Hi DOSH,
The idea of an harness is that it sits very tide, and doesn’t move. Otherwise it damages the tissue more or less. If that is true for the given case, I would like to exclude Cloth from the option list directly.
The main question is simple, is it possible to include the “belt” parts of the harness into each model or does it need to be separate-able and a given moment.
If the harness becomes integrated, texturing and modeling needs to be changed in each case. The moveable parts, where 3rd party robes might be connected need to be modeled separately and attached via “Constrains”
The other way is to keep the structure and with that the mesh similar to the “bodies” and transfer the weighting of the figures/joints to the harness, so they move in sync, which might result in some problems. Problems that I expect here are given if the body bends forward and release so the tension on the harness belt. I never have done a harness implementation, so this is just brainstorming.
I have as well no idea if the connectors for the external robes will pull the harness partly away from the body, nor if that phenomenon is needed in the illustration.
I exclude here the Surface Deformer as it might be a lot of work to fit a harness to a body with that. The result would be not interactive to any extern pull.
Continuing wit the brainstorming, I could think of “Projecting” splines to the body to create a tide harness.
If the integration of the harness is not a detailed demonstration of the harness itself, and more a “costume” decision, I would certainly go with the integration into each body, with some parts if needed constrained.
You asked how to model a harness as an object that is flexible enough for many body shapes. This is certainly a longer discussion. PoseMorph comes to mind, to have “sliders” for each difference in the targeted bodies, and be able to adjust seamlessly each in such way. The harness is build to adapt to different shapes, but I doubt that it will be easy to exactly recreate this flexibility in a model—following the exact options of the reality. As this leads to an stretching of the parts in C4D rather than adjusting it “mechanically” you need to have an eye on the textures (if the camera takes close ups)
I hope my little exploration helps to start your project.
Sorry about the delay, but the Holidays came across that.
Happy New Year
Sassi
