Female Character Modeling in Blender: Part 6

In the final part of the Female Character Modeling series, you'll learn how to use existing geometry to create a dress and socks for the character. You'll then complete the project by adding additional details, such as wrinkles and creases using Blender's sculpting tools.

1. Making Cloth

Step 1

With the Base Body dress mesh selected, turn on its visibility in the outliner panel.

Step 2

With the dress mesh selected, Scale it up a little bit using the S key.

Step 3

Now keep only the Base Body Dress mesh visible and turn Off the visibility for the rest of the meshes, so we can concentrate on modeling the dress.

Step 4

In the Front view, select the cloth mesh and then press Z for wireframe mode. Enter Face selection mode, select one half of the mesh and then press the Delete key, to delete the selected faces.

Step 5

With the sleeve border selected, Extrude it once as shown in the following image.

Step 6

With the half dress mesh still selected, click on the Modifier button and then apply the Mirror modifier.

Step 7

While in Face selection mode, select the 3 indicated faces around the breast area and then press Delete, to delete the selected faces.

Step 8

We deleted the cleavage faces because we have to modify the chest mesh into cloth. So adjust the vertices around the cleavage area as if cloth on the body.

Step 9

In the same way, we need to reduce the details around the abdomen area to make it look like cloth.

Step 10

With the indicated edges selected, press X and choose the Dissolve command to delete only the selected edges, and not the faces.

Step 11

After dissolving the edges, jump into Vertex selection mode and you will see some unnecessary vertices left on the edges. So with these unnecessary vertices selected, press X again and choose the Dissolve command to delete the selected vertices, but not the faces.

Step 12

After dissolving the edges and unnecessary vertices, you can see the simplified mesh that will be used as cloth. However we need to tweak it a little bit more.

Step 13

Switch to Face selection mode, and select the indicated faces shown in the image below.

Step 14

Delete these selected faces.

Step 15

Now unhide the body mesh so that we can easily offset the cloth mesh vertices in Vertex selection mode.

Step 16

Select the bottom edge ring and then click on the Subdivide tool, to add edges to the loop.

Step 17

After subdividing the faces, arrange the bottom row faces as shown in the image below.

Step 18

With the faces selected, use the E key to Extrude them once.

Step 19

Now select the inner border edge loop as shown in the image below. 

Step 20

With the border edge loop selected, Extrude it twice as shown in the following image.

Step 21

Adjust the vertices accordingly. You can keep extruding until you get the length you want. In this way, we complete the base cloth mesh of the character.

Step 22

Before moving ahead, do count the number of border vertices for equal and parallel connecting, so we can subdivide and increase the edges equally and accordingly.

2. Adding Detail to the Cloth

Step 1

Now let’s add details to the skirt. First select the last two rows of faces as shown in the image below.

Step 2

With the faces selected, press Shift-D to duplicate them and separate the mesh. Also Scale them down a bit.

Step 3

With the same faces selected, press E to extrude. We need this extrusion to add extra detail to the skirt.

Step 4

Next, select the indicated border faces of the collar shown below.

Step 5

With the collar faces selected, use E to Extrude the faces once.

Step 6

Following the same process, Extrude the sleeve border faces as well.

3. Making the Socks

Step 1

Now, hide all the meshes except for the socks and the dress.  

Step 2

In the Face selection mode, select the faces of either the left or right sock. Here we have to create a mirrored mesh as an instance for editing.

Step 3

With the faces selected, press X and choose Faces from the fly-out menu to delete the selected faces.

Step 4

Now with the rest of the sock selected, open the Modifier panel and click on the Mirror modifier in the list. This will create an instanced copy of the sock on the opposite side.

Step 5

Now with every alternate top vertice selected, move them a bit upward to create the design of the socks.

Step 6

Also unhide the body mesh and then arrange and offset the sock's vertices accordingly.

Step 7

Delete the toes to make it look more like a sock.

Step 8

Also adjust the vertices of the socks around the toe part, so that it looks like a real sock shape.

Step 9

You can now see how the socks look like.

4. Subdividing the Mesh

Step 1

Let’s add detail to the skirt. Select the indicated border edge loop as shown in the image below.  

Step 2

With the edges selected, first click on the Subdivide tool button and keep the Number of Cuts set to 2.

Step 3

After subdividing the mesh, arrange the vertices as shown in the image below.  

Step 4

Once done, the bottom of the skirt should look like this.

Step 5

With the indicated vertical edges selected, use the Subdivide tool with the Number of Cuts value set to 1.

Step 6

Following the same process, select the upper vertical edges by going to Select > Edge Ring, as shown in the image below.

Step 7

With the vertical edges selected, use the Subdivide tool again with the Number of Cuts value set to 3.

Step 8

Now select the upper edge loop and then Move it a little bit down, as shown in the image below.

Step 9

Next, select all the indicated faces (which we have subdivided) and then use the Extrude Individual tool to extrude the individual faces, as shown in the following image.

Step 10

After extruding the faces, select the individual faces and Scale them down a little bit. They should look similar to the image below.

Step 11

Following the same process, select each bottom face and then use the Extrude Individual tool.

Step 12

After selecting all the bottom faces, Move them down a bit as shown.

Step 13

Following the same process, select the faces of the lower part and use the Extrude Individual tool again.

Step 14

Also select and Extrude the bottom faces by using the same Extrude Individual tool.

Step 15

In this way we have completed the skirt design. You can see how it looks below.

5. Increasing Subdivision for Sculpting

Step 1

Now let’s start sculpting the cloth mesh. But before we do that, we need to increase the subdivision of the mesh as sculpting demands a highly subdivided mesh. Here we use the Loop Cut and Slide tool to add subdivision, as shown in the image below.

Step 2

In this way, we have subdivided the cloth mesh for detailed sculpting using the Loop Cut and Slide tool.

Step 3

Increase the subdivision level by applying the Subdivide modifier with the Subdivision View value set to 3.

Step 4

Now with the cloth mesh selected, choose Sculpt Mode as shown in the image below.

Step 5

First select the F Smooth brush from the Brush Selection panel, as shown in the image below.

Step 6

With the F Smooth brush selected, you can set the brush's Radius and Strength values as needed.

Step 7

Use the Smooth brush to make the mesh surface smooth where required.

Step 8

Now, for asymmetrical sculpting on the cloth mesh, we need to merge the mirrored parts. So, with the cloth mesh selected, turn on Object Mode.

Step 9

Go to the Modifier panel, keep the View value at 0 and then click on the Apply button to merge the mirrored meshes.

Step 10

After that, with the cloth mesh selected, turn on Edit Mode.

Step 11

After merging, there may be some unmerged vertices. So with the mutual corresponding vertices selected, press Alt-M and select the At Center option from the fly-out menu.

Step 12

After merging the vertices, turn on Sculpting Mode with a View value of 3. Begin sculpting the cloth mesh to add more details, like wrinkles and creases.

Step 13

In this way, sculpt on the mesh to show wrinkles and crease on the cloth. You can play with the sculpting tools to get a different and more detailed look.

Conclusion

We have now completed our female character model in Blender. I hope you have enjoyed this series.