UV mapping help, is there an alternative?

[HolyKnight777]

After weeks of non stop work, Ive created over a dozen new weapons, shields, and two new sets of armor. The problem is , UV MAPPING SUCKS!!! I have yet to create a working uv map to put on my models, I have just been using materials and unmapped dds textures to do the job. Some of the textures came out really good, others came out flat and terribly dull. I have read so many tutorials for 3dsmax, uv mapper, cinema4d, on how to uv map models, I followed every direction they give me, but in the end Im at a complete loss of how the uv map is attached to the models. I assign the uv map I painted to the meshes in NIF Scope, made sure they weren't hard coded, and when I put them in, there nothing more than blobs of crap that look like a blind man wiped his a## with them. This is extremely frustrating, as I have just about mastered 3d modeling in 3dsMax, Google Sketchup, and Cinema 4D. Not one tutorial I have read explains how to correctly uv map a custom mesh and import it into NIF Scope, then into Oblivion CORRECTLY. Is UV Mapping absolutely necessary to make a worthy mod to upload to TES Source ? It should not be as complicated and frustrating as it is. In 3ds max, I render beautiful images of my weapons and armor with the materials it provides, then when I try to get it into NIF scope it says the materials cant be found, and I try and combat this problem for hours on end with no results. I have worked very hard modeling my new content, and I don't want it to be flushed away because those stupid UV maps are harder to make then world peace. Does anyone have alternative methods to mapping them , or a good tutorial aimed at Oblivion to correctly UV map meshes then apply them to the model correctly? I'm itching to get these out for people to enjoy, somebody please help, before I put my fist through this computer. Keep in mind I have spent weeks on end looking it up with Google, and looking through forums, so far it hasn't answered my questions. And if your reading this Vagrant, thanks for your links and knowledge from my last post, your help got me up and running. I followed your link on texturing, but unfortunately its not detailed enough.

[Peregrine]

No, there is no alternative to UVW mapping. I mean that literally, without the UVW map, your renderer can not assign textures to objects. Pure 3dsmax procedural materials work because they don't need mapping coordinates. But once you have a 2d image, you need the UVW map to tell the program which 2d pixels go with which parts of the 3d surface.

 

But I'm not sure I understand where your problem is. Are you having trouble getting the UVW mapping done in your 3d program, or are you having trouble getting the finished mapping coordinates to export properly?

[HolyKnight777]

I get to the point where I have a UV map I can texture, I use uv mapper mostly because its much simpler to do, but when I assign it to my mesh, oblivion dos'nt show them on my models, just blobs of color. For example, when I make a sword, I divide it into 3 parts, the blade, the handgrip, and the handguard. Each gets its own texture, I convert them to dds format, fine, it shows up as crappy as it may be in Oblivion. So to try and apply a uv map, I dont assign different parts seperate textures, I export the model with none so I can uv map it, then paint the uv map. All the mods I own have 1 sometimes 2 uv maps assigned to one mesh all bunched together, one of the most important things I want to know is how exactly do you assign 1 uv map to 1 mesh. NIF scope and my programs, 3dsmax, cinema4d and their training dvds do not explain how to achieve this clearly. UV Mapper has a feature that supposedly attaches the unwrapped UV to an .OBJ file. Then allows me to export the uv texture map to paint. So I paint it, I assign it to the entire mesh which I have made into one group, no different parts seperatly labeled and textured, and it does jack. How can I do this?

[Vagrant0]

Unfortunatly, uvwmapping is one of those things you do need to learn how to do. First off, the material settings in max really don't export, they're mostly for things within the max environment. I suck at tutorials, and have figured out most of mapping on my own... The problem with UVW mapping is that it can't always be done effectivly, or easily on a finished model, you kinda have to have some idea how you want the textures to lay on the mesh before you set some basic mapping to the mesh... This is primarily true with very complicated meshes with few flat surfaces.

 

If you have to work with a finished mesh, your first priority should probably be in breaking it down into various texturing planes. For this we'll take a common example of a sword. The blade is usually flat, the handle is usually round along one axis. If they are the same entity, you would want to seperate them to apply mapping coordinates to only one part. The UVW mapping modifier has planar mapping, which can be very useful in cases like the blade, it also has cylinder mapping for the handle. Change the dimentions of the mapping, and rotate it (if needed) by affecting the gizmo. For irregular shapes, like a decorated pommel, you would need to break it down further, and figure out how to map it. For more complicated shapes, you should probably use the unwrap UVW modifier while the pieces are still seperated within the Edit window, you'll be able to adjust how the verticies, and faces are mapped. There are also some additional methods for generating the mapping, but I find getting a good standard mapping before editing can save a bit of time. Within the edit window, you can detatch parts of the mesh to be mapped differently, and determine what part of the image is mapped on what part of the mesh. It should be noted that changes to the mesh (adding/removing faces) can adversly affect the mapping, and that moving the unwrap UVW modifier within the modifier hierarchy tends to remove any changes you made within that modifier.

 

Once you have one part done, move onto the next. Once you have them all done, recombine them into a single mesh (using a new edit mesh modifier), and reapply a new unwrap UVW modifier. Edit this to further refine the mapping, and to seperate the parts into different areas of the texture. Moving parts around changes how they're mapped, if you already have a completed texture, doing this will ruin any attempt you made trying to match it. If you don't have a finished texture, you can render a UVW template to create the texture from the edit window.

 

It would probably be a good idea to test this using very basic meshes to get a feel for it before doing anything you plan to actualy release. Weapons are good for this since they tend to have reasonably simple texturing requirements. Things like armor and clothing kinda need to be built with mapping in mind unless you feel like taking the time to rearrange alot of verticies.

[Peregrine]

What you're saying really doesn't make any sense. Like "I export the model with none so I can uv map it, then paint the uv map"... you shouldn't be exporting the model without the UVW map, this is something done in your 3d modeling program. And I don't know why you'd talk about "painting the uv map", since you don't ever paint one. The UVW map is just a set of coordinates that tells your renderer which parts of the texture (.dds) to apply to which parts of the 3d model.

[Vagrant0]

What you're saying really doesn't make any sense. Like "I export the model with none so I can uv map it, then paint the uv map"... you shouldn't be exporting the model without the UVW map, this is something done in your 3d modeling program. And I don't know why you'd talk about "painting the uv map", since you don't ever paint one. The UVW map is just a set of coordinates that tells your renderer which parts of the texture (.dds) to apply to which parts of the 3d model.

I would have to agree with peregrine here, it sounds like you're going out of your way, using several programs, just to do something which is supported within Max. You don't need to bother with the .obj stuff, there is a working 3ds > nif exporter, that does everything you need.

[HolyKnight777]

It turns out 3ds max has a problem with .obj files, which I have been using because from what I have read the geometry of the model exports better in .obj format, apparently not. I just successfully made several UV maps that show up beautifully in-game. Thanks for the tips again Vagrant. And you too bird boy.