Because Maya UV editor only shows your selected objects UVs. If it didn't every object in your scene would always show in the UV editor. It's not like Max where its a modifier on certain objects and only then can you open and see the UVs in the editor. You can have the UV editor in Maya opened at all times and just select…
Coming from max to maya I find the mechanics of the UV editor to be a little confusing, when I have a multi-object model why do my unselected clusters hide in the layout box? If I want to manually re-arrange the clusters so all the islands of a certain object are kept together it becomes difficult because everything…
Ah I see. Ya that's interesting, the way I've worked in Maya selecting UVs has mainly been in the UVeditor and not selecting shells via the 3d viewport. The 2nd link GlowingPotato linked looks like what you're after, although a faster way would be: Select all objects - F12 (rather than suggested method in link of object by…
You should be able to just select all your mesh objects and enter UV mode for all of them (F12 shortcut). They should all stay "on" in the UV editor this way.
I guess I meant something a little more like this: http://imgur.com/rwoif48 Rather than this: http://imgur.com/R69mfky Its true I can have all islands viewable in UV mode but then I lose the ability to manipulate or transform by object select without making everything else disappear.
Not sure I understand your question. Do you want them all to be in 0-1 UV space? Select all objects and you can use the Layout function to get you part of the way there, or manually pack them yourself. If you want say the Sword and Shield to be on one texture, select those, lay them out in 0-1. Then the rest of the…