pupe unwraping issue

roosterMAP

I've run into this several times in the past and will likely again with my new drop shop model.

PROBLEM: Image you have a pipe that is bent at an x degree angle.
http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee214/wareznoob/1.jpg

What is the best way to unwrap it? I want to get a clean unwrap like...
http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee214/wareznoob/2.jpg
(unwrap above is from same cylinder above before i applied the bend modifier.)

i use 3ds max.

Rhinokey

if you unwraped it then bent it, you should have that uv map for it still. just unwrap before you bend,, sure you will get a bit of stretched uvs this way, but unless the pipe is large or is a focal point it should be ok (well bolts an such will get messy

DEElekgolo

Use the spline unwrapping feature in this script to unwrap your "pupe".

00Zero

if you have a bent pipe and the unwrap is straight, youre going to get stretching on one side and compression on the other. probably wouldnt be a big deal.

if you really dont want stretching, and want an even pixel distribution, the unwrap wouldnt be straight like that.

use Roadkill. you can download the standalone version for free. just import your obj, select the edges that you want to cut and it will unwrap it automatically. i'd imagine the best shape for this would be some kind of bowtie...maybe. my in-brain unwrapper is weaksauce.

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

it can be just a small standalone program, or a plugin for maya, max or softimage.

Mark Dygert

I agree with mojokey. Or you could recreate it with a torus primitive and delete the unwanted geo. Make sure "generate Mapping Coords." is checked on before converting it from a primitive to edit poly.

Or if you're really bent on unwrapping it as is you can straighten it out pretty quickly by:
Click a vertical edge, click ring, hold shift and click the flatten vertical button.
Click a horizontal edge, click ring, hold shift and click the flatten horizontal button.

If you're on pre-2010 version of max, you can use my Align Horiz/Vertical scripts
http://www.vigville.com/forum_images/3dsmax/Scripts/VigTools_v1.5.ms

Ott

He means the "Align Vertical" and "Align Horizontal". Not flatten.

Mark Dygert

err yep I keep saying flatten lately...

Ghostscape

If you didn't unwrap it prior to the bend, you can get pretty good results by using the pelt tool followed by relax. Just put a seam down the side and around the caps, use pelt to pull it out, then relax to revert it to a squarish shape.

then you can use the align-vertical/align-horizontal tools to straighten out the outer edges and the edgeloops going across, then you can use space evenly on the verts in each edgeloop to minimize stretching.

System

Apply uvw unwrap, select all poly's except end caps (if there are any) open edit and select "Box No Top Mapping".
Stitch a few edges (alot less to do with this method) finally relax by face angles: amount to 1, iterations to at least 1000 if you don't want to wait all day Done.

O yeah you could straighten out all the lines but it will look stretched with textures on as suggested, depends how much screen space this will be taking up and or how detailled the textures are.