where can I learn to uv map a model?

winnppl

Hi Im working on a model for dota and just finished all the modeling, now Im on the texturing, I cant figger out how to map my model to be able to paint it in gimp, where can I find a good tutorial on how to uv map a model?

Thanks

ZacD

What application did you model it in?

crazyfingers

Youtube i'm sure has tons of resources, just do a search for "how to UV map", and your 3d moddeling program of choice. I'm assuming it's blender as that's sort of the 3d equivelant of gimp.

If so here ya go!:

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-Zkt3uAeO0"]Blender 2.6 Tutorial 35 - Character UV Mapping - YouTube[/ame]

Edit: Some quick things to focus on early... Focus on chopping your character's uv's into bits and pieces that hide their uv seams at the start. Nice clean textures aren't important at first, just worry about getting the right cuts on the uv's. Once the character is broken into UV pieces you can start relaxing these portions and figuring out how to best set up the map in full.

Most importantly just know UVing is a totally alien process at first and when you first do it it's going to be extremly frustrating, but if you mess with it long enough u'll have a revelation and it's all gonna click at once. Just think of it as your 3d program being able to view your character from one view, and it can't rotate the camera, only the geometry itself!

winnppl

hay its actully maya im shure I can apply the same concept to it

Thank you very much!

ZacD

unwrapping is a balancing act, you want to avoid any major stretching or distortions, I first plan on where I want seams to be on a model, for characters, its pretty straight forward and 90% the same for the most part. For environment stuff you normally want seams on anything near or over 90 degree angles.