Good UV-ing tool?

DeathstrokeFTW

Hi guys! I am currently looking for a good tool to efficiently UV my models so I can move onto texturing. I absolutely hate 3dsmax's UV tools and it just keeps breaking my setup no matter how much I fix it. I currently use 3dCoat's awesome UVing tools that help me just like Headus UV layout but I fear many studios don't use 3dCoat just yet. I would still use Headus but after I upgraded to Win10 I cant install or uninstall or even launch it.
Could someone recommend me a good UV tool?

oglu

you should be able to do everything in max... what are the issues there..?

huffer

polyunwrapper for 3dsmax greatly helps in creating uv's, I suggest giving it a go.

DeathstrokeFTW

oglu said:

you should be able to do everything in max... what are the issues there..?

Whenever I try uving something the entire uv breaks recently I was having trouble unwrapping a low poly sword, when I would unwrap the hilt it would break up the blade's UV. I tried using the peel tool to unwrap my batmobile but then again it was acting odd. I showed it to a friend of mine and thought it was weird. 
Ive tried reinstalling max but it keeps happening.

DeathstrokeFTW

huffer said:

polyunwrapper for 3dsmax greatly helps in creating uv's, I suggest giving it a go.

Does it work witn Max 2017? Ill give it a shot.

cptSwing

Have you looked up some (maybe in-depth) tutorials of unwrapping in Max? It doesn't seem like Polyunwrapper by itself would instantly fix things here - as awesome an addition it might be.

DeathstrokeFTW

cptSwing said:

Have you looked up some (maybe in-depth) tutorials of unwrapping in Max? It doesn't seem like Polyunwrapper by itself would instantly fix things here - as awesome an addition it might be.

I have but everytime i did something some other part would break and crash max a lot. I've actually been using max since its 2013 version came out and it was pretty much annoying and time consuming to UV large environments. I was previously using headus until I found 3dcoat and ive never looked back since but im not sure what the industry uses. Max 2017 peel tool is good but ive had a bad experience with it.

kanga

DeathstrokeFTW said:

oglu said:

you should be able to do everything in max... what are the issues there..?

Whenever I try uving something the entire uv breaks recently I was having trouble unwrapping a low poly sword, when I would unwrap the hilt it would break up the blade's UV. I tried using the peel tool to unwrap my batmobile but then again it was acting odd. I showed it to a friend of mine and thought it was weird. 
Ive tried reinstalling max but it keeps happening.

Yup this happened with me when I used Hedus and max. I love headus but after trying to fix the breaking uvs I tossed it and now do uvs in max or blender. It takes some getting used to but its just that, a question of keeping at it. But then again I find uv work relaxing.

DeathstrokeFTW

kanga said:

DeathstrokeFTW said:

oglu said:

you should be able to do everything in max... what are the issues there..?

Whenever I try uving something the entire uv breaks recently I was having trouble unwrapping a low poly sword, when I would unwrap the hilt it would break up the blade's UV. I tried using the peel tool to unwrap my batmobile but then again it was acting odd. I showed it to a friend of mine and thought it was weird. 
Ive tried reinstalling max but it keeps happening.

Yup this happened with me when I used Hedus and max. I love headus but after trying to fix the breaking uvs I tossed it and now do uvs in max or blender. It takes some getting used to but its just that, a question of keeping at it. But then again I find uv work relaxing.

Heh that sounds fun, my friends tell me to move to maya xD I wish I could use headus... moving to win10 effed a few things.

cptSwing

I don't know.. it sounds like you might have to go into more detail regarding your problems than "stuff breaks", then the PC hive mind might be able to help you out

DeathstrokeFTW

cptSwing said:

I don't know.. it sounds like you might have to go into more detail regarding your problems than "stuff breaks", then the PC hive mind might be able to help you out

The breaking thing is when I uv one object and move onto the other the previous one breaks and looks awkwardly shaped.

Neox

that definitely does not sound like a max error, but something on your behalf.

i assume you do not collapse your UV modifier down, then do stuff to the mesh and then your modifier doesnt apply anymore?

DeathstrokeFTW

Neox said:

that definitely does not sound like a max error, but something on your behalf.

i assume you do not collapse your UV modifier down, then do stuff to the mesh and then your modifier doesnt apply anymore?

No no. While Uving inside the editor this was happening, I think its definitely my version of Max but re-installing doesnt help.

cptSwing

So you have two objects selected, and a single (instanced) Unwrap UV modifier added to both of them? Or you move from one object to the next, editing UV's & collapsing the modifier on each one separately? Is whichever material or shader your viewport is using set to the same UV channel that you are working on in the Unwrap UV?

DeathstrokeFTW

cptSwing said:

So you have two objects selected, and a single (instanced) Unwrap UV modifier added to both of them? Or you move from one object to the next, editing UV's & collapsing the modifier on each one separately? Is whichever material or shader your viewport is using set to the same UV channel that you are working on in the Unwrap UV?

Look I had a sword with 3 parts but within one map. I unwrap the blade, im done with it, i move to the hilt and it breaks the blade. I didnt even touch the blade when I was uving the hilt. And then out of nowhere the guard breaks eventhough I havnt touched it. This was when i was using the peel tool. I uved it in Maya with no problem but  I dont use Maya for modelling

Justo

Yeah, default Max tools are way enough to get started with UVing. I think I used them for a few years before getting polyunwrapper and other scripts.

Eric Chadwick

Post your model, or a simplified version that causes the same error. And your step by step workflow. You're probably doing one thing in particular that's causing so much trouble.

Neox

DeathstrokeFTW said:

cptSwing said:

So you have two objects selected, and a single (instanced) Unwrap UV modifier added to both of them? Or you move from one object to the next, editing UV's & collapsing the modifier on each one separately? Is whichever material or shader your viewport is using set to the same UV channel that you are working on in the Unwrap UV?

Look I had a sword with 3 parts but within one map. I unwrap the blade, im done with it, i move to the hilt and it breaks the blade. I didnt even touch the blade when I was uving the hilt. And then out of nowhere the guard breaks eventhough I havnt touched it. This was when i was using the peel tool. I uved it in Maya with no problem but  I dont use Maya for modelling

still doesnt sound like typical max behavious but more like user error to be hones.

so yeah as eric said, can your post your mesh? maybe even save the step before and after it breaks. just as you have it in max

NoRank

Well at least max 2016 and 2015 are fine, been really long since something crashed it (and when it did, it was something about too many triangles accumulated by the decimated mesh that came from zbrush).
I still like to use Headus thought, but max is fine too tbh.

DeathstrokeFTW

Eric Chadwick said:

Post your model, or a simplified version that causes the same error. And your step by step workflow. You're probably doing one thing in particular that's causing so much trouble.

I can post my model but its gonna take a while :P 

DeathstrokeFTW

Ok this one was the old model I had.



I used the Peel tool for UVs. This time however it didnt break much this time but when I Uved the part of the far left it broke.



Somehow it fixed (isnt scaled and arranged properly) 



but when I go back to edit again in the peel tool this happens