Creating new UV maps for existing products?

murgatroyd314

Over the years, I've picked up a few items which I really like, but which belong in the UV Map Hall Of Shame. (One example: a pair of shorts where one leg is vertical on the UV map, and the other is sideways. Just try applying a striped texture to that...) They'd be so much more versatile if I could remap them to work better with my shader collection.

Is this something that can be reasonably done in Hexagon? If so, is there a decent tutorial/guide somewhere? I prefer non-video tutorials.

barbult

I've often wondered the same thing. I'll be watching to see what responses you get.

Wee Dangerous John

Please bear in mind you may not be allowed to sell anything you make with altered uvs, just wanted to say that to be on the safe side.

On ordinary props it is very easy to change the uv maps, for clothes or things which have been rigged it will probably be a bit harder.

In Daz Studio you export the prop as an obj with the setting shown in Pic1 and import it into Hexagon with these (basic) settings.

In Hexagon you'll find a split screen option at the bottom of the screen - first panel on the left, last icon. If you click on this you should open up the UV window, if it loads up a different view click on the View Name (Perspective etc) and select on the UV option.

In the UV window, select an outer edge and press L (loops the selection), then choose anothe outer edge and repeat till you have got all the outer edges - Pic 2.

To pin the prop a good starting point is to use 2 pins, find the center line then place a pin one in from the outer edge - Pic 3. (go through the Pinning and Proj axis options and choose the best one). 

Hint, sometimes you will find it iffy to know where to place the second pin, when (not if  ) you come across this problem change from pins to edges, choose a line near the pin and press L to loop, zoom into the other side and choose the mirror point.

Move things around and get the islands the way you want them, scale wise here's my UV template (nothing special but it works). Remember, you want to use the test grid to help reduce stretching, all the square should be roughly the same size, the numbers will tell you which way things will be facing. When you are happy press Validate.

One final thing, DAZ products all come with a UV map, you'll find them in your product library.

Hope that helps - John

Edit - I use UV Viewer to make the map, another good one (free) is UVmapper Basic.

patience55

IF one totally remakes the UVmap [from scratch], the UVmap [NOT the .obj data] can be shared [as a D/S file option on the Surfaces Tab]. Then new textures for that UVmap can be redistributed too.

Possibly a more convenient notion would be to make the desired texture with the shaders to a flat plane*, then in an image editor apply the texture to the official template(s).

* Flat plane that is made in Hexagon - LOTS of squares in it and as large a uv template as possible ;-) To get a good template to work with, definiately find another utility for one such as D3D UViewer. Just save out the .png files in squares, i.e. 4096x

 

edited to add a clarification

Wee Dangerous John

Hi Patience, long time no see - How have you been ?

Not sure about the copyright issue, I do not think you are allowed to modify and pass the modified content on.

As you said it would be easier to use the supplied maps.

Morkonan

I recreate UV maps pretty frequently, either my own or those for objects I've downloaded or purchased.

In short - Remapping an object is just like mapping it from scratch. Any UV tutorial for Hexagon will show you the basics. It's a good idea to make a copy of the object, though, so you can always revert. My typical reason is that the curren object doesn't have enough material zones for my liking. The next most likely reason is because it's poorly mapped to begin with.

On using Hex when remapping, be advised that Hex does not like non-symmetrical geometry when it's generating an initial map. For ease-of-use, try to arrage groups so that they're sharing symmetrical geometry. Isolate non-symmetrical groups and map them separately. It is possible to map a multi-grouped object in one go, hiding the groups and only unhiding the one being worked on as one applies the initial unwrap, then hiding that before unhiding the next group. This can be problmatic, though, but if it works, it can be a great help, so it's worth using if needed.

For complex tasks involving manipulating groups, materials, UVmaps and generating .uvs files, which one can then apply to objects sharing the same geometry, I recommend the free version of UVMapper. Hexagon also has a bad habit of generating spurious material groups, so I use this frequently to merge or delete them. https://www.uvmapper.com/downloads.html (UVmapper Classic is free and a must-have, IMO, or something like it.)

I also use UVMapper to generate a new template for new objects because Hexagon will not generate a UV template that is larger than the current screen display size. And, that's highly annoying. :)

PS - Hex will generate an .mtl file by default when exporting objects. Never use .mtl files with Poser or, I assume, DS, since that will confuse most programs that load wavefront object formats, as they'll often try to load those settings everytime you load the object, which can cause issues with the custom materials you've chosen. (ie: Don't move them into the object directory with the .obj file, just delete them since they're meaningless with programs with custom material rooms.)

patience55

Wee Dangerous John said:

Hi Patience, long time no see - How have you been ?

Not sure about the copyright issue, I do not think you are allowed to modify and pass the modified content on.

As you said it would be easier to use the supplied maps.

Hi,

Have been busy! Wrote a book :-) [not a very conventional one]

No, like any other content, one cannot redistribute modified content without written permissions, etc. of the copyright holder.

Maybe a little clarification is necessary here. One can remake a uvmap from scratch and redistribute the UV map as an option in Daz Studio. One canNOT redistribute the .obj file [or .duf or whatever data file for the actual figure].

In D/S there is a way to load multiple UV maps to figures. THAT D/S file can be redistributed [if one made it from scratch]. I have no idea if such would work in other programs such as Poser. In D/S on the Surfaces Tab there is a place for the UV map settings.