Sorry your browser is not supported!

I was wondering why a UV Map template is not included with models? A simple 1024x1024 .jpg or .tiff could be provided and it would be great for folks who want to paint new textures. The template could be resized for high quality textures and there is no fear of giving up mesh data since it is an image projection.

Or you could make a map yourself...

because unless your model is of a piece of paper you'd need to see the model in 3D as you paint it, plus if you had access to the model you can always bake your own UV map.

Well, most folks protect there .x file, so you can't extract the mesh, and rightly so. What I am talking about is saving a jpeg image of the UVs so folks can paint their own textures without having to modify or paint on top of existing ones.

Dark Coder, Folks have to paint in 2d over existing textures if they want to mod FPSC characters...

well, if the model is protected then obviously the person that made it doesn't want you to mess with it, now does he?

I am not sure folks understand what I am suggesting. Having an image of the UV map allows folks to mod existing models without the risk of the models security. Folks are already painting over existing textures, but many do not change the texture enough before trying to sell it. It's quite simple...If you provide a UV map template, you can protect your rights to your textures and mesh and still allow folks to make additional textures. Win-win.

I guess it is no big deal, I was just curious as to why it was not being done. In my line of work it is the industry standard.

Ideally people would provide the PSD file (or whatever) which might include the UV map as a hidden layer, even if there are only 2 layers it's very handy. The other factor is for people learning, I mean just looking at other people UV mapping can really help when learning, see how the pro's layout their UV's and make use of the space available.

How do people do their texturing anyhoo? - like what is your workflow? - might be interesting to see how other people do this.

I use Lithunwrap to UV the model, then save it as a .3DS and save the UV map, usually as a 2048x2048 coloured bitmap. Lith can load most model formats, so people should consider it as it's free and can quickly provide a UV map image, even from a .X file. I load this UV map into PSP or Photoshop (I find PSP better for roughing out the texture), copy the image onto a new layer, get rid of the black background and make it a lighten layer. Then I can draw on the backdrop and create layers before the UV map, keeping the UV layer on top of everything. To preview the model I use Deep Exploration, which is damn useful, even the demo version because you can simply apply your PSD file to the model and see live updates - everytime you save the PSD file it updates in Deep Exp. You can also preview the model in different renderer's, like DX, OpenGL, and the jaggy software mode. I always keep the high res PSD file, usually just save as a .PNG then load it and rescale.

I never got on with 3D paint packages, I miss the traditional 2D art package layout too much.

Van B, UVMapper Pro allows you to see your progress with photoshop actions. It is not quite realtime but it can be setup to auto update after saving the PSD. You can keep UVMapper open, in a corner and set it to remain in front of all apps. (Btw, 2d painting is all we had when I started in this business too.)