Multiple UV mappings

#1 I have a btter idea for you use 3dsmax...

#2 I can't quite afford it, though I do have some experience with it.

How would you do it in 3DS Max, then? Or any 3d art program for that matter.

#3 You have one mesh and three textures to apply...right?

Actually this is easier in gS. Use the painting tools in the material editor. You can select (or rather paint) any single or group of polygon(s) with the material you have loaded in the color shader.

#4 Hmm... I was thinking I'd be able to have a multi-layer texture with the three as the layers, though your idea is good, too; I'll give it a try. Thanks.

However, the one thing that concerned me the most is that I want each texture to include ONLY those specific areas (head, upper and lower), and that would require the mesh to be in 3 different shapes in the UV Mapping Editor, wouldn't it? I'm wondering if there's a way to accomplish this.

#5 After some careful layout of the single mesh uv's, you could export the bitmap (wireframe uv layout) and then cut it up into three textures, paint the skins and then go back and apply/align each of them back on the model. One mesh, three separate textures for each area. I have no idea why you want to do this but yep it's doable:) You really have many options with how you want to layout the uv's and textures. Myself, I really really don't like gS when it comes to unwrapping but, Caligari has improved the uv editor somewhat so it shouldn't be too hard to accomplish.


This can make unwrapping a breez compared to gS- unwrap3d

#6 Well, what I'm really trying to work with (though had no success with) is the scaling done with the UV mapping editor. I want the face texture to be really big (in terms of dimensional size), as I wanted to put a good deal of emphasis on the character's facial expressions.

However, I can only seem to cover a certain area with it, and the area is relatively small, so I can't put a lot of detail into the head, upper body and lower body, which is why I want to have it as 3 different textures.

I hope I explained it clearly there as to what I am attempting to accomplish. Do you know how I could do this? Or was it something that you already mentioned and I may have missed? >.<

#7 I see what you're doing now.
I'm not sure if you've made three meshes or if you have just one mesh..? Just the same, to scale the uv's: Select all the poly's in the UV Editor of the face (for example), and move the cursor to a corner of the selected polys and you'll see two arrows forming an "L", That will allow you to scale up/down the selection.

A few things that might help.....
-Once you export the uv bitmap (It will be the same size as the texture on the model, or the size of the UV Editor) you can scale that up in your photo/texture editor if needed (keeping the same aspect ratio and power of 2) for painting and it will scale properly on the model. This might be all that you need to do to get more detail.

-Don't forget you can expand the UV Editors window with the lower right-hand corner of the window for a larger area to work with. Won't change any scaling because the scale in the UV Editor is always relative to the texture size.

-One thing I do is paint all my skins/textures @ 1024x1024 then reduce the texture size later. Much easier to start larger and drop it down later.
Hope that helps.

#8 It is one mesh. I wanted to have 3 textures for it due to scaling problems; it's not so much that I don't know how to scale it (as per your top explanation and second tip, though that one like you said isn't really scaling it).

However, you first tip was something I did not think of, and your third tip is very helpful. I think I've been starting off too small (I've been trying to keep it around 256 x 256). Starting off big is a great solution, and I should be able to fit the 3 textures into one, in terms of detail.

Thank you so much for your help. :D

#9 Um... Just make difrent UV's for each area...

Most apps can do this..and yes one model can use more than one UV..I have done it and tested it myself. Now, as far as layering...not sure.

#10 By different UVs, I meant applying 3 different textures to 3 different UV mappings of the same mesh, and each texture would be the same size.

#11 Here's my process for making multiple uv maps for one mesh object. We'll use a human body for an example.

1. Create the model. Select all the faces of the head, and detach them from the rest of the mesh. Do the same for the upper and lower body as well. You should have three separate meshes now.
2. Export each mesh individually (if you use an external uvmapper--if not, isolate each one in your software), and uvmap each part. Assign each part their separate materials/textures, make sure they're named differently.
3. Import them all into the same project file. Make sure the materials/textures are still separate. Usually they'll keep their scale and transformations the same as it originally was, unless you did something weird to it, so there's no need to manipulate the meshes. Combine all three into one mesh and wield the vertices (some programs won't wield vertices of two or more different mesh objects, which is why I mention combining or merging them into one first).

There you have it, one mesh object with multiple textures/uvmaps assigned to it. Some of the higher-end applications probably allow you to make separate uvmaps without physically isolating each part. Since I don't have high-end software, I use this process :P

#12 That's also a very good idea. Also something I need to try out.

Thanks. :D