The
following describes how I setup the UV's
for my model in order to paint the textures.
Step 7: Now it's time to use the Move
and Sew command. Select the edges of your
neck shell (which automatically selects
the connected edges on the other shell)
and use the Move and Sew command (Edit
Polygons>Textures>Move and Sew)(this
command can also be accessed from the
UV Texture Editor's Polygon menu). Do
the same with the top of the head's shell.
You'll
see that all 3 shells are now joined.
But the UV's are pretty bunched up where
you've sewn them together. This is a job
for the Relax UV's command (next step).
Step 8: You can use the Relax
UV's command to space out selected UV's
into a more neat layout. Just select the
UV's in the problem area and use the relax
UV's command.
NOTE:
don't do this too much or you'll probably
get stretching in the textures where
you've relaxed the UV's too much!
Step 9: When you're finished and happy
with your unwrapped UV's, select the entire
shell, and go to the Polygons>Layout
UV's>options command in the UV Texture
Editor. Change the settings to what I have
in the picture on the right.
You
want the Separate option off so that
Maya lays out the UV's in 1 piece. Then
the Layout option you want to select
"Into Square" so that maya fits your
selected UV's into one square unit.
The Scale option you want to select
Uniform so that Maya scales your selected
UV shell uniformly to fit inside a 1
unit square.
Here is a screen shot of my finished UV's.
Not perfect, but you get the idea...
Step
10: After your UV shell is layed
out in a 1 unit square, select the model
and go to the Polygons>UV Snapshot
command in the UV Texture Editor.
Change the path/filename to whatever you
choose, set the XY size of the texture
to be created, and the Color Value for
the UV's, and image format. After you
select OK, an image file is created with
your UV's and an alpha channel in the
image format you selected. You can now
take that image into Photoshop (or image
editing software of choice) and start
to paint your texture. (next
step).
