Topic: Using IMVU avatar helper as sample can not be textured.

[JanXuan]

I wanted to make a figurine in IMVU (a request) and smartly used the avatar helpers as a template.
I changed the standing.rig link into furniture.rig and broke them up to make a standing male, adding materials and textures.

In Blender it shows correctly with textures and materials which I added, but in IMVU it only shows two parts made from the default Blender block. Blender exports it with all files complete. Manually adding the xrf files (14) does not help.

I have gone comparing the block and helper parts for differences in settings and modifiers, but I can't find any difference. Is there something specific that needs to be modified other than the .rig link?

[kat]

You mean the helpers textured in the checker image as below?



If I'm understanding what you're trying to do you don't use the Armatures named *.RIG (e.g. "standing.RIG") for furniture in this context. Basically what you should be doing, so long as the helper meshes are supposed to be statues, is parent the respective avatar meshes to furniture.RIG - you treat the dummy meshes like furniture items no different to a coffee table mesh.

It could be then, based on what you've said, that you're trying to, or are, exporting several Armatures (to FBX?) and then assembling everything you've exported in Create Mode? That won't work generally, and is probably what's causing the Material assignment errors (make sure the material is properly named as "standing [0, 1, 2 etc.]" and not just "standing" as it is by default, the number is relatively important).

[JanXuan]

Yes, they are meant as furniture and I have parented them to furniture.rig.

Where you are refering to numbering, I think that should be "texture", not "material".
I have the textures numbered as you described, materials have unique names.
I did the same with my XB-70 and that worked fine.

I have taken the upper part of the male and lower part of the female, and made hands, head, eyes, etc. single meshes to prevent a too complex UV map. After all done I joined them again in Blender, resulting in a single mesh with 14 textures. I do not put them together in IMVU.

With checkers I did not mean the texture on the mesh, but in the editor window, see image.
I just noticed on my XB-70 that the checkers had also turned black, but that did not prevent them from working in IMVU.

[kat]

Material ID names not Texture ID or Image ID names.

IMVU Material names and references are parsed from Blenders Material names, and they have to follow the format mentioned above, "[word] [n]" ("[n]" being a sequential number), i.e. "standing [1]". If you don't do this, IMVU basically performs a 'best guess' approach, which is likely why your materials are constantly getting messed up. You need to define them properly following the expected naming convention (this is for Rooms but it explains in detail how to properly set-up Materials).

[JanXuan]

OK, I did that, and the result is still the same.
Only two components show up, the ones which were made from the Blender block.
The parts made from the helper avatar do still not show.

I carried out a test with only the helper avatar as a mesh, with one material and one texture.
The standing pose is the only thing that came in IMVU. The avatar does not show.
I seriously believe that the problem is not the materials, but a modifier or asignment.
I have been searching in that direction before but I can not find it.

[kat]

If each section of the status can have its own image assigned in IMVU they need to have separate Material assignments in Blender. For your project, having 14 "textures" (images assigned in IMVU?), your Material (ID) assignments in Blender will be similar to the following;

• "statue [ 0 ]" through "statue [13]" (ignore the spacing for "0", having to add those to bypass html shorthand for the forum thinking a 'list' should be shown).

Each Material (Material Properties) should have a set of Texture Properties and either a uniquely referenced Image, or one that's link multiple times - a single image can be linked to several Materials so long as each Material is unique.


The numerical append is important for IMVU. Make sure its sequential where more than one Material is used.

So if you've got your Materials set up similar to the above in Blender, and on export sections of the mesh are not visible, then that could be related to the face normals being inverted. To check this, in "View > Properties", scroll down to "Shading" and enable "BackFace Culling". If sections of the mesh vanish from the 3D view this confirms face normals are flipped. To correct this, select everything in Edit Mode and from the "Shading / UV's" tab of the Toolshelf (third one down), click "Recalculate".

[kat]

I carried out a test with only the helper avatar as a mesh, with one material and one texture.
The standing pose is the only thing that came in IMVU. The avatar does not show.
I seriously believe that the problem is not the materials, but a modifier or asignment.
I have been searching in that direction before but I can not find it.

Are you exporting to CAL3D or FBX? If you're exporting to CAL3D it's not possible to export multiple meshes at the same time, they have to be exported separately and then assembled in Create Mode. You also cannot export multiple Armatures. If you do either, although the export process may be successful (you don't get any errors), IMVU will not honor the contents of the file(s) when loaded.

[JanXuan]

I exported them joined  to CAL3D, so it actually was brought back to one mesh with 14 materials, same as I did on the XB-70 and StarWars barge. I did not export multiple armatures nor meshes. I exported multiple meshes at once  before and it worked, only I had to put them in IMVU one by one as you described.

When I enabled backface culling and recalculated, things only went worse. More parts went transculent (outlines were still there). In Blender the mesh looks OK with backface culling off. I do not think that this is my major problem, missing faces will turn back in IMVU when I select "double sided".

[kat]

I exported them joined  to CAL3D, so it actually was brought back to one mesh with 14 materials...

Right, so if you've named your materials as outlined above there should not be an issue, the single ('unified') mesh will have 14 slots displayed in the Material List, each clearly defined once imported into IMVU  (numbered 0 - 13).

You'd be better off fixing the non-displaying faces, but enabling two-side in IMVU is a cheap and quick way to address the problem. If the item is to be derivable make sure to note on the product page that two-sided should not be disabled.

[JanXuan]

Right, so if you've named your materials as outlined above there should not be an issue, the single ('unified') mesh will have 14 slots displayed in the Material List, each clearly defined once imported into IMVU  (numbered 0 - 13).

You'd be better off fixing the non-displaying faces, but enabling two-side in IMVU is a cheap and quick way to address the problem. If the item is to be derivable make sure to note on the product page that two-sided should not be disabled.

Indeed, I do have the 14 slots in IMVU. But since it also happens to 1 mesh (helper avatar) with 1 material with backface culling enabled, there must be another problem. This is not a composed mesh. I guess to solve the problem I will have to redo the whole project from the default block (not using the helper avatar).

[kat]

The invisible faces are simply inverted. If this appears to be happening to a section of the mesh with a specific Material assigned use the Material List in Material Properties to select the errant faces and then click the "Flip Direction" button instead of "Recalculate" as was tried previously. This approach will fix the problem specifically for faces that are inverted, but selectable, by material assignment - if you still have the odd face inverted there should be few enough for you to manually select and invert after doing this.

You might also want to "Apply" before joining the avatar parts together, this will reset each mesh making it easier to address any inverted faces more easily - faces might be inverting because the avatars are not reset from setting up the original file (the dummy's were never intended to be used for actual products).