Image projection too tiny

# 1 12-07-2012 , 12:01 AM

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I'm trying to 3d matte texture geometry by projecting a photographic image onto some simple models.
One of the objects needs two different projections, and I have assigned two separate surface materials to the two different sides of a shed
that I want to texture separately. Problem is that, while the perspective projection from the image plane camera is fine, the other planar projection image is tiny in the UV editor and is tiled, covering the whole face in tiny pictures- when I only want one image projected onto it.
(I know that my geometry is HUGE because I began working in large proportions in the beginning because I thought it was affecting my focal length/perspective, so maybe this is why the image appears so small in relation to the face of the model.)

Do I resize it in photoshop? If so, whats the process to make sure its the size I need?

I've tried to just work this out with trial and error, but it proves difficult on something as complicated as maya hehe. I'd love to hear any solution to the problem! Many thanks!

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# 2 12-07-2012 , 12:36 AM

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A scrrenshot mate?

cheers bullet

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# 3 12-07-2012 , 03:16 AM

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Hi bullet1968, thanks for the response! Here's a screenie showing the face of the model with the tiny texture photo tiled across it:

This is the actual photo I'm trying to texture the face with:

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# 4 12-07-2012 , 03:54 AM

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post me the file mate, so I can have a look. Your UVs dont seem arranged properly. Put your ref images in with it an zip it.

cheers bullet

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

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# 5 20-08-2012 , 05:43 PM

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I couldn't post the image files for the scene as they were too large, so I decided to try to progress myself and I've gotten to this stage:

I have a model of a shed that I have succesfully lined up, and projected onto, my main photographic image using a perspective projection based on the camera with an image plane.
That's all pretty much fine, but I want to texture a side of the shed with another photograph that I have taken of the actual shed in question, but I'm having trouble with getting the textures to display correctly.

I'm using a layered texture node and have set up two UV maps of the object (map1 & uvset1) which both contain UVs of the entire geometry. I assigned the image of the side of the shed, which has an alpha channel making all of the photograph surrounding the side of the shed transparent. I UV linked using the relationship editor. Then assigned it, I think through a lambert.

What I'm getting is not the desired result, and I can't tell exactly what adjustment I need to make.

Also, the images aren't displaying the UV editor, it's just grey, so I can't try to fit the UV's over the alpha properly.

I can't really find any tutorials that address this particular method. But any help understanding what I'm doing will be fantastic.

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# 6 20-08-2012 , 09:41 PM

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This should be simple but you have tried to over complicate it, for a simple shape like this just do a auto map projection this should give you a reasable UV map to start with. Next take a UV snap shot to the size you need then take that into photoshop or like and get your shed texture to fit the UV shells..............dave

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# 7 20-08-2012 , 09:54 PM

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Lol, can I alpha blend doing that?

How do I connect/assign it to a shader? Do I still need a layered texture node I think I follow what you're saying, I know that's the usual way of texturing. I'm going to try and do as you've said and see how it works out. I'll tell you how it turns out, thank you.

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# 8 21-08-2012 , 06:49 PM

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I've not had any luck. I'm still new to maya so it's probably a really obvious thing I'm doing wrong. I think I might post a new thread for the stage that I'm at.

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# 9 21-08-2012 , 07:52 PM

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Can you lay out the UVs correctly, and then post a screenshot of the new UVs. user added image

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# 10 21-08-2012 , 08:34 PM

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This sounds complicated and I'm officially confused. What are you trying to achieve exactly?

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# 11 21-08-2012 , 08:35 PM

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To get you started all I have done is create sides and a top from poly planes so all the sides are not joined then I combine them then do a auto map witch create usable UVs (not great) then I applied a checker pattern to look for stretching, see how you go............dave

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# 12 25-08-2012 , 03:30 AM

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Thank you guys again for replying, and for the picture aided advice hehe. I've managed to complete that stage, or rather skipped it entirely, because I have textured half of the shed using a perspective projection from my reference image, as shown in the first two attached pictures.

Now I want to texture the side of the shed (outlined in red) with the image of the side of the shed.

But, and here is where it gets complicated for me, I would like to- and it is also a requirement of this exercise, have the side of the shed texture blended into the current projected texture using what I think should be a painted alpha channel blended from white to black. This, I would guess requires the use of a layered texture node (because two layers would share the same face) with one layer blended into the other.

Here are my UVs. There are two sets, but I'm not sure if I accidentally created the second set, or if it was created by the perspective projection. I think it was because it is mapped exactly how it's projected onto it.

I hope this at least clears up the confusion of what I'm trying to do. I wasn't sure how to ask in the original post, and again, thanks a great deal for your time and help user added image

Last edited by Hypernova; 25-08-2012 at 03:46 AM.

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# 13 27-08-2012 , 09:29 PM

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Honestly, I would just use blend colors node and plug the painted alpha in the weight channel, and plug the blend colors into the shader's color slot, if you have more layers you can use the layered texture or the mib color mix. I don't see the need for all these different uv sets.

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# 14 02-09-2012 , 02:45 AM

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thanks

but I've never used a blend colours node. I solved it though through perseverence. I just mapped a the face using a planar map in a new uv set, then auto mapped the rest o fthe faces and scaled it right down, while scaling the face I wanted to texture up. Then i uv snap shot it, fading the texture in using an alpha mask, and made sure the scaled down map of the rest of the shed was all underneath an area that was painted transparent. I then opened a new layer in the layered texture tab, assigned the file with the alpha, and uv linked the maps to the corresponding files, making sure the alpha channel was assigned also. And I was done. The key thing was mapping the rest of the geometry as well as the face I wanted to texture, and telling maya not to display it by making it transparent using alpha.

Thanks for helping gentlemen

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