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View Full Version : Unwrapping Duplicate Elements -How?

saturnfive
05-06-2003, 11:53 AM
Hi, I'd like to know if there's a better way of doing this, and if there's an easy way to do it in Max 5.

I'm unwrapping a 500 poly plane, which naturally has a lot of duplicate elements.

Using Max 4, I currently do it this way:

1) apply a Unwrap UVW modifier to the plane.
2) select all the faces on the top half of the right wing.
3) apply a planar map and edit the verts in the Unwrap window using a checker map.
4) move the wing verts to one side and collapse the plane / mesh.
5) apply another Unwrap UVW modifier,
6) select all the faces on the top of the left wing.
7) planar map these, then open the edit window and move them to one side.
8) in the edit window, select the already unwrapped verts of the right wing and freeze them.
9) mirror the left wing and drag it's verts over the frozen right wing's verts.
10) thaw the right wing (now exactly under the left) and drag the two into place on the final map.

This process means I only have to spend time ironing out distortions once and i can use the same peice of texture for the two wings (albeit a mirror image). This effectively doubles the resolution of the texture.

I've only just started using Max 5 to unwrap, and that handy freeze / thaw button seems to have been dropped, making my previous method pretty tricky.

Many thanks for any help on this.
mrapelje
05-06-2003, 05:20 PM
If its a plane and symetrical cut it in half unwrap it and then mirror it and whamo you have done half the unwraping and applied it to both sides, all you have left is to tweek. Does that answer you question?

If not go through the tutorials/manuals and learn the features Max 5 unwraping has they make it a a breeze, I stopped using DeepUV when 3ds Max 5 came out.
EricChadwick
05-06-2003, 10:22 PM
Chuggnut's unhidden the freeze/thaw buttons, along with a bunch of other handy tools. Well worth the d/l.

http://www.chuggnut.com/scripts/unwraptools/unwraptools.htm
Rivendale
05-06-2003, 11:55 PM
There is a script at www.scriptspot.com (http://www.scriptspot.com) called UVtools that let's you copy and paste UV coordinates. It's very handy, I use it all the time. Just perform a serch for "Game tools". It says MAX4, but it works for MAX5 as well.

But like mrapelje said, it's best to do mapping for half the mesh and then mirror the geometry.

The freeze option will come up on the quad menu if you right-click.

Cheers!
saturnfive
05-07-2003, 02:35 PM
Mrapelje: Mapping half the mesh and then mirroring the geometry sounds like the most economical way to do it. In this case after I welded the halves I slimmed the polycount a little along the centreline, so I'd have to add back a few polys, but I'll bear it in mind for the next model, though.

Yes, some of the new unwrapping features are great, and save a lot of time :)

Rivendale: right click eh? d'oh! never thought of that. That script sounds really usefull if you are duplicating certain parts of a model.

Posm: I'll check that out, thanks :)

Thanks a lot guys, that gives me a lot of options :)
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