Tutorial: Unwrap UVW

[OffshoreTacos 5]

Notice: This tutorial was partially deleted at some point and was subsequently reconstructed from memory on November 15, 2008. If some of the replies to this thread don't make sense, that's probably why.

Unwrap UVW is an essential tool for texturing in gmax/3ds Max. In this tutorial, I will show how to quickly make a very simple but useful HVAC unit for your roof junk collection using Unwrap UVW. It assumes basic knowledge of gmax/3ds Max. You should know how to create a box and how to apply a bitmap texture.

We'll start with Maxis' HVAC.jpg texture, which you can find in gmax\gamepacks\BAT\Textures. It looks like this:

As you can see, the texture looks like many plates of metal stitched together. That's because it's designed explicitly for use with UVW Unwrap. UVW Unwrap lets you cut up a stitched-together texture and apply the pieces to individual model faces. This will make more sense shortly.

Let's build an embarrassingly simple model. It's just two boxes, one on top of the other:

Go to the Material Editor and create a new texture. Set the diffuse map to HVAC.jpg. Apply the texture to both boxes. Make sure that the "Show Map in Viewport" button is turned on, as shown below:

After you click that button, you should see the texture applied to your objects:

Now we will do some UVW unwrapping. Select both boxes. Click on the Modify tab on the right-hand menu (the second tab from the left). Open the drop-down Modifier List and apply the Unwrap UVW modifier to the boxes.

Note for advanced modellers: If you are applying this modifier to an Editable Poly or Mesh, you will need to apply a UVW Map modifier first. This is because gmax's primitives come with default UVW mapping, but polies and meshes don't.

Select the box on top. We're going to map it first. Expand the modifier by clicking the plus sign next to its name, then click "Select Face," as pictured below:

This will help you to see what you're doing in the upcoming steps. (Try working without it sometime, and you'll see what it does. For now, just turn it on.)

Now let's map! Click "Edit" in the Parameters rollout. If you're using Gmax, you should see the following dialog, while 3ds Max users will get a similar but more complicated one:

If you see empty grayness instead of your texture, make sure "Show Map" is enabled. It's the blue and white cube icon in the upper right.

Those white lines represent the edges of your polygons. Right now, all of the polygons are showing, but we want to work on one at a time. Go to your viewport and click on the top of the box. The polygon should get a yellow highlight. (This is why you enabled Select Face before.)

Return to the Edit UVWs dialog. Enable "Filter Selected Faces." It's the button highlighted in red below:

As long as this is turned on, you'll only see the edges of the selected polygon(s). Now that only the top rectangle is showing in the Edit UVWs window, we can map it.

We want to use only a portion of the texture for this particular polygon, so we're going to drag the vertices (the tiny white rectangles where the lines meet) until they enclose the part that we want. Specifically, we want the dark vent texture in the middle-top of the image. Move the vertices so they're like this:

The vent texture should automatically update on your model. It should look like this:

Now go through face by face and map it to an appropriate part of the HVAC texture. You should end up with something like this:

And here it is rendered in Gmax:

It's not exactly jaw-dropping, but then, it's not bad for 12 polygons and about 5 minutes of work.

[mntoes 270]

Thank you so much for this tutorial. I always wanted to know how to do this. You should get this added to the Omnibus section so it doesn't get lost in the forums.

Thanks again!

Mntoes

Edit, Tried and it works. One question though how would this work on a circular area or other more complex shape?

[Cleaner475 150]

great tutorial well done, this will be very helpful to all members

Richard

[BurroDiablo 222]

Thanks so much for this! I knew it could be done somehow, but its abit of a brain fryer... most of Gmax/3Ds is...

[Jasoncw 11,839]

ahh!! Great tutorial!

I've set this thread to not archive, and have put a link to it in the useful links area in the BAT - Mega FAQ.

[autoVino 26]

awesome!  I've used uvw unwrappin in other modelling softwares, ut I could never figure out how to use it extensively in gmax/3ds max.

Once again, thanks!

[bixel 1,223]

OH MAH GAWD!!! Finally somebody shows me step by step whats going on with uv unwrap, I am sorta working with some professionals on some contract work, but when you are getting paid for your work these guys are very reluctant to show you how to do stuff. Thankfully I can now figure this out many thanks, plz sticky and expand the tut.

[OffshoreTacos 5]

Thanks everyone!

mntoes: Unwrap UVW can be used on circular or any other sort of geometry. Just be sure that it already has mapping coordinates. Many primitives, such as boxes, automatically generate their own mapping coordinates. But some geometries don't, or the automatically-generated coordinates are bizarre. In these cases, you must apply UVW Mapping before Unwrap UVW.

I'd be happy to expand the tutorial in other ways as well. What would people like to see?

Are there any other topics of modeling in gmax that deserve tutorials? I might be able to do some more, since I know the program pretty well.

[Sim shady 12]

Wow thanks for the tutorial, I'll have to try this texturing method in my 3d modeling class after thanksgiving.

[mntoes 270]

Thanks again! Much appreciated.

Mntoes

[Chris M 406]

Very useful for those who are just starting with the BAT.

[BIWDC 2,296]

Excellent tutorial

[Jazzmaster 716]

Wow, a great tutorial! And a great way to get around spending all that time modeling out the machinery...

-Yoshiisland

[SimRabbit123 6]

This is a very useful tutorial. I just used it for my newest model.