Creating & Posing figures with MPFB2

[philipy]

As Rik said on another thread:

Sounds promising. I'll let Philip get his head around the finer points and keep fingers crossed he'll produce one of his excellent tutorials.

Rik

Your wish is my command!

Attached are 2 pdf's. One is how to install it and the other is how I used it to create a customised driver for my F & B loco, just as an example. If you find errors or something doesn't make sense, please let me know and I'll update them.

IMG_0983.jpg (205.55 KiB) Viewed 56654 times

All we need to do now is work out how to increase the poly of the stl to get rid of or at least reduce, the facetting, and how to make clothes - both easier said than done.

Installing MPFB2.pdf

(48.12 KiB) Downloaded 1142 times

Posing a figure in MPFB2.pdf

(420.67 KiB) Downloaded 1143 times

[ge_rik]

Getting this far is a minor miracle in my eyes. I find the complexity of these things initially quite baffling.

Rik

[Paul_in_Ricky]

Thanks for putting those docs up.
Your posing one does assume you have a design to trial fit with. That won't be the case for many people.

I haven't tried it, but a quick Google suggests you should be able to get Blender to work in actual real world measurements. That would mean you could drop in primitives (cubes, columns etc) to use to align the figure to.

[philipy]

Paul, I guess you're right about me making that assumption, although that wasn't my intention. I was simply trying to show what could be achieved and to some extent how it could be done at a first attempt.

I have in the past tried to draw a diesel cab driving panel in Blender to fit a character to in MH, but with only very limited success. I think it probably needs a much more in-depth knowledge than I have now, and I'm not sure I have enough time ( or will!) left on the planet to actually acquire!

In the past I have posed mh figures to fit specific cases by repeatedly adjusting the rig , saving stl, and importing into a drawing, checking, adjusting, reimporting, etc but it takes forever and is only 95% successful.

[Paul_in_Ricky]

I have in the past tried to draw a diesel cab driving panel in Blender to fit a character to in MH,

I think that if you can find out how to set Blender to work in actual measurements you won't need to over complicate things by drawing exact items. Just hanging lumps in mid air with some blocks for limits should give you enough to work on.

Although we'll still be stuck on rubbish clothing. I did see this video that might offer some hope at fixing some bits;

[philipy]

Although we'll still be stuck on rubbish clothing. I did see this video that might offer some hope at fixing some bits;

I've been having a play with using Meshmixer to remove the front patch pockets on the jacket of my driver. Not there yet but I think it may work. I had intended to file them off, but If i can remove them before printing that would obviously be better.

[Sam95]

Do you have any problem when importing the STL in CURA in the head of the model.

I have some errors highlighted in CURA on the eyes slots and mouth cavity. And when I print it I have some holes at those points.
I tried to remove the mouth cavitiy and eyes slots in blender but it is very difficult.

Do you have tips for that ?

Thanks
Sam

[philipy]

Hi Sam,
I must admit that I haven't actually had that problem, although in passing I did notice that something appeared a bit odd with the eyes and mouth when I have been experimenting with editing the mesh in Meshmixer.
However, as a routine I tend to run stl's through Repetier-Host ( https://www.repetier.com/download-now/) to fix any oddities like that.
I think it is maybe to do with the fact that the basic program is really aimed at graphics rather than 3d printing, so the fact that the eyballs are not a fixed part of the whole thing doesn't matter to them!

I also have a feeling that it may be more of a problem if you are intending to print in filament and not resin, because Chitubox usually fixes things like that anyway.

[Paul_in_Ricky]

the fact that the eyballs are not a fixed part of the whole thing doesn't matter to them!

I think it's a little more complex than that. When you add detail, clothes, eyes, hats etc they seem to start getting treated as separate items. That in turn can result in poor fits between bits and leave anomalies with an exported STL. I've seen it a few times and my FDM slicer (Bambu Studio) picks it up and sends it off for repair.

[philipy]

All we need to do now is work out how to increase the poly of the stl to get rid of or at least reduce, the facetting, and how to make clothes - both easier said than done.

Well I think I've cracked one of those items,i.e how to increase the poly and lose the facetting in the print:

Screenshot 2025-01-23 12.13.58.jpg (440.13 KiB) Viewed 56540 times

Same drawing, but on the L, straight out of MPFB2 and on the R, after running it through Meshlab - NOT Meshmixer!

A long time ago when I first started playing with 3D printing and Blender, I also looked at both Meshlab and Meshmixer but they both made my brain hurt so I put them on one side for a rainy day which never came! However, whilst searching for "how to increase the poly count..." I came across this YT video, which gave me the answer - the bit we need starts at about 3:12:


Basically it's: Open meshlab --> Start new project --> Open Mesh ( i.e your stl) --> Just "OK" the next pop-up box --> Filters --> "Remeshing, simplification and reconstruction" ---> "Subdivision Surfaces : Butterfly Subdivision".

Screenshot 2025-01-23 12.33.36.jpg (186.81 KiB) Viewed 56540 times

After that select "Iterations 3" and adjust "Edge Threshold" - I used 0.8 - click Apply.

Then watch all the facets magically disappear!
You can play around with the Iterations and Threshold, but those two figures are what seems to work for me. Just possibly the Threshold could be lower, but the triangles started to faintly show although I don't know how that would translate in a print.
There are some artefacts as well - line on the shoulder, but a file will deal with them.

[Paul_in_Ricky]

Worth a quick look at the video below. This tells you how to do something similar, subdividing the surface, within Blender (Things have moved around bit between 3 and 4, but you'll work it out)

[philipy]

Looks interesting Paul, thanks. I've had a quick flick through but need to look in detail.
As an aside, I came across this from the same guy. Could be very useful.

[Paul_in_Ricky]

I posted a link to that on Sunday <sigh>