BakesOnMesh as a creator what do we need to do?

[kalliopi Ziplon]

Hello , thanks for taking the time to read me.

I am a creator, I buy mesh full perm clothes and work on them and I am planning to make tattoos again.

Now as a creator, the BakesOnMesh how will affect mesh clothing? Do I need to do something or is it only for tattoos and skins?

If it affects mesh clothing then do we apply to them a script or something?

Last one, for making tattoos what do I need to do so my tattoos will be compatible with the BakesOnMesh (do I add something? How will it work?)?

[Theresa Tennyson]

2 hours ago, kalliopi Ziplon said:

Hello , thanks for taking the time to read me.

I am a creator, I buy mesh full perm clothes and work on them and I am planning to make tattoos again.

Now as a creator, the BakesOnMesh how will affect mesh clothing? Do I need to do something or is it only for tattoos and skins?

If it affects mesh clothing then do we apply to them a script or something?

Last one, for making tattoos what do I need to do so my tattoos will be compatible with the BakesOnMesh (do I add something? How will it work?)?

With mesh clothing you'd want to start including system alpha layers if you don't do so already. The clothing itself is unchanged.

Tattoos are exactly the same system layer tattoos as were used before appliers became the standard, and they can use the same textures as applier tattoos.

 

[Kyrah Abattoir]

If you're gonna add BoM support to your meshs think long and hard which layers you're going to use for your product (keeping in mind potential conflicts & what other creators end up doing)

And once you did? Don't change it on a whim.

 

Script wise it's as easy as applying a specific texture to an item.

Edited August 28, 2019 by Kyrah Abattoir

[kalliopi Ziplon]

4 hours ago, Theresa Tennyson said:

With mesh clothing you'd want to start including system alpha layers if you don't do so already. The clothing itself is unchanged.

Tattoos are exactly the same system layer tattoos as were used before appliers became the standard, and they can use the same textures as applier tattoos.

 

With mesh clothing you'd want to start including system alpha layers if you don't do so already  = you mean alpha layers even to those that only have mesh bodies sizes? Because to those i do not give one ( when i buy them full perm they do have one either because of the use of the mesh body hud for alpha )

[Theresa Tennyson]

2 minutes ago, kalliopi Ziplon said:

With mesh clothing you'd want to start including system alpha layers if you don't do so already  = you mean alpha layers even to those that only have mesh bodies sizes? Because to those i do not give one ( when i buy them full perm they do have one either because of the use of the mesh body hud for alpha )

Yes. With Bakes on Mesh alphas can be used instead of the alpha HUD; the way Slink is setting it up will require them to be used (if hiding any of the body is necessary, that is.)

[kalliopi Ziplon]

3 hours ago, Kyrah Abattoir said:

If you're gonna add BoM support to your meshs (keeping in mind potential conflicts & what other creators end up doing)think long and hard which layers you're going to use for your product

And once you did?

3 hours ago, Kyrah Abattoir said:

If you're gonna add BoM support to your meshs think long and hard which layers you're going to use for your product (keeping in mind potential conflicts & what other creators end up doing)

And once you did? Don't change it on a whim.

 

Script wise it's as easy as applying a specific texture to an item.

My eng are not perfect so its hard to be sure I understand what you try to tell me.  So please be patience with my questions.

 think long and hard which layers you're going to use for your product =  what do you mean?

(keeping in mind potential conflicts .. = meaning?

All I want is to learn what is all about so as a creator I will be update on what needs to be done on the clothes + tattoos I sale  

Script wise it's as easy as applying a specific texture to an item.

 

[Janet Voxel]

You’ll most likely have to provide an alpha layer if you’re doing mesh clothing moving forward.

Don't panic, it’s a relatively easy process and will only add a few minutes to your workflow.

 

[Teagan Tobias]

It took me a long time to go from the Classic Avatar to a mesh avatar, but the one thing that pushed me over the edge is getting rid of ALPHA CUTS.

To me, alpha cuts are for the Classic Avatar and if you need them for a mesh body, your doing something wrong.  I have loads of clothing that fits.

If I see clothing with an alpha I will look long and hard for something else rather than add an alpha to my body, that is what I spent loads of Linden$ to get rid of.

That is how “I” look at alphas and mesh bodies.

[Theresa Tennyson]

7 minutes ago, Teagan Tobias said:

It took me a long time to go from the Classic Avatar to a mesh avatar, but the one thing that pushed me over the edge is getting rid of ALPHA CUTS.

To me, alpha cuts are for the Classic Avatar and if you need them for a mesh body, your doing something wrong.  I have loads of clothing that fits.

So, none of your clothing has auto-alpha scripts or requires you to use your alpha cut HUD?

[Teagan Tobias]

Some do but its because I did not see it and there was no demo, so low linden cost mostly. And I have found you can turn off the alpha in the body HUD. But when you relog its back on, so I just don’t use them very often. But clothing I use on a daily basis has no alpha included or needed.

[Kyrah Abattoir]

3 hours ago, Teagan Tobias said:

It took me a long time to go from the Classic Avatar to a mesh avatar, but the one thing that pushed me over the edge is getting rid of ALPHA CUTS.

To me, alpha cuts are for the Classic Avatar and if you need them for a mesh body, your doing something wrong.  I have loads of clothing that fits.

If I see clothing with an alpha I will look long and hard for something else rather than add an alpha to my body, that is what I spent loads of Linden$ to get rid of.

That is how “I” look at alphas and mesh bodies.

It's debatable, I made a corseted outfit for a mesh body, it's supposed to look tight, in fact it's modeled in such a way that it digs a good inch into the waist of the mesh body i made it for.

As a mesh garment creator, the only places I really care about matching the body is where the garment ends. For the parts that are supposed to be covered, because I'll sometimes use a completely different geometry, for the sake of optimization, or simply because the details I'm making necessitate it, I can't really gurantee that it will always be perfectly on top of the body's skin at any slider/pose.

The way mesh bodies use slices to show/hide sections is not magical, it's in fact very very crude: It is literally made by cutting up the body in what is, effectively dozens of "separate" models maquerading as a single continuous one.

Each separate mesh that is displayed on screen has a fixed overhead, no matter how complex it is. Alpha masks are a far more efficient way of hiding body parts.

Why? Because despite being (slightly) more expensive to render, in the end there is only ONE mesh to skin to the skeleton, transform, texture and light, instead of "fifty something".

[Cackle Amore]

4 hours ago, Teagan Tobias said:

It took me a long time to go from the Classic Avatar to a mesh avatar, but the one thing that pushed me over the edge is getting rid of ALPHA CUTS.

To me, alpha cuts are for the Classic Avatar and if you need them for a mesh body, your doing something wrong.  I have loads of clothing that fits.

If I see clothing with an alpha I will look long and hard for something else rather than add an alpha to my body, that is what I spent loads of Linden$ to get rid of.

That is how “I” look at alphas and mesh bodies.

It's a perfectly legitimate method used in countless video games with character customization to just have the body split into chunks and hide em or selectively slice up to match the clothing worn.

While not impossible, majority of the time you're not going to get 1:1 weights and polys between a base body mesh and the clothing going on top, so the simplest and most effective way is just slicing out the body underneath.

Usually the only main way you can ever get the topology and weights nearly 1:1 is by slicing it out of the body itself, but that can only go so far depending on how altered the end result is.

[kalliopi Ziplon]

Thank you all for your answers I truly appreciate it :DD You rock!Ty!

To answer to some that ask me about it :

 I do not make the mesh items I buy them so if the creator that made it made it not to be worn without alpha I cannot undo that. All I can do it always provide free demos so the costumers can try the mesh item and see how it moves with their ao , how good it is on them or if it needs for them to use their alpha hud, if it fits their shape and so on….  

 

I stop using a script to auto hide the mesh body because I had 30 costumers complaining about it and being rude on their complains because they hated to undo the hide , they prefer to not have it, so I stop using it.

[Kyrah Abattoir]

13 hours ago, Digit Gears said:

It's a perfectly legitimate method used in countless video games with character customization to just have the body split into chunks and hide em or selectively slice up to match the clothing worn.

It is, however those cuts are typically very few, and the final character tend to be "fused" back into a single model if the game is trying to be conservative with draw calls.

Yet another optimization we can't really use in SL because we can't go with the assumption that a script isn't going to "change" that model one way or another.

Edited August 29, 2019 by Kyrah Abattoir

[Clara Hollyberry]

6 hours ago, kalliopi Ziplon said:

I do not make the mesh items I buy them so if the creator that made it made it not to be worn without alpha I cannot undo that. All I can do it always provide free demos so the costumers can try the mesh item and see how it moves with their ao , how good it is on them or if it needs for them to use their alpha hud, if it fits their shape and so on….  
 

There are some full-perm mesh creators that continue to make mesh apparel for classic avatars, not just for mesh bodies, and those creators do include an alpha texture for you.  With that alpha texture, now you can include an alpha layer for your customers.  It's how it used to be done when classic avatars were wearing mesh clothes in the beginning (2011/2012/2013).

I remember when mesh clothing was offered in one size; and then it became offered in five "standardized sizes" with alpha layers to help hide the body peeking through the clothes.  An alpha layer was a standard offering in the clothing bundles for sale; and sometimes merchants even offered the alpha texture itself for knowledgeable customers to tweak it further if they wanted to.

[MaxMare]

Actually custom alpha cuts are an improvement..Your mesh body won`t be limited with preset alpha cuts from the hud but custom made in any shape or form that fits any piece of clothes best. Most fit-mesh clothes creators offer auto-alpha scripted garment, so you won`t have to bother anyhow, it will be done for you as it`s been so far...

This should provide more freedom, plus it would be easier to add 2 UIIDS for alpha textures then determining which alpha cuts your clothing uses, adding numbers for 20485757 alpha cuts to the script which is different for every piece of clothing and mesh body brand...Btw I don`t exactly know how will auto-alpha scripts work with BoM update (need to look into it), this was just a guess, but surely it would be a waste if mesh body brands don`t take full advantage of additional options BoM offers in that regard. Even if it`s just added as a system alpha, it shouldn`t be a problem..it won`t change properties of fitted mesh, alphas are used anyhow just not in such an obvious way as it`s been done with sized mesh

anyways, been reading through this section of forum and I don`t understand why ppl feel so much resistance to anything new without properly investigating the matter on their own first?

[Gabriele Graves]

In theory they are but in all practicality they are most definitely not because the vast majority of people cannot make custom alpha cuts and so they have to depend on the clothing vendors who are very often lazy and don't put enough effort in to intelligently making alphas.  Even for people who can make them it is a problem that cannot easily be corrected well when the clothing vendor decided to alpha underneath the whole dress or skirt so that the alpha is obviously showing rather than make the mesh fit properly.  This was a massive problem for women's clothing before the alpha HUDs on mesh bodies came along.  The most practical method has been proven to be the one the user can use themselves and determine how much to alpha.  Of course it isn't technically as flexible as a custom cut nor is it perfect but an instant selection is way more practical for most people and it forces mesh clothing makers to conform to those cuts when making clothing items for a particularly brand of body.  This is why the most popular women's fashion shops do not supply alphas and haven't for a number of years.

Edited September 7, 2019 by Gabriele Graves