CGTalk - How would you texture a horse?

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Animator395

06-23-2003, 05:09 AM

Okay here's the deal. I need to texture a horse using nothing but a single image map. I assumed UV maps (map in this case) were the way to go, so I have spent about a week now trying to figure them out. I am confident that if you gave me a test on what they were and asked how they worked that I would pass with flying colors, however if you told me to go ahead an make a template for painting in photoshop I would fail miserably. I have been through tons of links. All that I could find here and more and every effort leaves me with a jumbled mess of wires for me to try and differentiate. Along with me feeling like this guy :banghead:

Perhaps this is right , perhaps I just need to spend hours pulling these jumbles of wires apart until something recognizable appears, but I just think there might be a simpler way. Any helpful hints on creating a workable template? Im guessing most people have been in this situation at least once. What did you do?

I didn't put forth the time to add an image of my model here because, well... its a horse (sub-divided). I am using Lightwave 7.5c for this if that helps.

Thanks in advance
:beer:

EricChadwick

06-23-2003, 02:42 PM

It sounds like this is an employment test. I wish you the best of luck.

http://www.realtimecg.com/template.php?n=list&id=8

http://www.realtimecg.com/gameart/5/images/baalrogkgirl_ortho.jpg

Here is a link to a competition for real-time 3d artists, where you can see quadruped models and their texture sheets. They were limited to two textures, but you could easily take a 2-bitmap uv layout and rearrange it into one.

http://www.realtimecg.com/gameart/5/images/baalrogfinaltexture1.jpg

Make note of the use of mirroring. Left and right legs use the same part of the texture, etc. This saves a lot of room in a limited bitmap layout, allowing the texture resolution to be quite a bit more detailed on the model.

http://www.realtimecg.com/gameart/5/images/baalrogfinaltexture2.jpg

Mirroring needs top be done carefully though, it is an art form. Seams need to be painted out. Try to avoid obvious mirroring. A 3d painting program goes a long way towards fixing seams, especially when you have to deal with a pattern like fur.

Basically to get a good UV layout, start with a checkerboard texture on your model, then create UVs for every part so the checkers are undistorted, then arrange all the UV parts into a sheet.

Hope this helps. I know it can be confusing at the start.

Animator395

06-23-2003, 04:22 PM

Thanks for the reply. Today I will accomplish this one way or another. Your reply has started turning some long forgotten gears in my head. Thanks

Stroker

06-23-2003, 04:51 PM

Posm, loooks like your seams aren't down the middle. You know, "symmetry one row over".

In the second texture, in the upper-left, it looks like that is the back of your creature. However, the line down the back of the creature isn't the seam in uvw. Same thing with the front of the creature. You can clearly see one whole hooter on one side of the texture, but only half of the other.

Know what I mean? Is that the case?
Is there a name for this technique?

EricChadwick

06-23-2003, 06:07 PM

Sorry, should have made that clearer, this is not my artwork.

Most artists mirror right down the middle. This artist chose to hide the obviousness of that approach by not going down the middle. The mirroring start at the shoulder. I think it works pretty well. Doesn't save quite as much texture space, but still saves a lot instead of having both legs use their own whole texture space.

No term for this I can think of, other than smarts. :)

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