Offsetting UV islands - how do _you_ do it?
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I'm collaborating with a friend on some scripts for 3ds Max (tbh he's doing most of the work, I'm just testing and offering crits!).
I'm wondering how others are prepping their UVs for baking?
I make all my unique UVs first, then I mirror the model, and duplicate any parts that will have overlapped UVs. Then I pack. I like using the Group Selection tool in Unwrap UVW, because it keeps the overlapped UVs together when I pack.
However when the UVs are done, I need to move all the overlapping islands out of the 0-1 space, leaving just one copy inside.
How do _you_ do this part?
I use the Select Inverted Faces tool, Grow the selection until it stops, then use the Relative Type-In to move them 1 unit (or a small script which does the same thing). I do the same with Select Overlapped Faces. Then I move 1 copy of each back into the 0-1 square.
If some of the inverted or overlapped islands are welded, I have to Break them first, to prevent the long stretched bits.
How do others offset their UVs? There has to be a better way.
I'm wondering how others are prepping their UVs for baking?
I make all my unique UVs first, then I mirror the model, and duplicate any parts that will have overlapped UVs. Then I pack. I like using the Group Selection tool in Unwrap UVW, because it keeps the overlapped UVs together when I pack.
However when the UVs are done, I need to move all the overlapping islands out of the 0-1 space, leaving just one copy inside.
How do _you_ do this part?
I use the Select Inverted Faces tool, Grow the selection until it stops, then use the Relative Type-In to move them 1 unit (or a small script which does the same thing). I do the same with Select Overlapped Faces. Then I move 1 copy of each back into the 0-1 square.
If some of the inverted or overlapped islands are welded, I have to Break them first, to prevent the long stretched bits.
How do others offset their UVs? There has to be a better way.
Replies
I turn on shaded uvs so I can tell where the overlaps are.
I then click to select a vertex on an overlapping group of shells which selects 1 vertex from 1 shell, then I hold shift and marquee select that same vertex which deselects the vertex I had selected, and selects that vertex for all the other shells.
Then I repeat for all the other overlaps, and convert selection to UV shell and offset by 1 unit with a script.
Anyway, smoothing groups don't help with this, since they have no knowledge of overlaps in UV space.
Thats not new. Im talking about something like when you have a box for example, and there are 1-1 cylinders on its 2 sides, which should overlap on the uvs. You should have a uv cut along the cylinders so it can be unwrapped, but you won't add a smoothing break there , for sure. Okay , So the box has its smoothing groups, and the 2 cylinders are in anothers, and you know that they will overlap, but you want to offset one during the baking.In this case, you can do what I described. Actually I don't see why it couldn't work.
It's a shame I never became friends with the UV grouping feature, it seemed like a good idea but I found it hard to keep groups in between collapsing the modifier and later adding a new one.
They can only be welded at the central seam (assuming a left/right symmetry here), and that's entirely up to you. If it was a single shell folded in half, you'd end up selecting the whole shell. (I think you are asking if separate uv shells can be welded, say a series of bullet casings; which maya won't let you do.)
Can you not select UVs in the 3d view in Max? I either do what m4dcow suggests, or simply select the single uv/shell in the viewport if it would be easier.
1. I apply a material to all the faces I want to mirror (this makes it easy to select again if I want to move them back, for instance if I need to make changes and repack).
2. Select faces by material
3. Offset using the numeric transform box by 1 unit, in Modo you can transform uvs numerically in UV space with the same tools that you would use to transform in 3d. Make sure to click tear off so the UV's don't stick to the other islands and the center seam.
Unwrap the mesh, select the polys want mirrored using the tag, copy/paste/mirror then offset them. I generally give them a different tag at this point so I can select them easier.
Nowadays, I'll just pack all of the skin to the same UV set and use tiling detail normals with masks though... depending on the amount of exposed anatomy. (;
For example, if my character has a pullover covering all the way to the neck, I'd most likely give head its own UV set to have the "maximum" texel density.
...and if he, or she is wearing just pants or a swimsuit, I'd probably go with the "skin into one" style with tiling detail normals if needed.
Not sure was this off topic or not, haha.