The Game Artist's Guide to Maya, Pt. 2
UV Mapping the Leg
Next, we will focus on the leg. This is probably the hardest part of UV Mapping the
body because of Silenus’s rather unconventional leg form. The easiest way to go about
this part is to select the major parts of the leg.
1. Cylindrical map each of the three major sections of the leg. Use the Move and
Sew command, and manually tweak the UV positions to get the grid as straight
as possible for each section (Figure 3.18).
2. Use the Move and Sew command, and manually tweak the UVs’ positions to
attach the different parts together. The trickiest parts are the joints because of
the V-joint modeling techniques used (Figure 3.19).
Figure 3.18 Layout of the main sections of the leg in the UV Editor
Figure 3.19 Layout of the leg’s UVs
Keep in mind where your seam is. The seam of the UV shell is where there is a
break in the texture flow on the geometry. You will always want to try to place this
seam in as unobtrusive an area as possible. For the leg, you will usually put it along the
inner thigh or down the back. For the arms, put it along the underarm, anywhere that
would be the least visible during gameplay. The major exception to this is when mirroring
UVs across major areas like the chest and head. You will have to rely on your texture
painting skills to hide these seams.
3. UV map the hoof separately, as if it were a shoe. To save space, mirror the UVs
across the hoof. Select the faces of the hoof, and use an Automatic Mapping
projection and manual UV tweaking to straighten out the UVs (Figure 3.20).
Figure 3.20 Beginning the UV layout of the hoof
4. Move the UVs to mirror the UVs across the hoof.
You can mirror the UVs by either of two methods. You can manually move the
UVs out from one side of the foot to the other (using Snap to Point to match the
UV positions). You can also delete half of the foot, UV map the remaining half,
duplicate the remaining half’s faces, and mirror the geometry for the other side
(Figure 3.21).
5. Planar map (in the Y direction) the bottom of the hoof.
This area of the model will probably not be seen very often, so we can give it a
small amount of texture space. Beginning the UV layout of the hoof
4. Move the UVs to mirror the UVs across the hoof.
You can mirror the UVs by either of two methods. You can manually move the
UVs out from one side of the foot to the other (using Snap to Point to match the
UV positions). You can also delete half of the foot, UV map the remaining half,
duplicate the remaining half’s faces, and mirror the geometry for the other side
(Figure 3.21).
5. Planar map (in the Y direction) the bottom of the hoof.
This area of the model will probably not be seen very often, so we can give it a
small amount of texture space.
Figure 3.21 The hoof’s UVs mirrored
UV Mapping the Arm
The arm is pretty straightforward, as it is primarily cylindrical in shape. However,
because of the large muscle formations Silenus has, it is important for the UV layout to
be readable for accurate texturing.
1. Select the faces of the arm, excluding the hand, and apply an Automatic Mapping
projection (Figure 3.22).
Figure 3.22 The arm after Auto Mapping
2. Move these UVs to the side and use the Move and Sew command, as well as
manual tweaking, to straighten out the UVs of the arm. Use the grid texture to
help you (Figure 3.23).
Figure 3.23 Layout of the arm’s UVs Layout of the arm’s UVs
Created: March 27, 2003
Revised: January 10, 2005
URL: http://webreference.com/graphics/game2/1
