Thank you, Delerna, for how detailed you are.  This is a very well organized post! 
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I think it does struggle for solid mesh to have an even flow at the point of contacts. But for the multipart, where the point of contact is minimal and has to be solid anyway (I think), It should work out fine.
I am using milti maps for the hair (though the mesh is separate), without a problem. Still worth to try.

Thanks Rampa. I suspected the physics coding would struggle with the weight map split over more than one UV map

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My experience is that one map is better. If you have two adjacent materials with matching weight -maps, it creates completely rigid strips where they meet.

I tried to do the front and back of a dress as separate materials. Put the same weight map gradient on both, so it matched perfectly. It failed miserably. But as a single material, everything was fine.

Yes I think you might be right about no one totally understanding cloth physics. Things can happen that are difficult to find an exact answer for.....especially me.
By the way. Just on the point of cloth layers penetrating other cloth layers during animations. As I said, that is not the strange effects I was talking about. 
However, the strange effect I am talking about usually starts to occur because of some modifications I made to the clothing mesh, uv-map and or physics weight map to try and help stop cloth layers penetrating each other. I believe it is related to how close weight map sections are to each other and whether they go from white to black and the direction it goes compared to the other part near it.
I have tried moving them further apart from each other and it fixed it. Then I have repeated it again in another outfit and it didn't fix it. I have added one part of the UV-Map that gets painted totally black between those 2 and that fixed it. But then in another outfit I repeated that and I had to move that totally black part away from between them to fix it. I will say the effects occurring differ based on the style of the clothing and the cloth flow I am trying to achieve. It also relates to how many parts get physically weight painted differently. The more there are the more likely strange things start to happen and adjusting the UV-map and physics weight map is needed to fix it. OK, I think I will do that. Demonstrate the effects and what I did to fix it. Maybe someone will notice something I didn't think of?


Using the Babylonian outfit as an example
For this outfit I do the whole outfit (all cloth layers) as a single mesh rather making each layer as separate clothes so I can use iClones physics self collision control to help prevent the layers penetrating each other. Unfortunately, this only works on the meshes within the single object so that's why I did cloth layers on this as a single object. It helps prevent the layers penetrating each other. Not totally, but it certainly helps.

I keep all the layers on a single uv-map and for something like this Babylonian outfit a single UV map ends up with tones of islands (blenders naming for the separate parts on the UV map) and I am sure this is what begins to make iClones physics have difficulty knowing what to do and gets confused based off the physics weight map.
I haven't thought of separating the UV-Map into more that one map. That is something I do with architecture models I make so I can reduce the polly count by having it all as a single mesh but be able to texture the different parts of the object with different textures. This is not something I have tried with clothes. I don't know if its a good idea, especially with reguards to the physics weight mapping. However I am definitely an experimenter. I will all way try anything even if it is just so I can personally prove to myself whether the idea works or not. Over my 62 years I have experimented so many idea's that I thought and others thought was silly and it actually turned out to be good. Obviously, not always turns out to be a good idea but often enough. That's why I always say if you have an idea then experiment with it to find out if its good or not. Never get an idea and not try it because you think it might not work.

Anyway, yes I am going to try what you have suggested. Just to prove to myself one way or the other whether it is a good idea or not.
 




i7-3770 3.4GHz CPU 16 GB Ram   
GeForce GTX1080 TI 11GB
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I see now. Yes, hard to understand the cause of the problem you have described without actually having experiencing one or at least seeing it. Now I am curious (and I did not see it in the screenshots of the multilayered cloth) - do you use single, or multiple UV maps for them. Have you tried to separate maps. I am not sure though what is better (performance vise), having a single weight map, where all those gradients are painted (sometimes in different directions), or having a separate materials/UV maps and respectively separate weight maps. Seems it makes more sense to have them separate.
In any case, you are doing a very good job for the folks around. And I think you should continue with the topic even though you said you have not figured it out 100%. I do not believe anyone understands cloth physix 100%, not even Reallusion people do (nvidia core developers - maybe :) )

4u2ges
No, definitely not poke through or parts flowing through each other. that's more related to collision shapes, cloth tightness and bone weight mapping in Blender rather than the greyscale physics weight mapping image added to the clothing in iClone. I find it hard to describe. But its really strange cloth flow relating to the color combinations of the greyscale images.
I will try and see if I still have one that I can show in a video. But it's things like some parts of the cloth flowing up while another part flows down and aother part doesn't flow at all even though the whole set of all of those parts is set to black. There are second clothes close by that are set to white.

Its hard to understand the explanation. I know it might seem to people like its related to bone weight mapping. That can cause clothes to rise and fall where they shouldn't because, for example, the weight mapping to the hip goes too far down the legs and that can cause the clothing to get pulled up the body as the character animates.

But for what I am talking about I know its not that, Have highly checked that out. I generally fix this problem by adjusting the UV map and redoing the physics weight map to suit the new UV map and it gets fixed. That is what I was going to talk about in the topic I mentioned. I often get Ah Huh found why it does that. I did this and it fixed it. But then I do it again in another outfit with the same problem I found so I could prove to myself that that is what it was. But it doesn't do the same. I even get other things that worked fine in the one that I had problems with that don't work well in the new one. I find an answer for that but then doing it again in something else it works fine again.

I know it is related to how I have UV mapped the clothing and how they get colored for the physics weight map. I believe there are things relating to having different directions between the black and whites, how close they are to each other, whether you have a black section between two white sections or not. etc etc etc. But as said On one piece of clothing it has problems and on another it works fine so I'm not confident that what I think the causes are is correct.

The key point for what I am talking about here are when you make a single clothing that has many layers over each other that are enabled for cloth flow. Not always but probably 25% of the time I get really strange flow occurring. Can get really frustrated trying to figure out what is causing it.

I will try and find some of the ones that had the problem and do a video of it. My Babylonian was the most frustrating one I ever had. I will check out if I still have the problem version somewhere


i7-3770 3.4GHz CPU 16 GB Ram   
GeForce GTX1080 TI 11GB
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Delerna, I've read your last message, but still not sure what is the issue you are referring to. Is it a body parts pocking through the cloth, or 2 flowing parts are going through each other?

Good to hear Irina, Hope it helps you

Posting to say the topic

WEIGH MAPPING THE CLOTHES FOR PHYSICS FLOWING CLOTHS

hasn't had anything entered yet. Unfortunately I get issues with it when creating multiple flowing clothes quite often. I get ideas for the cause and eventually resolve it and note what I think what the cause was.
But then I make something else and have the same setup of the weight map that I noted as the cause just to test it does it again. And it doesn't do the issue. It works fine.
I have always managed to resolve flowing problems due to the weight map. But being confident enough that what I think is causing the problem is correct enough that I can give help to people.....no I just cant figure out what is really causing it with enough confidence to post it here.

I surely would appreciate anyone else sharing answers on this if they have any. As I stated I always get around it but only after trying many adjustments. And its really only when I have more than 1 flowing item in the same area of the characters body. I know its easier to just keep outfits so they only have one flowing item. But my preference is to work at having the clothes flow wherever it makes sense that they should flow. Things like my Pope, Legionnaire and Babylonian outfits





i7-3770 3.4GHz CPU 16 GB Ram   
GeForce GTX1080 TI 11GB
Windows 10 Pro 64bit

I will be very grateful for your lessons