Display UV Map While Editing?
Hi, it has been a good minute since I've been here, just noticed ShaderMap 3 was released - congrats on what looks like a really great update - upgrading from v2 is definitely a no-brainer!
I'm here now because I was looking for something to let me draw on my normal maps using alphas and shapes and look-a-here - my ShaderMap has been nicely upgraded.
The one question I have as I'm playing with the demo, is when my model is loaded, for placing my shapes and drawing, HOW can I see the UVs so I can tell where to place the artwork overlays??
I'm guessing I can perhaps load a UV map image and place it as a layer, but unless I'm missing something on the usage of SM3, how can you tell where to place stuff / draw around your model?
Any tips appreciated!
-Will
I'm here now because I was looking for something to let me draw on my normal maps using alphas and shapes and look-a-here - my ShaderMap has been nicely upgraded.
The one question I have as I'm playing with the demo, is when my model is loaded, for placing my shapes and drawing, HOW can I see the UVs so I can tell where to place the artwork overlays??
I'm guessing I can perhaps load a UV map image and place it as a layer, but unless I'm missing something on the usage of SM3, how can you tell where to place stuff / draw around your model?
Any tips appreciated!
-Will
Comments
First off, I'm loving it. I noticed during rendering, I could see my UV shells for example when the AO map was baking, but after it was done, the whole window goes white, making the individual shells invisible again. This is why I was wondering if there was a way to keep the UV shell outlines visible.
I noticed if I enabled Alpha during the render, the empty areas remained "dark" so I could easily see the various areas the UV shells occupied.
IMO, it would be more helpful to have a UV overlay similar to the mesh wireframe, so you can see your UV shell wires to help during texturing.
The one problem I did run across was I had a small model I had created in Maya LT that had two UV sets, (targeted for Unreal Engine 4).
I didn't see an option in SM3 to allow me to select which UV set I wanted to work with, unfortunately SM3 chose the lightmap set, not the set laid out for texturing? I don't believe UDIM applies in this case so I didn't try enabling it?
I'm loving how you can load an alpha image into the displacement map and "slide it around" placing it where you want!
I really enjoy texturing this way compared to say working in photoshop, with a UV layout image background and going back and forth saving each update to then see how it looks on the model when you go back your the 3D app.
The Surface / Pattern editor is a godsend for creating paneling and nurnies on your models - BRAVO!
After coming to grips with, and loving the Normal map editing, for some strange reason, for color texture maps, SM3 still forces you to edit those images externally??
Why can't you load a color texture and drag it around your model for placement similar to the normal map??
PLEASE add this feature for color texture editing as well!
Being able to scale/rotate and place my color texture images as well as the normals would make SM3 perfect for how I like to texture - directly on the model, moving and placing the images around with real time visual feedback. (I think it would also be hella cool for each layer to have a chooser that lets you select a b/w mask image, (or perhaps even allow drawing the mask shape), to further refine exactly what parts of the texture you want to be visible! I have to review your masking video again, maybe this is already possible?)
The only other feature I'd ask for at that point is adding skew and perhaps perspective warp to the transform widget; sometimes I need to skew or warp an image to get it to fit properly in a triangular corner or a rectangular area that has one end a bit smaller than the other.
That's it! SM3 would be PERFECT for me at that point.
Thanks for your consideration, and again, congrats on a wonderful update to this program.
-Will
Thanks for the suggestion. To be clear, you are asking for a wireframe rendering of the UV (from a model loaded into the Material Visualizer) over a selected map? In the Normal Editor?
I will add this to the list. Because of the way data is stored in ShaderMap this will need to be done on import of a 3d model. Expect a dialog box with options for import in a future release.
We have considered adding additional editors (color texture, displacement) to ShaderMap. Thanks for your request, we will continue to give it consideration.
That's a great idea for the transform tool. Thanks.
Thanks Will. Great feedback.
For the UV overlay, just a wireframe of the UVs for reference only, drawn in the views so I can see the various UV islands. (Similar to how you export a UV image to paint over in Photoshop, I found it strange not being able to see the UV wires in SM3 to use for reference.)
With the UV sets, what I ended up doing was deleting the 2nd UV set, since the lightmap set was auto created in Maya LT - I can easily recreate it after my work in SM3. Glad to hear you have a solution for working with multiple UV sets!
Yes, please consider adding similar editing capabilities for the Color map aspect of SM - after using all of those great tools sliding around things for the normal mapping, it was sort of a system shock when I was ready to do my color texturing! I was looking around for a good minute wondering why I couldn't find the same tools for the color maps LOL!
Being able to slide around images, placing them where desired in a similar fashion would be amazing!
Thanks for your consideration with this, hopefully you can see the benefit of being able to use the same editing tools across the normal and color maps (you also mentioned displacement as well) - I course I don't know the behind the scenes coding, but to me if feels like the existing editing tools are great, you just need to create a set for the color texturing (I'm guessing you need to create a new Editing Room(s)).
I can see myself going crazy creating my paneling in SM3 - being able to scale, transform into position and additionally being able to warp transform my panel shapes (and color textures) to fit into various corners, and diagonal shapes would be icing on the cake!
I used to use (Genetica's Canvas Node) to do my paneling work, but there's nothing like having real time feedback when placing your texture and normal elements around your models!
Thanks so much for a great utility!
-Will
Just thought I'd let you know 3.0.6 has been released and it includes the ability to select the model UV channel in both the 3d node properties as well as in the Material Visualizer.
Viewing a wire-frame of the UVs as an overlay will be available in a future release. We will continue to consider adding an additional editor "room" for color / grayscale map setup.
Thanks again for your feedback.
-Will