UV Texturing

[thrasherstudios77]

Hi

I am trying to learn how do UV texturing in Houdini. I thought I would start out easy and try and unwrap a box. what i eventually want to do is paint bump, specular, diffuse ect maps in photoshop on a face.

One technique i saw on a training video for unwrapping a face was to select a group of polygon faces that are pretty close to planar and apply a planar map to the group. You continue applying planar maps to groups of faces that are close to planar untill the entire face is mapped. Then in the UV texture editor you reassemble all of the different groups of planar polygon faces, by merging uv's, moving and resizing until you have a uv mapped flattened face.

I have had a hard time creating this technique in Houdini. Should I first use Group Sops for all my faces and then apply a UV project or texture. And using a visibility SOP select between the different groups of uv's. Or should I start with a UV unwrap SOP and then use UV edit and fuse SOPs to get my map. Just wondering which techniques you people use when unwrapping a human face or any organic shape.

If someone could maybe get a box unwrapped and ready for photoshop and supply a hip file that would be very helpful so i could see the procedure you used to unwrap your uv's.

Thanks to everyone in advance

Benjamin

[anakin78z]

I don't have much experience with it myself, but talking to a friend not to long ago, it seems the way to do it is to apply a cylindrical map to the head, then go into the texture viewport and fix any overlapping areas using uvedit (can't remember if that's what the sop is actually called).

Give it a go. Sounds easier than your technique

Cheers,

Jens

[Marc]

The easiest and most non controllable way of getting uv's out is to use the UVUnwrap SOP. Apply it to your geometry and change your viewport to a uv viewport (space-5). You can play around with the settings to see what it does.

Of course the other way is to use the UVProject SOP to apply your uv's (cylindrical, polar etc.) and then use the uvedit SOP to move em about.

In order to use the uvedit SOP you need to be viewing the uv viewport.

Cheers

Marc

[Jason]

It really depends heavily on what you're attempting to texture.

For a head, an edited cylindrical projection is a better way to go than using UVUnwrap, and thats mainly because:

a ) Your UV space is not fragmented up - making it far easier and more intuitive to paint on in 2D... no worrying about seams and trying to remember where chunks of UV's map to. Even with a 3D paint package like Deep Paint, it can be pretty awkward. Of course the benefit is that it's really easy to do and there is less texture stretch right off the bat, but don't be tempted to take the easy way out. UV Unwrap is excellent for buildings and so on, but not heads.

b ) Cyberscans scan cylindrically so it makes it easier to find maps out there to play with.

Hope this helps a bit

Jason