Want to start texturing your own clothing or characters? Here's a trick to create a template with each material on it's own layer - great for make-up, lining cuffs, etc.
This requires UV Mapper (the free version will work) and a photo-editing program that supports layers.
Why do this?
1 - It's simple to match up seams when you can see where each material begins and ends.
2 - You can easily make trim by loading up a material as a selection, contracting (or expanding) the selection, and painting in the detail. (In Photoshop, you can even create paths from the selection and stroke the path with different brushes for very detailed trim.)
3 - You can get a better idea where on the texture you're detailing if you know which material you're working on at the time.
4 - To isolate materials that are surrounded by other materials, such as the lips on Michael or Victoria. (Not only does it keep the texture map clean by keeping colors inside the correct material zones, but it makes it easy to create textures with different colors/designs that easily swap out with MAT files, such as different lipstick options.)
5 - For cat suits, it makes great generic superheroes - Clashman and Clashgirl! ;-)
In UV Mapper:
1) Open up UV Mapper and import your item. (File: Open Model.) For this tutorial, I'm going to use the Michael 3 Body Suit. (By default, the suit can be found in Runtime\Geometries\DAZClothing\MilMan\M3.)
This will generate the UV map.
2) Click on Select: All. Then Select: Display: Hide. (That's Ctrl-A then [ for you keyboard gurus.) This will hide the entire map. Now go to Select: Deselect (Ctrl-D) so your template appears blank.
3) Now we need to select just one material and unhide it. Select: Select By: Material. (Ctrl-M.) For simplicity's sake, I'd suggest going alphabetically and selecting the first material on the list. For the body suit, that would be "Crew."
Note: Normally I like to view my materials by color. However, some colors are pale and may not contrast well enough for the Magic Wand in Photoshop. I recommend keeping the entire template in black and white to avoid this problem.
4) Select: Display: Show. (That's the ] key.) Now you can see just the Crew portion of the body suit.
5) Go to File: Save Template. Select the following options:
The "Exclude hidden facets" option will save just the material that is currently visible on your template map.
Note: You can set the size of the material to any size you want, but you MUST use the same size for each material you export.
Save the template as Bodysuit-Crew. (Or meshname-materialname if you're using a different mesh. Always include the material name in each template so you can keep track of them.)
6) Hide the material. Select: Display: Hide. (The good, ole [ key again.)
7) Select the next material. Select: Select By: Material. (Ctrl-M.)
8) Lather, Rinse, Repeat until all the materials are done.
In Photoshop (or another image editing program):
1) Open up the first template. It will look something like this:
2) Use the Magic Wand tool to select the white area of the template map. Click somewhere in the large white expanse - far away from the visible material.
3) Invert the selection. This will select just the material.
4) Create new layer. Give it the same name as the material.
5) Fill the selection(s) on that new layer with a bright, solid color.
6) Open up the next material and repeat steps 2 - 5. Use a different bright (if not obnoxious) color each time.
7) For Photoshop, hold down the Shift key and drag the new material layer to the first image. This will drop the layer on top and keep the correct location. For Paint Shop Pro, you can align the layer for similar results.
8) Do this for each material, dragging the layer to your original material, until you've built up the template.
Now you have each material on it's own layer.
9) Save the file as bodysuit-template.psd. (Or whatever type of layer file for your photo-editing program.)
Don't forget, you can always make a copy of this file and merge some layers together for ease of use. For example, if I wanted to make some pants for this body suit, I'd merge the hip, thigh, and shins together. I might also merge the other layers into a shirt.
You can also import in the original UV Map and put it on top of the other layers (reducing the transparency) for an even more detailed seam guide.
Now go forth and texture!
