Revamping the Cloth Tailoring Pipeline at Pixar

Christine Waggoner, Fernando de Goes

Abstract:

This work presents the most recent updates to the cloth tailoring pipeline at Pixar. We start by reviewing the evolution of cloth authoring tools used at Pixar from 2001 to the present day. Motivated by previous approaches, we introduce a structured workflow for cloth tailoring that manages multiple mesh versions concurrently. In our implementation, artists interact primarily with a low-resolution quad-dominant mesh, which defines the garment look as well as setups for rigging and simulation. Our system then converts this coarse input model into a triangulated mesh for simulation and a quadrangulated subdivision surface for rendering. To this end, we developed a new remeshing tool that outputs surface triangulations with adaptive resolution and conforming to edge constraints. We also devised procedural routines to generate render meshes by applying fold-over thickness, refining the mesh, and inserting seams. In addition, we introduced a suite of algorithms for transferring input attributes onto the derived meshes, including UV shells, face colors, crease edges, and vertex weights. Our revamped pipeline was deployed on Pixar's feature films Turning Red and Lightyear, producing hundreds of high-quality garment meshes.

Paper (PDF)

Siggraph Talk 2022