Texture Artists, what do you prefer in models?

[Gadget Girl]

So my texturing skills are very very basic. Which leads me to wonder what people who are good at texturing prefer in models. I've heard people mention they like to see the geometry on an object because it lets them know if it will be easy to make textures for that item, but I'm not sure if the things that make texturing easy for me (as someone who has trouble drawing a straight line) make it easy for others.

For instance, I'm working on an outfit now. I decided to add a material zone to the vest to create trim, which is much easier for me, but I don't know if that becomes a hassle for other people, because now they have to deal with my trim. Here's what I mean:

And at the moment the UV layout looks like this:

Does this look like a nightmare to work with or what you would like? Of course I can move things closer together or further apart. In fact I'm inclined to thing that the trim bits are sitting too close to the main part of the vest on the UV.

My thoughts when I look at what I have so far, is that it's easy to make a solid color trim, or even something done procedurally. But it would be hard to then make this have all one pattern. It might also be hard to do certain types of trim, but then I don't use programs like Blacksmith, just a regular 2d image editor, so maybe I'm thinking of it wrong.

Anyway, any feedback thoughts would be appreciated so I can learn to make better models.

 

[Glitterati3D]

Not a texture artist, but I have been told by many that making trims a rectangle makes texturing much easier and faster.

UVLayout has a keyboard shortcut for turning something into a nice Rectangle (R+LMB). I flatten then hit R.

 

[Miss B]

Yes, that's a good point Traci. I've used Blender and Silo, and both have options in their UV Mapper to straighten out the trim.

That said, I would also move the trim pieces further away from the pieces of the vest. I don't know what the norm is for most texture artists, but I always extend my textures at least 15-20 pixels past the edge of each UV island to thwart any color/texture bleed. If you are planning only to have the vest on the map (putting any other pieces on separate maps, I would straighten out the trim islands, and place them vertically (except for the hem trims which can be horizontal) to the side of the main pieces of the vest. IOW, I would put the trim pieces for the front of the vest to the right of the two large islands, which can be moved over to the left to give you room for the trim pieces. I would also do the same for the two islands for the back of the vest, with it's trim pieces to it's right. If that doesn't work for the size of the UV Map, then you can alternate them with the front pieces on the left, and the back piece to the right, with their respective trims opposite each. That might give you more room.

One question, though, is there a specific reason why you put a seam down the center of the back, if you already have seams down the sides. I think for texturing purposes, one island for the back, and two separate islands for the front would be sufficient. It would make things a lot easier as far as matching patterns at the seams.

 

[Glitterati3D]

Yes, that's a good point Traci. I've used Blender and Silo, and both have options in their UV Mapper to straighten out the trim.

That said, I would also move the trim pieces further away from the pieces of the vest. I don't know what the norm is for most texture artists, but I always extend my textures at least 15-20 pixels past the edge of each UV island to thwart any color/texture bleed. If you are planning only to have the vest on the map (putting any other pieces on separate maps, I would straighten out the trim islands, and place them vertically (except for the hem trims which can be horizontal) to the side of the main pieces of the vest. IOW, I would put the trim pieces for the front of the vest to the right of the two large islands, which can be moved over to the left to give you room for the trim pieces. I would also do the same for the two islands for the back of the vest, with it's trim pieces to it's right. If that doesn't work for the size of the UV Map, then you can alternate them with the front pieces on the left, and the back piece to the right, with their respective trims opposite each. That might give you more room.

One question, though, is there a specific reason why you put a seam down the center of the back, if you already have seams down the sides. I think for texturing purposes, one island for the back, and two separate islands for the front would be sufficient. It would make things a lot easier as far as matching patterns at the seams.

I lay all my rectangles horizontal, only because all the MRs are saved that way - then I don't have to flip the MR to paint it on.

Yeah, I make life as simple as possible, just because I am no texture artist.

Excellent point about the back seam. I, too, see no need for that additional seam.

 

[Miss B]

Ahhh, I'm used to flipping textures, so that doesn't bother me.

 

[LisaB]

In this particular case, you have to ask the question, is the trim meant to be a sewing edge or an entirely different material?

As a sewing edge, I would get the trim as close to the vest as possible so that the texture used on the vest can seamlessly be used on the trim at the same time. With this method, any irregularities that are textured in, such as a cut across the trim and into the vest, or wear marks, chafing, wrinkles, etc. can be applied to both surfaces at once, seamlessly.

If the trim is meant to be an entirely different color and material, then it is easier for the texture artist to have them be straight.

Hope that helps.

 

[Miss B]

Good point Lisa. I haven't played much with stitching, but you're absolutely right in that respect.

 

[NapalmArsenal]

Well, personally I fake most of my trims. It's fairly easy to do in Photoshop on your templates and you get pretty good results.

Ermm a mini tutorial.

You can do this by selecting your template. Usually you increase size on a template by say 3 to 5 pixels so that way you are sure to cover the seam area. The Selection tool in PS allows you to select more than one item at a time if you hold down the shift key.

Go back to the select tab at the top and go to Modify - Contract and contract by 10 or whatever thickness you want

Select the wand tool from the tool bar and hold down the shift key. This allows you to select more than one area of the template.

Repeat step 2 and inverse your selection under the selection tab.

This creates a new layer with only your trim on that layer.

 

[NapalmArsenal]

Make sure you are on the layer where you have pasted what you copied from your template.

You can change how the light hits the trim and also the highlights and shadows and can even change the colors on them. Then go to the layer tab and scroll down to merge visible and click it will merge the trim and the template together, but
I tend to save a copy as a PSD for when you have to work on your bump and displacement maps. If there is an area you don't want trim before you merge the two layers insert a blank layer and link the trim layer with it and merge. Then use the erase tool to erase where you don't want the trim to be.

And presto insta trim. You can change the color, add patterns and textures and they look pretty good with a bump and displacement map and a bit of a drop shadow.

View attachment 21668

 

[NapalmArsenal]

 

[Lyrra Madril]

Although the above technique does present a decent look, in rendering the texture is still flat and the illusion fails with changed lighting and angles. Instead, setting up a full set of textures with diffuse, bump map and displacement/normal map supplies all the information needed to set up a more realistic surface setting. Some textures also need a specularity mask, if you add shiny things or fabrics with varying surfaces. If you build your diffuse as explained above, then breaking out the additional maps adds about ten more minutes to your workflow.

I prefer to not bake any sort of emboss effects on the diffuse texture and instead use the trim shapes, and any wrinkles, to build the displacement/normal maps. The cloth texture goes on the bump map. Then when the shader is assembled, the texture reacts to the environmental lighting in a more realistic fashion.

I do use layer styles on the stitching, specifically the stitching line gets a black outside glow effect, set to Multiply and a very low opacity. This is to simulate the 'stitch ditch' you get when you are top-stitching fabric. For the displacement/normal map the stitch-line is set to a colour of 50% gray with the darkening still on. This makes a slight depression around the stitch-line and forces the stitch to the fabric 0 level, leaving a slightly raised appearance at render.

These are all very subtle changes, and the stitching line becomes mostly invisible except at certain angles. Which, generally, is what real world sewists have in mind when topstitching.

I'm not going to write out my full process again, for the curious it is Chapter 7 in my book

LM

 

[English Bob]

Thanks @NapalmArsenal for the tutorial! I'm not an expert modeller or texture artist, but I get by - and this kind of procedure is just the sort of trick I like to employ.

The piping effect on this dress was done by shrinking selections and filling with black, then white, then black - then I applied it as a displacement map and also a colour switch.

@Gadget Girl - my preference as a texture artist would be to include the trims as part of the main clothing (although that might make a little more work when I have my UV mapping hat on). By all means assign a separate material zone, because that makes it easy to use a procedural material on the trim, or a generic texture tile. However having the trims and cloth integrated means the texture artist also has an easy option to ignore the trims if they want, and flood-fill the whole island. If the trims are separate, there will be a visible seam along the join.

 

[English Bob]

This is the material room setting (my units are PNU):

 

[Glitterati3D]

I think what's important is to remember that however YOU see your model is not necessarily how a texture artist doing addon textures sees it. And that's what makes it all so great. A different texture, some well place trans maps, and your model becomes something entirely different than your vision.

As a modeler, your goal should be to make good UV maps that anyone can manipulate. A texture artist will jump on anything with a good UV map.

 

[NapalmArsenal]

Yeah, with that outfit it was rather a learning experience as I had not used displacement just bumps only and there is no displacement set on the outfit either and it didn't have a trim line set, but now have a much better handle on it.

Dagger sword all done with this type of method too with styles overlay for the metal look the bevel on the center crucifix is a fake and not in the model. All the deco surfaces are flat so I have also used the bevel emboss on the decos.

Again a bevel fake on the center cross it's actually a flat surface.

actual dropper looks like this

 

[NapalmArsenal]

This is the material room setting (my units are PNU):

View attachment 21686

Thanks for sharing your setup, and your comments!

Love how that trim turned out!!

 

[NapalmArsenal]

Although the above technique does present a decent look, in rendering the texture is still flat and the illusion fails with changed lighting and angles. Instead, setting up a full set of textures with diffuse, bump map and displacement/normal map supplies all the information needed to set up a more realistic surface setting. Some textures also need a specularity mask, if you add shiny things or fabrics with varying surfaces. If you build your diffuse as explained above, then breaking out the additional maps adds about ten more minutes to your workflow.

I prefer to not bake any sort of emboss effects on the diffuse texture and instead use the trim shapes, and any wrinkles, to build the displacement/normal maps. The cloth texture goes on the bump map. Then when the shader is assembled, the texture reacts to the environmental lighting in a more realistic fashion.

I do use layer styles on the stitching, specifically the stitching line gets a black outside glow effect, set to Multiply and a very low opacity. This is to simulate the 'stitch ditch' you get when you are top-stitching fabric. For the displacement/normal map the stitch-line is set to a colour of 50% gray with the darkening still on. This makes a slight depression around the stitch-line and forces the stitch to the fabric 0 level, leaving a slightly raised appearance at render.

These are all very subtle changes, and the stitching line becomes mostly invisible except at certain angles. Which, generally, is what real world sewists have in mind when topstitching.

I'm not going to write out my full process again, for the curious it is Chapter 7 in my book

LM

Been meaning to grab that at some point!!


I also use that greying effect in Daz as sort of a band aid when working with the displacement settings so the displacement and bump for that matter don't blow out your model from setting them too high.

Also wondering if you might consider converting @Daio 's native costumes to Harry?

Love the Arabian and the Egyptian styles!

 

[VortigensBane]

I am not a texture artist (yet), just a texture cannibal...

I like using cloth shaders on items, so the more material zones an item has, the better. That way you can decide whether you want to use the same shader or a different shader for each material zone. I also always try to reduce the UV map to as few islands as possible, so that if you want to flood fill the whole thing with one shader, all the textures line up with no seams. The last UV map that I put together ended up with about twenty-five material zones, but only four UV islands.

 

[Gadget Girl]

First of all, thanks everyone for the thoughts and comments. I've been really sick this last weekend and never got back to my computer.

Yes, that's a good point Traci. I've used Blender and Silo, and both have options in their UV Mapper to straighten out the trim.

That said, I would also move the trim pieces further away from the pieces of the vest.

I'll have to look into that option for straightening the trim. That makes a lot of sense as far as being easy. Also, will make it easier to move them away from the vest.

One question, though, is there a specific reason why you put a seam down the center of the back, if you already have seams down the sides.

So there is a specific reason, although that seam will be going away. At this point I'm at my first pass at the model in Marvelous Designer. The symmetry is weird in that program, and until I've decided the arm holes are the way I like them, it's easier to have two pieces for the back. I will end up making it one piece just not there yet. But a very good point.

As a sewing edge, I would get the trim as close to the vest as possible so that the texture used on the vest can seamlessly be used on the trim at the same time. With this method, any irregularities that are textured in, such as a cut across the trim and into the vest, or wear marks, chafing, wrinkles, etc. can be applied to both surfaces at once, seamlessly.

Hmm, I hadn't thought about things that way. That's a really good point. I had one idea in my head where the trim was more of a sowing line, but I think for the most part it's just meant to be a separate piece, so I will go ahead and make sure there's room between the islands.

Well, personally I fake most of my trims. It's fairly easy to do in Photoshop on your templates and you get pretty good results.

Thanks for posting this. I've used a similar technique for other things, but never thought to apply it trims. I may play with it some on some other things.

 

[Lyrra Madril]

When trim has a visible modeled sewing indent then I cut it loose of the main fabric and set it off to the side. If its flat in, you can leave it all together to give the texturist more options. Either way, separate material zones are a good idea! And for sanity sake .. name them something obvious like 'Cloth' and 'Trim' or 'Leather' , 'Metal' and 'Fabric'. I can't tell you how much time texture artists spend playing "Name That Thing!" on uvmaps.

If you have to make shells that overlap PLEASE name them with a number of the map they go to, like they did on V4. So you have 1_cloth and 1_leather and then 2_leather and 2_Buttons so you know that these things go to this map and those go to the other. I just spent a good half hour puzzling out a really complicated jumpsuit map with a dozen materials overlapping and it could have been so much easier with numbering.

Oh and do leave the fabric/leather shells proportionate to each other. Nothing is more frustrating to find that the sleeves need the fabric 100% scale and the body needs it at 58.6%. Again this is something that is tough to match up across seams and hard to work around. This is a garment that will get solid colours just to make the texturist not pull out their hair.

UVlayout does let you straighten out one or both edges of and mesh item, which is lovely for things like cords and bootlace and also ruffle and lace edging. Most lace textures are straight, or a tiling snippet to make a long straight piece. So the closer the uvmap is to that, the easier it is for the artist to get a nice sharp lace texture onto it. If the ruffle UV is too wiggly, then you are kind of stuck making plain cloth ruffles or coarse netting and hoping nobody notices the texture stretching a lot.

As for uv seams .. I try to match the seams of actual fabric cloth patterns where I can. This leaves texture seams where we expect to find them on clothing. If you can't do that, then try to get the seam in a harder to see place like inner leg, bottom of arm or the back of the garment.

Napalm Arsenal - funny you should say that

LM