Topic: [IMVU] Make a Morph Animated Heart Accessory (LIVE!)

[kat]

Recorded live on Twitch (may include off-topic chat), discover how to make a simple beating heart accessory item for IMVU from a cube and using Shapekeys to animate (Blender's version of 'morphs'). Using the default Scene cube a few basic loop cuts are made that allow the mesh to be shaped and manipulated. Once done a Material is added, UV map made and exported, then animated added using Shape keys.

The result is brought into the accessory Starter File using Append, parented to the bone, Spine03 in this case, and then exported using FBX, which is then imported into IMVU and assembled into a working product.

In part II the export process is double-checked to sort out a positional issue where the accessory item is not positioned where it should be. This is fixed by keeping the contents of the accessory file intact and exporting everything which forces Blender to include all the right parts in the FBX (which can be filtered out on import into IMVU).

00:00:00 – 00:22:00 meshing.
00:22:01 – 00:27:40 materials.
00:27:41 – 00:40:40 UV unwrapping/texture map.
00:40:41 – 00:49:40 GIMP/bitmap.
00:49:41 – 01:01:10 Shape Key animation.
01:01:11 – 01:14:00 Append/accessory set up.
01:14:01 – 01:28:07 Blender export/IMVU import.
01:28:08 – 01:58:51 product set up/trouble shooting.
01:58:52 – 02:29:53 trouble shooting fix/product set up.

Source & Example Files:
 - Derivable item and texture map.
 - Blender accessory Starter File.
 - Animated Heart | c. 900 kb (*.blend, *.png).

Twitch Alternative
Part I - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/380889848
Part II - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/380892569