh is then more natural and smooth. For example when you are making a maxi skirt, when you use only the triangulated mesh from MD, then it is very hard to not get a zigzaged edge in the middle of the skirt during walking. However if you have quads in your mesh, you have straight lines as edges that stretch and the move of the mesh is smoother and more natural.

[Zlyskritek1488315261]

---

Astrid Kaufmat wrote:

 

2) now according to complexity of yourmesh you can select edges or vertices and use from edit mesh menu 

merge vertices

or

merge edges

.

there is also an edge se w script in case you'd need or feel it better

see here

 

---

Thank you for your answer. I may be misleaded, but does that mean I need to select individual pairs of edges and merge them each pair individually? 

Shame me, I am not able to even get my view to the mesh so close I am able to select the edge precisely. 

[Astrid Kaufmat]

I would do so, yes that's how the tool works.There is another tool to  join all the edges along a loop selection or more edges or vertices together that is bridge tool. Which tool to choose , use, prefer is up to your and your model.

This is how I'd fix that premade mesh that you've got from marvelous designer for istance.

 

In case you'd had done your mesh from zero in maya I would also do these things ( keep this handy for future models  where you might need to do the same thing, i.e  models made starting from zero)

Consider after all that while you model  you may want to be doing it on low poly and on half model if you can, to apply later simmetry.  Don't worry if your initial shape is looking  jagged or sloppy compared to the result, you'll apply later the  smooth proxy preview and  when done convert it into polygons modify --> convert--> smooth mesh preview to polygons

 

inI also remind you some useful shortcuts to keep handy while you see the smooth preview to se if you're happy more and less with it, before you convert it to polygons, here are the keys ( numbers from keyboard or num pad).

3 gives you the preview of your subdivided mesh

1 to go back to not subdivided mesh view

2 is a mix between 3 and 1 showing both ways and useful to do your editing process

incase of non mainfold unwanted result , after the  merge tool use keep handy the cleanup tool from mesh menu.

I think that on youtube I found two classic examples that could help you to see it also from a practice point of view.

 

[Marinshe]

Hello! Excuse me I'm nipping into your talk, I'm a newbie here and have the same problems with Md meshes and turning them into quads in Maya. I thought your thread is the most proper place to ask my questions, though before I asked this in the very thread - http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Mesh/Maya-Boolean-making-mesh-vanish/m-p/2462669/highlight/false#M25526, but as I see now, I choose a bit wrong place, cause it's enough old thread, so may me ask here? (if the author of the thread is still here). Zlyskritek wrote above he used scripts from Adam Vanner from https://sites.google.com/site/adamvanner/scripts-and-tools/marvellous-designer-quad-mesh-in-maya and got a quad mesh, just as Vanner promises. I try to run them too (in Maya 2013 now) and cannot achieve any decent result - the scripts don't work in my hands.Maybe these scripts are composed for another version of Maya - I wonder, which exactly? The plugin for welding edges, as A.V wrote here, was compiled namely for Maya 2013 x64 Windows (which I use). So I think the scripts must work within it too, am I right? Maybe, I run them wrong (I never have dealt with Python scripts before). If Zlyskritek or someone who used them with a success too, reads this thread, couldn't you explain me how to use them properly?  I just select the mesh, then load the first script - getUVshells, run it and see no result, then load the secon one - mdSetupMesh, and in stead of working it's starting to updare some plugins (the message sound like this -

Updating pymel with pre-loaded plugins: Fur, DirectConnect, studioImport, ikSpringSolver, rotateHelper, MayaMuscle, fbxmaya, ik2Bsolver, objExport #

It's all it does. What does it mean? Is it necessary for the script to work or it's an error within it? How to fix it? Does Maya 2013 have built-in support for Python scripts at all, or I should install Python and PyMel for it separately? Prompt me what to do, if you know, I'm a complete noob in Python scripts so cannot figure out what I do wrong, How to make these scripts work?