Select your objects and in the Lighting window select the Object tab. Then in the Advanced Parameters dropdown, choose Create New... You should then have a whole bunch of new options to choose from including baked tag and system tag.
I have an old script that works well for this. With an object selected it will refresh all materials assigned to that object. With nothing selected it'll refresh all materials. I have it assigned to a hotkey. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1889770/alexxUpdateFileTextures.mel
Typically you can work that way (g to extrude again without making a new selection.) Technically the face isn't selected; the polyExtrude node is. Try clicking the circle icon on the outer are of the manipulator. (toggles local/world location)
Ribbon > Object Paint > Paint Objects Add whatever mesh you want to place on something else to the "Edit Object List". Set the "Paint On" to "Selected Objects", then select the object you want to paint on to and click the Paint button.
I would advise against any "Delete All by Type" as that clears the selected attributes on everything in the scene. It may or may not be what you want. To be safe, select the objects you want and do Delete by Type without the All.
Add and Edit Normals modifier> select all normals> Unify(this will bake the normals) If you haven't already got baked normals then you can select all faces> polygon:smoothing group rollout> clear all and set a number
I'd been exporting using the Maya 2013.3 FBX, Export All ... Just tried optimizing the scene, Selecting only my mesh and bones and exporting selection, also tried FBX exporter 2009. Still the same results :/
Seems I understand a solving. I selected need areas and scaled it out with soft selection and then just used relax - polygons have become bigger. I will try to make more accurate UV and then I will share results.
Use the selection tool next to the normal selection tool on the new material editor, allows you to pick an object in the scene and 'suck' the material from it into the editor. Don't know what to call it off hand, the paint picker? pipette?
if you stick with the paint weights method you can do it too. Select your verts, enter paint weights, select the bone. Then flood with 1.0 on the little slider. It seemed faster to me than using the component editor.