Building UVs

Development Asset Creation
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1

Hi guys I have a question about how to deal with texturing a module building and other things, first the way that I have been using but im not happy with the results. I have been making a texture sheet (texture kit) in Photoshop using textures i want to use on my models:

This is an unfinished example hence the white space. then after I have the textures that I want to the right scale I then apply them to my models in 3ds Max then unwrap UVW maps and place the UVs in the places with the texture I want on that face:

But I have found the results to not look very good im using a 2048 x 2048 texture sheet and high-quality textures inside that I have also made a Normal map for the texture sheet:

But this still does not help with the quality of the texture, and if i was to use this in UE4 i would not be able to for example use the roughness option in the Material editor for just the brick or wood due to it be one material. then i noticed how the textures were achieved with some of the starter content:

I found that this was used to dictate which parts of the models should be textured with what textures or base colours:

so to my question can i use this system to texture my models and if i can how do i do this and what is this called?

sorry for the long winded explanation and sorry for any spelling mistakes its not my strong point

thanks everyone :slight_smile:

2

I believe the technique you’re thinking of is a combination of masking and layered materials.

A guide to layered material (in a slightly different context):

A nice tutorial on masking:

3

Thanks man ill get working on that, would you say this is a feasible way of texturing this type of mesh?

4

As the materials are so different, but the differences are localised into different regions of the model, I would personally consider just making the model take three separate materials. I’m not sure what others would advise.

I think the masking method is more useful when you have little splashes of different materials all over the place (for example, if you were making a cloth coat, with lots of buckles and button details that you’d want to highlight in gold metal, and then later on you make a new coat using the same materials but with the cloth and gold in different places).