Hi: I got sims 4 not long ago and I just downloaded some jumper suit and recolored it to my liking using s4studio. I looked in the game and everything looks good except I see a split on her thighs. I've seen stuff like that in sims 2 meshing but can't figure out how to fix this. I only have s4studio. Do I need to get blender as well and if yes which version and what do I have to do to the mesh to fix that. I see a line on her ankles as well as if the bottom part was using ankle short tights which I hate so maybe I need to use a normal body bottom as well. Many thanks in advance.

It looks like the normals on the mesh are messed up, probably by smoothing. The vertices along that seam need to be aligned and the ankle vertices need to have the normals matched to EA standard. I can tell you how to do it in Milkshape but not in Blender.

Gladly please cause I hesitate using blender. Anyway do I need special plug ins for milkshape for sims 4. I'm completely lost when it comes to sims 4 meshing. I've got s4studio and been thinking about your program which uses milkshape. My only hesitation is learning how to use it. What exactly do I need to be able to start meshing sims4? Are there any good tutorials which I can use to get started? it must be completely different than sims 2 meshing if I'm right.

To fix the seam along the side of the thighs, using CAS Tools and Milkshape:

- In the Clone Package Editor tab of CAS Tools, open your package.
- In the Mesh Manager sub tab, check that Milkshape MS3D is selected in export options and click the Export button to export an .ms3d file.
- Open the .ms3d in Milkshape. Select the vertices along one seam and in the Vertex menu click 'Align normals'. (If you don't have the Align normals option, download the plugin here: http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=139859)
- Save the .ms3d. In Mesh Manager, import the modified mesh to the same lod you exported it from. Click the Commit Changes button.
- Save the package.

To fix the ankle seam:

- In CAS Tools, open the package in the Clone Package Editor as above.
- In the Mesh Fixing Tools sub tab, click the Fix Part Seams button.
- Click Commit Changes and save the package.

I'm assuming you have Milkshape and are familiar with it, if not you can upload your package here and I'll fix it.

This should give you an idea of how to use CAS Tools and Milkshape to modify a mesh. You can also convert obj and ms3d meshes to TS4 in the Mesh Tools / Auto Tool tab. Yes, there are big differences in TS4 meshes, mainly that they have two UV sets and extra data for seam matching and arm positioning. There's no meshing tools that include that extra data. CAS Tools calculates all of those when you auto convert a mesh to a TS4 simgeom in the Mesh Tools tab. When you export a mesh in the Mesh Manager tab, modify it, and import it back, CAS Tools uses the extra data from the original mesh, meaning you can only move and modify vertices or delete vertices, not add anything.

CmarNYC: Ok it is a very nice explanation and I'll give it a try. First I have to download CAS tools and see what happens. Many thanks, I'll let you know what happens in the same post.

Update: Ok CmarNYC: everything worked like a charm despite my shaking hands out of uncertainty. I'm amazed on how easy it was. The problem remaing is the ankle part. The mesh stops at the ankle and doesn't have shoes like your example mesh and I think that's the problem so your program acts correctly on just that but it doesn't have the shoe ankle part to react to. I don't quite know how to clone game skins yet but was thinking about cloning a bottom or a whole garment containg shoes and a whole leg to frankenstein. What do you think?

Update 2 Problem partially solved. I cloned shoes mesh and merg it in milkshake just for sake of aligning normals on the ankle. No changes seen in game,took off her tights, still no changes. I got her in swimsuit using maxis skintone and body, still I could see irregularity at the ankle. This is in game problem either with the normals or the skintone but most likely where ankle meshes meet and normals are not aligned and it came with the game. Look at this picture she's wearing swimsuit,maxis skintone and body. How would I fix that since I do use tights on my girl's outfits, it becomes even more visible. I would imagine cloning different parts of the naked body and after aligning their normals would overwrite the original.

Don't know how or if I'm right. Let me know what you think.

Did you not see the second part of my instructions? CAS Tools will fix the ankle seams automatically.

Importing a shoes/feet mesh and aligning the normals does not work because you get normals that are an average of your mesh's and the EA shoes mesh's. You need the normals to be exactly the EA standard so they will match all correctly-made shoe meshes. In Milkshape you could copy the normals from the shoe mesh to your mesh. (Put the shoe mesh on top in the Groups list, select one pair of seam vertices at a time and click Vertex / Sims 2 UniMesh Normal Data Merge. Plugin here if you don't have it: http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=122399)

CAS Tools has all the EA standard seam normals built in so one click does it.

Yes I did follow the second part of your instructions as well but it did not fix the problem. Have you seen that picture of the irregularity on the swimwear? That is not a custom mesh and it seems built in the game so after testing with swimsuit the problem seem apparent that something need to be done correctly to game files as maxis seem to have overlooked that irregularity either on their skintones or the ankle mesh part as you see on the swimwear so problem is definitely not a cc one. I suggest you do the same test in your game using maxis swimwear and skintones and see for yourself maybe you'll get the same result.

I never noticed this before that outfit, it just looked so good that I kept looking for any imperfections that might exist and that is when I noticed it. But now we know it's not a problem with the cc and rather maxis. Please confirm your observations. Thank you.

I tried with a completely EA skin and EA swimsuit, and I don't see any line. You could try removing all your mods and CC and see if the line still shows.

Fair enough and thanks. One question are there any meshing tutorials for the CasTools that explain how to merg meshes cause i tried and something was sticking out of her shoes outfit about 20 meters forward. Also when it comes to lods, as i undertood it in your explanation i would only use lod0 and not the other 3. Many thank for helping me. It is a steep learning process for me.

If you want to merge two meshes into one, you can extract both meshes to TS4 format in the Mesh Manager and then go into the Mesh Tools tab, GEOM tools sub tab, where one of the sub tabs has a tool to combine geom meshes. Then you can import the resulting .simgeom. If you need more details I'll do it later. There are no tutorials that I know of.

You should do at least lod0 and lod1.

Just for information purposes, in blender to fix the leg seams you would select the affected vertices in Edit mode and use the Remove Doubles command.
I haven't run into the ankle issue before.

What if I need to frankenstein two meshes and i need to use milkshake? Wouldn't that be a problem if I have to open the mesh in milkshape since it is in sims 4 format? lod0 and lod1. Ok I pressed import on lod I and as soon as I press commit, lod0 gets the blue highlight? Why is that ? Also do I import the same ms3d file I used for lod 0 on lod1? Too bad there are no tutorials for using CasTool. that makes learning very difficult.

Well, there's a couple of ways to approach it. You can either:

Export the two as TS4,
combine them in Mesh Tools / GEOM Tools,
import the merged TS4 mesh,
commit,
then export the merged mesh as Milkshape .ms3d which you can modify and import again.

Or:
Export the two as .ms3d,
merge them in Milkshape,
make what changes you need,
then convert the .ms3d to TS4 in the Mesh Tools / Auto Tool tab and import that.

When you click Commit, it reloads all the meshes and lod0 gets selected again. Just ignore it.

If your lod0 and lod1 are different meshes you can't import the same .ms3d to both. When you import an .ms3d in the Mesh Manager it's used as a modification to the mesh that's already there, not as an original mesh. For that reason you have to export .ms3d, modify in Milkshape, and import back to the same mesh or lod. (You can export, modify, and import an entire lod as long as you don't change the order of the mesh groups.)

When you import a simgeom it replaces the existing mesh. Since each mesh part is a separate simgeom, you have to change the view in Mesh Manager to 'By Meshpart'. In that view you can also delete mesh parts and add a mesh as a new mesh part.

I'll think about doing a tutorial for the basic functions.

[QUOTE=CmarNYC]Well, there's a couple of ways to approach it. You can either:

This is a great explanation still I have an idea but I'll have to try. I'd suggest if possible for you, definitely should make a series of basic tutorials for your CasTools. This program you've designed is a great tool with many functions that needs tutorials with some pictures to fully be understood and appreciated. That's my opinion CmarNYC.

Take your time, one at a time. One of my many questions: when i merg lets say yfBody_LingerieCorsetLaceSides_SolidBlue_lod0.ms3d with yfShoes_CrossTrainersAthletic_lod0.ms3d , how do I do with the comments. I regrouped the two meshes and combined the two comments and in game I got something sticking out of her shoes looking like a long sliver of a tree about 20 meter long. That is the kind of stuff that can be understood better with a simple tutorial for instance merging meshes in ms3d and so on. I wish I had a better understanding of this stuff so I could pitch in and help out making some nice tutorial with pictures.

The comments are left over from TS3, I left that part in the conversion to ms3d but they're not used for TS4 meshes so you can ignore them.

How did you convert from the combined ms3d to TS4? If you used the auto converter in Mesh Tools, did you get a message saying there are too many bones? Without seeing the combined mesh in game it's just a guess, but it sounds like too many bones in the mesh. TS4 has a limit of 60 bones per mesh, which is one of the reasons so much clothing is split into mesh parts. Feet have a lot of bones in them.

You can try opening your package in the Clone Package Editor, then click the Remove Unused Bones button, commit, and save. If that doesn't fix it please upload the package so I can take a look. You may have to leave the shoes as a separate mesh part.

All I did was to regroup the two groups and renamed the Group0 and then I open the mesh in mesh tool and reimported the saved file. At this point I had copy/past the comments from the shoe into the top comments.