Converting projection textures to file textures

[leigh]

I'm not entirely sure of what it is that you are asking :surprised

[3danim8d]

Do you mean Baking a series of proceedural textures into a bitmap that is UV mapped to an object?

[mabuffaloe]

well, i was reading through a maya character animation book which said that you need to convert projection textures to file textures--i believe that it has to do with stopping the projected map from sliding along the surface. It was an older book, so maybe that has changed, i don't know. I hope that explains it a little more, Leigh--you'll have to forgive me, i'm kinda new to the texture mapping in maya! :) Anyone heard of this?

[mabuffaloe]

I think that was sort of what they were talking about, 3danim8d.... although i think this method was offered as an alternative to UV mapping. The procedure was to get the projection map where you wanted it and then to select the geometry and its material and bake in the texture using Convert to File Texture. I don't think I entirely understand the process myself! Do you know how this works?

[leigh]

What I don't quite understand is the "projected" texture thing - are you not referring to procedurals then?
What you are describing just doesn't make sense... Because to put an image onto the model in the first place, it has to come from an external file...

[Mickley]

Buy Gnomon: Texturing 2. Explained and shown

[AlexAlvarez]

Leigh... projections are a Maya thing.

You can project textures onto a surface using Planar, Spherical, Camera, Triplaner, etc.... But the textures exist in 3D space... Therefore if the geometry moves, the texture will slide. You therefore have to 'convert' (bake) the texture into a UV map... Select the geo, select the shader, and use the 'convert to file texture' tool...

A.

[Slater]

This also works really well for baking a huge shading network into a few file textures.

[sedric]

1 you will have to map the uvs of the polygons.....look for a tutorial on unwrapping polygons, if you are using nurbs, no problem.

2 when thats done, find the texture that is being projected, and in the hypershade, select its SHADING GROUP NODE, (find the material and choose SHOW UP AND DOWNSTREAM CONNECTIONS)

3 then select the polygonal object its being projected on,

4 then, in the hypershade, go to the EDIT pulldown menu and select CONVERT TO FILE TEXTURE

5 you should get a new material node in the hyperhade, showing your new file texture

you can play with the settings so bake lighting and a bunch of other stuff, but this is the basic method.


hope that helps!

sedric

[mabuffaloe]

thanks for the replies, guys! I think I actually understand the process a little better.... Now i must go try it out!

[Astro_13oy]

I'm having the exact same problem...

I have laid out the uv's in the UV Texture Editor and painted my texture map.

I then assigned my painted texture map onto a new material and applied this new material onto my polygon. Looks nice and very thing is in place, until I try moving it around. The textures start sliding all over the place.

I followed the above steps as Sedric described and I do get a new material in the hypershade. But it still slides around :( anyone have any idea's of what I might be doing wrong?

-any help VERY appreciated.

[sedric]

astro, did you apply the new material to the object after it is created?


sedric

[Astro_13oy]

Sedric - yup I did assign the new material to my poly. However it is still sliding around... it sounds so simple, but I must be missing a small step.

I'll try to explain what I did better. Here's some picks of what I've got, it's probably easier this way.

http://home.attbi.com/~anim2/hypershade.jpg

The first thing I tried was to select what I have labelled as #1 on the Hypershade pic and then my poly. Then Convert to File Texture. New material popped up, assigned that to my poly and I got the pic below. (texture that doesn't stick) Then from scratch I also tried it with selection #2, #3 and #4. Maybe I'm not understanding what the Shading Group Node is? Am I way off track, or missing a step?

http://home.attbi.com/~anim2/slidingTexture.jpg

Oh... I forgot to mention that the poly is already skinned if that makes any difference.
I hope I made some sense.
-Astro13oy

[mabuffaloe]

so how do you choose different parts of a poly object to texture separately? do you have to split them apart or can you just choose faces?

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