Submission Box: Suleman Tutorial – Clothing from an angle

Here is the second post in the new "Submission Box" feature of the blog. Once again it is a Tutorial from Suleman. I hope you enjoy .........

Hey there! This is my quick and dirty guide to clothing those Heromachine characters who aren't facing right towards the viewer.
Of course, there are many other options and things to consider, but this can help you get started.

1. Make the pose you want to put clothes on.

2: From the Backgrounds-Shapes section, take two rectangular shapes. Place those in such a way that their outer edge follows the line from the center of the chest down the abs. This is the actual centerline of the chest. The rectangles should overlap slightly. You will be masking two different copies of the clothing item on these rectangles.

3: Take a torso clothing item from the Tops section. Things to consider:
Avoid skintight items. The muscles will not fit the ones on the angled torso anyway.
Avoid items with something distinct and symmetric in the middle, such as a necktie. Those items will be difficult to make symmetric-looking when angled.
Avoid sleeves. You'll have to make the sleeves manually.
Avoid long items, such as trenchcoats. The longer the item, the harder it is to make symmetrical. The exception to this rule is:
Favor open items such as open vests, coats and robes. These are the easy ones that require no work at all.
Favor symmetric items. If the item is asymmetric already, it will be harder to fit together in the end.

4: Fit the item so that its centerline is at the edge of one of the rectangles and so that it covers the rest of the torso on one side.
What might happen is that some of the space on the side of the torso is left uncovered. Don't worry, we'll get there.

Mask the torso item to the appropriate rectangle.

5. Make a copy of the torso item. Place the new item on the other rectangle and follow step 4.  Adjust the size, location and rotation until the halves look like they fit together.
This is where it is important that the rectangles overlap. If the rectangles do not overlap, an empty space will be left in the middle.

Mask the second item to the second rectangle and place one of the items in front of the other in layers.

6. Now it is time to fill in the empty space left by step 4. Make another rectangle that covers only the area you need. Make another copy of the torso item, or pick some other item that you thing would look good covering the side. Place it in such a way that it continues the item on that side naturally.

Mask the new item to the new rectangle, and put it behind the other torso item in layers.

The edge of the side item might not look great, but we can still adjust how the torso looks with color, shading and accessories.

The same method works for many items. You will occasionally need to adjust it or use some sleight-of-hand to cover unpleasant edges. Remember: What the viewer doesn't see, they don't know.