Topic: Texture Maps

[markyd]

Ok..... I have a question for anyone with enough time to answer it!

Texture maps... I normally use 1  1024 x 1024 jpeg... I have seen most models use 3 or 4 320 x 320 jpegs.... my question is how do you use more than one... In max I use the UVW Unwrap method to texture...

Any help would be greatly appreciated.. thanks guys! 

[Starforce2]

you don't want 320x320. odd dimentions like that wont work, gotta be like 256x256 or 128x128 or 64x64 ect. or larger  512x512 ect. Depends on vid cards too I think, so vid cards will run the odd sies and some wont.

[markyd]

Thanks but if you have several maps... how do you assign them to the one model?

At the moment I am placing one texture onto the ship and mapping it.... how does it work with three or 4?

[Starforce2]

I haven't a clue how to texture a ship.

[markyd]

rofl.. thanks NYWAY 

[111wallace111]

break up the model into texturable pieces then apply them in the same way as you did before. Note the real cool ways you can place them....planar, cylindrical,box, face,. ect. you can get some pretty good mapping by paying close attention to these features.

[markyd]

Ahh Ok so Instead of having the one texure on the once sphere thingy you place i.e the saucer on one sphere hull on another, then when you highlight the polys on the surface you apply the sphere for the texture that corisponds... is the filename for the textures important... i.e shiptexture.bmp if their were more would it need to be shiptexture_1.bmp / shiptexture_2.bmp etc..

thanks for your help

[111wallace111]

Ahh Ok so Instead of having the one texure on the once sphere thingy you place i.e the saucer on one sphere hull on another, then when you highlight the polys on the surface you apply the sphere for the texture that corisponds... is the filename for the textures important... i.e shiptexture.bmp if their were more would it need to be shiptexture_1.bmp / shiptexture_2.bmp etc..

thanks for your help

Yeah thats the idea. I tend to name my textures based on what they texture so i can have a better feel for the prosess. That way i know what goes where and when i need to modify it it's easier to find.

There are also several texturing plug-ins that help make it quicker...
The other thing to remember is to keep as organized as you can so you don't get things mixed up. either by making everything with its own texture (which is a lot of textures) or makeing fewer textures (which is more difficult to apply...use the uvw unwrap) I generally select an area and detach it to texture it. depending on the meathod you may need to convert the new mesh to and editable mesh so that the texture is placable. generally i get around 10 or 15 detached meshes per model..... some are alot more some are only two or three. after i'm all done i attach the whole thing back together. be carefull not to accidentally mode the "sub" meshes around.
Really in my meathod of creating ships the texturing takes about four times longer than the actual model creation....although i make the textures from scratch as well.

[markyd]

Normally I use the UVW unwrap but I dont detach the mesh at all.....

But thanks for your help regarding this... its sure to help... I wanted to know because I wanted a more detailed Saucer than i was getting using the single JPEG.. Thanks for your help! 

[Tus-XC]

Hey

I normally select the areas i want to texture (expecially if the file is already in .mod) and then detach it from the main mesh.  once that is done i use uvw map (to select the method in which i want to map) and use uvw unwrap to help position it (like you can flip the saucer in half so that you only need to do oneside of the texture) once i got my uvw unwrap done i use a plugin for max called texporter (do a google search for it) which takes apicture of my uvw map.  that makes it really easy to texture since there is no guess work for one and 2 it makes the texture fit like a glove (no adjusting it)

Robert

[Heavens Eagle]

There is a tutorial I did a long time ago in Acrobat format that shows a lot of things about texturing in Max.  At the time it was Max 3, but 4, 5, and 6 all work the same.  One of the things in the tutorial was how to use multiple textures on one mesh.

The tutorial was specifically done for ship texturing.  I am not sure where you can d/l it from at this time, and it is large enough that I don't have the bandwidth to host it.

[markyd]

Thanks Tus... 

HeavensEagle do you have it??? could you send it via email???

[J-O-K-E-R]

Here the link I have for it   

 http://www.the-tcs.net/_hosted/atheorhaven/html/userfiles/tools/3DSMax_TEXTURING_TUTORIALv10100.zip


I have a video tutorial on this subject @ my site, based on the written tutorial by Heavens Eagle.

[markyd]

Thanks Joker