How to modify G6 Clothing? Let me count the ways...

Texture/Opacity Replacement:
The easiest way to modify clothing if the clothing is somewhat like existing clothing is to create an new texture map and/or opacity map. For example, Heidi's existing dress can be shortened by applying an opacity map which trims off the bottom of the dress. In some cases a corresponding change needs to be made in the Skin opacity map to avoid nasty holes in the body. With clever use of opacity an existing clothing item can be changed significantly using this method. It should be noted that opacity does not change how the mesh reacts to softcloth/physics. For example, if you use opacity to make the bottom of the dress fringe, the fringe will look like fringe but it will act like solid softcloth.

Mesh Replacement:
The clothing mesh in G6 characters is one of the few meshes that can still use the Replace Mesh option in 3DXchange. This allows the clothing mesh to be significantly changed but the number of vertices must remain the same (otherwise the new mesh will be rejected). With this option larger changes can be made but it is a great pain if the source (e.g. Heidi's dress) is going to become something significantly different (due to the vertices requirement).

New G6 Base:
As far as I can see the last resource is to export the G6 character, edit externally as desired, and then re-import the character. This involves re-boning the new characters (if you exported as OBJ). This solution should provide the maximum flexibility but if you only have the PRO version of 3DXChange (so you can not export FBX), the re-boning process may be difficult. I am still looking for someone who has experience with this to provide some fairly easy instructions.

EDIT:
If content designers start to implement clothing using the last option, will this result in a tonne of G6 Bases (similar to the G5 Cloth bases)? Will this also mean that you will not be able to easily mix and match tops and bottoms (like you could do with G5 characters because they had a Upper and Lower component) because both the top and bottom will be part of a single base? In my opinion this is one of the biggest disadvantages of iClone over DAZ Studio. In DAZ Studio the clothing is all implemented independently (not part of the character mesh) so you can mix and match, add and subtract with no issues. The DAZ Studio conforming clothing (which automatically adjusts when characters proportions are changed) is also an excellent feature. We will see how the new Character Creator will handle that in iClone.


EDIT2:

It seems that this post answers some of these questions. I have not tried it yet since I am at work but it seems that the Character Creator comes with a bunch of standard bases available for Content Developers to use as the base for their own creations.


"We often compare ourselves to the U.S. and often they come out the best, but they only have the right to bear arms while we have the right to bare breasts"
Bowser and Blue, Busting The Breast

Mesh Replacement:

Doesn't work at all. The CC clothes character can't be modify in other 3rd software now. You get this:

Hi,

Strange because it's work fine for me . Zbrush or 3dsmax.

CGTRADER

@Sen

I used 3Dcoat. May I missed something... I just exported in obj format as usual with other character, but thank you talking about Zbrush I don't have, so
I used Sculptris and it works for the replace. BUT when I apply to Iclone , it doesn't update the shirt...

Actually you can't modifier cloth , because it's base on body morph . You can Only modifiy G6 body shape using replace mesh,
And change cloth texture.

CGTRADER

Thank you very much Sen. I will post your answer in other thread .

Really? I believe yesterday I created an Avatar with CC that had a shirt and jeans. I then took the resulting Avatar and imported it into 3DXchange. The clothing showed up as individual meshes within the whole character mesh (similar to how it showed up when I imported Heidi into 3DXchange). I was then able to Export Mesh, modify it, Replace Mesh and export the avatar. This allowed me to use it in iClone but once a CC character goes through 3DXchange it becomes a iClone character and thus cannot be taken back to CC.



"We often compare ourselves to the U.S. and often they come out the best, but they only have the right to bear arms while we have the right to bare breasts"
Bowser and Blue, Busting The Breast

These options work for G6 clothing but not for CC clothing. I am able to export, modify and replace CC meshes and they show up correctly in 3DXchange but when you import into iClone they revert to the unmodified version.




"We often compare ourselves to the U.S. and often they come out the best, but they only have the right to bear arms while we have the right to bare breasts"
Bowser and Blue, Busting The Breast

EDIT: Removed


"We often compare ourselves to the U.S. and often they come out the best, but they only have the right to bear arms while we have the right to bare breasts"
Bowser and Blue, Busting The Breast

If CC clothing is done as body morphs then why does it show up as a individual mesh in 3DXchange and offer the Export Mesh and Replace Mesh options.
I can understand the Export Mesh (to allow the clothing to be used outside iClone) but why allow the Replace Mesh function if iClone will not accept it?
And why does the modification work in 3DXchange? When I use Replace Mesh in 3DXchange to replace a CC cloth mesh, in 3DXchange I can see the change. Only when I import into iClone does it disappear.



"We often compare ourselves to the U.S. and often they come out the best, but they only have the right to bear arms while we have the right to bare breasts"
Bowser and Blue, Busting The Breast