UV map - best layout

[philnolan3d]

Does anyone have a suggestion for the best way to layout the UV map for a head? If I was painting by hand I would make a seam up the back of the head and unwrap it from there, but I found when I do that to use with 3DC the mouth, nose, ears, and maybe eyes are just too small. and even with the biggest image size I just get little blobs of color instead of the nice detail I need.

[SonK]

Does anyone have a suggestion for the best way to layout the UV map for a head? If I was painting by hand I would make a seam up the back of the head and unwrap it from there, but I found when I do that to use with 3DC the mouth, nose, ears, and maybe eyes are just too small. and even with the biggest image size I just get little blobs of color instead of the nice detail I need.

I haven't touch 3DC UV tools, but i usually run my seams in the back from the head and abit in the front(neck area). and i usually "cut" the ears out as as a separate UV island. I did a video tutorial on unwrapping the human head , but i was using Modo(just testing its UV tools):

Head unwrapping:

http://www.mediafire.com/?5i45yumaw12

Mirror:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/ssvi8l

For unwrapping UV, i prefer to use "UV Layout" which in my opinion is the best application for UVing bar none.

[yukon_28]

For unwrapping UV, i prefer to use "UV Layout" which in my opinion is the best application for UVing bar none.

Agree 1000%. I also using it for all unwraping. Generaly i also cut ears to separete island. My seam is starts on the back of the head, and few polygons to each side at the end of the seam (like "T" letter).

philnolan3d, on uvlayout website you have selection of free videos, most of them explaining different parts of interface, but there also "Head Tutorial" in 4 parts, shows head unwraping process.

http://www.uvlayout.com/index.php

[Oliver Thornton]

UV Layout is good, but they're into the commercial release now.

For anyone who can't afford a new app right now, here's a free stand-alone app that does good work and has a lot of the newer 'standard' features like pinning. From their site they seem very open to developing for other apps, but no one from the LW community has stepped up to help with the conversion.

Roadkill UV:

http://www.pullin-shapes.co.uk/page8.htm

yukon_28 mentions cutting ears, which I am seeing more and more these days in other people's work. The idea is to remove an overly complex relatively small piece of mesh to put less stress on the surrounding area of the larger mesh. I have been using this technique with great results. It helps so much sometimes that I am now also cutting out eyesockets, any interior mouth geometry, even nostrils! This leaves just the skin you need to paint (maybe leave one extra ring of polys for bleed) for the unwrapping algorithm to work with. This has even improved my results from the PLG plugs for LW tremendously.

Using PLG you can even unweld your entire model, run the plug, and merge points after, giving you a uv map with all polys laid out flat like ZB's AUVTiles. You can even use PLG's UV Packing to change the distance between the polys. Default value is 128, 256 is closer, 64 is further apart. Not a perfect tile solution, but free if you have LW (make sure save your morphs though, pretty sure all the unwelding may destroy them). Might be worth a shot. Haven't tried 3DC with a model UV-mapped with tiles yet though, no idea how it will handle it.

-Oliver

[yukon_28]

Roadkill UV:

<a href="http://www.pullin-shapes.co.uk/page8.htm" target="_blank">http://www.pullin-shapes.co.uk/page8.htm</a>

Agree. I used RoadKill before i fall in love with uvlayout, its somewhat more simple, but still very useful tool. So called "plugin" for RoadKill->Max connection its a 2 or 3 lines of maxscript, so anyone know something about lightwave script should be able to make such "plugin" for that application.

There is more free LSM Unwrapers, but its a scripts for max, its would not be useful for someone using other main app.

P.S.

I seen last week someone using Reactor's (max's built in dinamics toolset) Dinamic Cloth system for unwraping mesh, then simply copyng polygon channels into map channel. Its funny, but works not bad at all, also its fast method.

[philnolan3d]

I did my usual line up the back of the head, but then I took the nose, mouth, ears, and eye socket areas and made them separate islands, then unwrapped. Of course I would never do this if I was painting the maps by hand, but that's a nice thing about 3DC, I don't have to worry about it. So far it's worked out quite nicely.