Lvl. 1 | Stage 2 - Clipping

Lesson Objective:

  1. Learn what clipping is, and what it's used for

  2. Learn how to clip art meshes together

  3. Clip all the required art meshes on the Lua Model

Lesson Quests:

Quest 1: Learn what clipping is, and try clipping two art meshes together

Quest 2: Clip the art meshes required on the Lua Model

Quest 1: What is Clipping?

Clipping allows you to "mask" or "hide" an Art Mesh based on another Art Mesh (Which becomes the clipping mask).

When clipped, the initial Art Mesh will not display beyond the area of the Art Mesh (the one that becomes the mask).

What is an Art Mesh?

An Art Mesh is a single layer or art piece of the model. You create a mesh on top of that art piece that can be deformed, bent, or moved. This is what we refer to when we say "Art Mesh".

Example:

Resource file for you to try:

ExampleFile_Clipping.cmo3(847 KB)

The following shows two Art Meshes (Protagonist Logo & Purple Circle), not clipped with one another.

As you can see, the Protagonist Logo moves freely on top of the circle, displaying at all times.

Next, we can see the same two Art Meshes, but this time with the Protagonist Logo (Initial Art Mesh), clipped down to the Purple Circle (Became the Art Mesh mask).

You can see here, the Protagonist Logo does not go outside the area of the purple circle.

This is clipping.

To do this, click on the Circle Art Mesh in our Deformer Window, and go to the "Inspector Window".

Here we can see the Name of our Art Mesh, and it's ID.

For the circle, it's just named "Circle" and it's ID is also "Circle"

*Note: Live2D automatically makes Art Mesh ID's the same name as the Layer name.
However, if the Art layer has a space in the name, Live2D will set the ID as "Artmesh[#]" by default.
It is common to name layers in the .psd with _'s instead of spaces.
Example:
Name: "Mouth_line" -> ID: "Mouth_line"
Name: "Mouth line" -> ID: "Artmesh1"

We need to copy the ID of the Art Mesh that will become the "mask".

In this case, we will copy the ID from the Circle, as it is the "mask" or art mesh we want things to be clipped to.

Highlight the ID ("Circle"), and copy it. (Ctrl + C or Right click > Copy)

We then need to click on the "Protagonist Logo" art mesh in the Deformer Window.

In the Inspector Window, we will then look for "Clipping ID".

Paste the "Circle" ID into the Protagonist Logo's Clipping ID box.

This will clip the Protagonist Logo to the Circle.

You can also invert the clipping, to make the initial Art Mesh only appear outside of the masked Art Meshes area.

Here you can see that the Protagonist Logo only appears when moved outside of the Purple Circles area.

This is reverse clipping.

You can do this by checking the "Invert Mask" check box on the initial Art Mesh's Inspector Window.

Quest 2: Clipping Artmeshes

Our model does not have any art pieces clipped to one another.

That causes the model to look like this:

We need to look through the model layers and decide what art pieces need to be clipped.

The most common parts on models that need to be clipped are:

  • Shadows (Hair, Clothing, etc.)

  • Highlights

  • Art Masks

For the Lua model, we can immediately see the Blue and purple art pieces that need to be clipped to a mask.

So let's find the art piece that we want to be the mask, and clip all the other parts to it.

In our Parts Window, we can hit the drop down folder of the Lua_Faye_VTuber_Model.

Our parts are located in the Chest folder. We can see everything labeled with "Badge_".

Our mask appears to be the pink art mesh at the very bottom named "Badge_Mask".

Let's select our Badge Mask, copy the ID.

Then let's paste the ID into every other "Badge_" art mesh Clipping ID Box.

Here we can see that selecting multiple Art Meshes makes the name in the Inspector Window appear as "- -".

However, you can still select multiple Art Meshes and paste the ID of "Badge_Mask" in one go. It will clip all the selected parts to "Badge_Mask".

Now the Badge parts will be clipped to their appropriate mask.

Though, you can still see other shadows and highlights that are not clipped.

For the Lua Model there is still other things that need to be clipped.

List of things to clip for the Lua Model:

  • Head_Shading clipped to Head_Colour

  • Neck_Shadow clipped to Neck

  • Eye_Highlight_Left_(1,2,3,4), Eye_White_Shadow_Left, Iris_Lines_Left, Pupil_Left, Pupil_Shadow_Left, Eyeball_Lines_Left, Iris_Blob_Left, Iris_Colour_Left, & Iris_Glow_Left clipped to Eye_White_Left

    • *The same parts but for the Right eye.

  • Shirt_Sleeve_Shadow_Left clipped to Arm_Left

    • *The same part but for the Right arm.

  • Shirt_Straps_Shadow clipped to Torso

  • Chest_Shadow clipped to Waist_Buttons, Shirt_Torso_Left, Shirt_Torso_Right, Ribbon_Middle_1, Ribbon_Middle_2, Ribbon_Middle_3, White_Shirt

  • Skirt_Armor_Plate_Highlight_Left clipped to Skirt_Armor_Plate_Colour_Left

    • *The same part but for the Right Armor Plate.

  • Leg_Metal_Loop_Highlight_Left clipped to Leg_Metal_Loop_Base_Left

    • *The same part but for the Right Metal Loop.

  • Earring_Highlight clipped to Earring_Colour

You can clip those to their respective parts now.

End of "Clipping"

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