topic Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material in Maya Forum

Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

Anonymous — Wed, 15 May 2019 15:04:26 GMT

Hi there,

(Note: I'm brand new to 3d texturing so please forgive silly questions)

My Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on the material and is also using parts of the texture not within the UV shell.

I have been making a Slurm can (like coke can 330ml :D) The main texture for the cylinder is perfect and looks great in Arnold render. I made seperate metal material for the bottom and rim of can, it looks good for me.

Then i decided to attempt to make the ring-pull area by using a texture and eventually making normal map etc for it.

I gave the area its own UvSet (i hope that was right because when I tried using the same one it affected the main Slurm graphic, which I want it to use the entire available space of texture for.) So i made UvSet2 and done planar projection of the UV on Y Axis and it worked great, the checkerboard looked perfect on the can.

But now (as per screenshots below) My shell looks great and I have a 'can top' texture as you see the source image has some blue background in corners, I wish that to be ignored. The UV isn't intersecting any of that background. But the resulting material is a stretched messy blob of metallic colours and I also see the blue background squelched into the mix too.

What can I be doing wrong? As far as I can tell the setup for this UV is the exact same thing I did with the cylindrical part which works perfectly.

Any help massively appreciated. Thanks

Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

sean.heasley — Wed, 15 May 2019 18:50:46 GMT

Hi @Anonymous and welcome to the community!

Are you talking about how the texture looks on the preview ball? That looking stretched is fine what matters is how it looks on the model itself which I can't see from any of your screenshots.

Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

Anonymous — Wed, 15 May 2019 23:02:08 GMT

Hi friend and thanks for the quick response. I had to go to my job so only just got back to reading this. Basically the problem is that it was all squashed and looked like the preview-ball even on the top of the can model (the blue corners were also visible on the model).

Before getting a reply, I figured my own workaround for it, by making assigning the texture file 'as Projection' and adjusting the 3dProjection transform to suit the sizing, rotation etc. It looks pretty goddam good now, however it made me think... Surely when the checker-board texture all looks good as per images above, the actual texture (ie. the top of the can picture) should also look straight and undistorted (surely??). But it isn't.

I am hoping it isn't essential to use the projection technique, as I just wanted the texture applied to the surface where i made the UV (hope that makes sense).

I attach the scene file in case you wish to take a look to see for yourself. The can will look OK because of how i did the projection thing. But try applying the 'top_textured' material to the surface and it will look all stretchy and nasty again :S (also attached is the jpg i used as I don't know if that gets included in the .mb scene files). THANKS!

Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

Anonymous — Thu, 16 May 2019 00:44:34 GMT

A further discovery I have, when I export this object as FBX with embed media enabled. Then I try import it in Unity. I have to click 'Export Textures' and 'Export Materials', then I have to manually assign the textures to the correct materials again. And importantly, the projection texture part (ie. The top of the can) was not included in the FBX (or wasn't found by Unity extracting). Furthermore, if I then manually add the 'top of can.jpg' to my Unity project and attach that to the color of the correct material in the imported FBX file , it goes all distorted and nothing like the projection (I'm guessing the 3d projection placeTexture thingy has no effect on the output result in Unity and maybe it needs to be just a conventional texture mapping like the main body of the can is (which as mentioned, works fine).

Really hope this is just me being stupid and missing something, as I have managed to download other peoples work in FBX and import to Unity with perfect results.

(A FINAL NOTE: After writing this I was combing through the project trying my best to see what makes this happen at the top side of the can. I am now thinking the reason is fully because I am using two UvSets. The first UvSet I meant solely for the Slurm main can graphic. The second was purely a plane of the top side. But when I look at UvSet1 the top is stretched, is it possible that its only using the UvSet1 and ignoring the second? How can I check that? If we cannot figure it after all this I guess i might just delete that scene and start from scratch on something else. Cheers for any help)

Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

sean.heasley — Thu, 16 May 2019 16:54:47 GMT

Hi @designdemontq

Here's a quick video I made with your can and how I would go about UV mapping it.

Using 2 uv sets is fine but its not the optimal way to work on an asset like this unless you're going for a really high quality render of just the soda can. Using one texture and one uv set can still get you really solid results and would be the workflow for an asset like this if you were working on a game for example.

Re: Uv layout is perfect with checkers, but stretched on material

Anonymous — Thu, 16 May 2019 23:18:06 GMT

Wow man thanks this is really kind of you. I was thinking I could do that with the one texture file, but kinda thought it might be better separating them. Its really good to watch your video as I get to see the steps I need so I can refer back to this video whenever i need to now!

I'm gonna keep making new projects to get to grips with it over and over again for a bit 😄

And yes eventually I'd like to make game assets mainly, however I am really starting to like working with the high-end style renders in Arnold and hope one day I can be a proper hero character designer and maybe even work on a large project one day for a company or indie group.

Cheers again matey!