Page 2 - mapping/skinning an object

I started to write up a step by step for the method but thought you may as well look at this as it pretty useful:

http://www.oman3d.com/tutorials/3ds/texture_stealth/


The only difference I could see after a quick scan of the tut is that your faces might not be separated into different smoothing groups for easy selection, therefore you would need to select them individually by clicking on the cross next to unwrap uvw in the modify panel, clicking on 'select faces' then choosing the faces you want.

when you get to the point when it says..."If you are making your own model and texture from scratch you would have to copy this image and paste it in your image editing software dont do that, this is when texporter comes into play (you could copy and paste it but texporter gives a much more accurate result), its found in the utilities tab on the command panel and the setting allow you to render the laid out faces into various file formats and sizes so you cant paint over it with the texture you desire.


Any problems, post back and Ill try to help in more depth.

Hope this helps, Im not at my 'Max' PC at the mo so couldnt really be any more detailed,

Michael

thanks for the tutorial, it's cleared a lot of confusion up, but it doesn't explain how to use the tesporter feature.

I followed it down to where you pointed out, but once I got there, I didn't know what to do with texporter.

No probs, Ill do you a little more detailed one on texporter tonight (my time, i.e. in about 6hrs or so)

just so I dont send you down the wrong path completely (as Ive got max 7 with a plug in and I know you have 8 where it is bundled with max), is the texporter function in the utilities tab on the command panel?

Michael

yeah, it's v.8

Hi Again you need to use unwrap UVW on the model first.

Add Unwrap UVW to the modifier list

click the '+' sign next to 'Unwrap UVW in the modifier stack and choose 'Selcet Face'

select all the 5 inner faces of the box and the top face

make sure you use the correct axis in the Sub Object Params roll out (probably Z in this case) Using averaged normals wont be very good in this situation. You will see the yellow plane move about whilst selecting the faces

click on 'Planar Map', this takes a snapshot of the faces whilst looking from above.

This is where it can become a bi tricky, click 'Edit'

A new window opens (the Edit UVWs window), the faces you selected are shown here as red lines (im presuming you can see a red square within a red square, these represent the edges of the faces you have selected. (ignore the green lines for now)

make sure 'select element' at the bottom of the Edit window is checked (if you maximise this window these tools at the bottom are lost until you restore the window again so try to work with it in restored mode)

with 'select element' checked and using the move tool at the top of the Edit window (not the usual move tool on the main toolbar) hover over one of the vertices on one of the red lines and drag the square completely out of the way.

uncheck 'select element' now and click in an empty area to clear the selection.

try dragging one of the vertices on the inner square now and you will notice that it appears to be cloning itself, but in reality there are two vertices on top of each other (these relate to the upright faces selected earlier). Move all four vertices on the inner square in or out so you hopefully end up with three square within one another. try to keep the faces in proportion with themselves so as to reduce the risk of distortion/stretching when a texture is applied.

once done, close the edit window, there is no need to save this as it is automatically saved with the file.

next select the bottom face (underneath) and the 4 outside faces

make sure the z axis is still selected in the Sub Object Params roll out, then click Planr map.

Click on Edit again and you will see that the other set of line are now red.

use the same method as before to drag out the vertices into a well proportioned shape the same relative size to the previous one.

check select element at the bottom and drag the two squares next to eachother then scale them (using the scale button within the edit window) so that they fit inside the thick blue square that they were originally based. you must not go outside of this square or you will end up losing some of the texture.

you should now have two squares side by side within the thick blue square border. if so close the edit window

you can either collapse the stack to preserve the mapping or leave iot as it is, it doesnt really matter.

Go to utilities and choose texporter then click on pick object and select the box you have modelled. this will automatically render the unwrapped faces. then you can save them to whatever format you like and open it in photoshop or whatever, paint over the top and use it as a diffuse map.

Hope this helps once again

any problems let me know

Michael

Im exhausted after that!

Ive been playing a bit more after watching another tutorial and found that when you are selecting the faces for unwrap UVW you can (instead of clicking 'planar map' just go into the edit window, click the mapping menu at the top, choose normal mapping, then choose box mapping from the drop down list, you might want to select the inside and top of the box in one go, then on the second go select the bottom and sides of the box, other wise the normal mapping might get confused and overlay the faces. This method keeps the proportions exaclty so distortion of the textures is minimal.

Michael

Sorry about the late reply, but I've been busy lately.

I've had several attempts at it, and I seem to keep getting lost along the way.

Having said that, I had another attempt at it today, and I think I managed to pull it off.

I'm not that happy with the outcome though, it's all distorted, it's probably something I did, or didn't do.

I'll have another crack at it later, I haven't fully got the hang of it yet, so a few more attempts might clear things up a little.

Thanks for the help so far.

After doing some more experimenting, I think I've finally got it.

The first try I did didn't work out that well because I didn't fo it totally correctly, I just tried it again and it turned out pretty much how I wanted it.

Thanks again for the help.

like wat was told before tho, since you are using 3d max 8, you technically have no use for textporter, cuz the stuff it does is basically already integrated into the 3d max 8 interface, you just need to know how to use it

very nice pictures