Why does texturing have to be so hard?

[malosal]

Hey ixicalibur,

I understand what what you are trying to say here. However, seen in light of which an inidividual who is checking out what is plausible for them to do, and technically possible, needs a bit more nuance. For example, in order to recognize a limitation in something one has a natural affinity for, one has to try and assess just how very probable it will be given that person’s limitations. For example, as you stated, building a spacecraft would be such a monumental task, that even those of the greatest intelligence would have no chance of doing so, natural affinity or not.

I don’t think that trying to learn 3d modeling is in this category, even if one sucks at it, unless one has really assessed all the variables and ruled the possibility out based on reality, and accepting the reality that it is just something that their brain cannot wrap around it.

I can acknowledge that in my initial post I was a bit overdramatic in complaining about the difficulty of texturing models. I had not given up completely since it had worked for me before, admittedly on a different 3d engine. In the past 2 days or so I have been able to follow some blender tutorials and have been able to texture very basic objects. And yes it has been difficult. But it is good that I tried doing this, as I now understand even more fully what my limitations are. So I do accept your input on that, though I think it was a bit hyperbolic.

If I may though, I would like to ask another question if possible. I have seen that in the unreal engine itself, it can display the unwrapped uv view of an object. My question is, can I use that to do the same thing as is done in blender and other programs that show the unwrap view of a model? I know there are factors to consider like resolution, scale, import/export format/screenshot vs image file etc. Basically, can this be used because if it can, I think the ability to bypass using seams in a program like blender, which has so many things on the screen, and which sometimes when I press the wrong keyboard key cause things to happen that I am incapable of fixing at this point as being at a beginner level in texturing, would bridge one more step in the difficulty gap. Thank you and I look forward to your guys’ constructive comments.

@ixicalibur

this is exactly how it works, everyone has a job that is within their means.

we humans like to tell ourselves a nice little lie, that we all have the ability to do anything we want, the truth is, just as everyone is an individual, completely unique, we all have an affinity towards different things. i would love to design spacecrafts, but no amount of hard work, blood, sweat and tears will help me do it, to any degree of proficiency, as someone with a natural affinity towards it.

and you can say, “hey, but you could go learn the things you need to learn in order to build spacecrafts, you just need to put in the effort!” but i wouldn’t, it’s not something im good at. i recognize that limitation in myself, and so i don’t go to spacecraft building forums and say “hey guys why is this so hard for me? make it easier for me please”

just the same way you could learn C++ and modify the engine source code and enable it to accept the textures that you drag and drop in Sketchup, i mean hell, while you are there you can redesign UV coordinates, or do away with them completely, you have the engine source and as much blood and sweat as you want to put into the effort, but will you?

[anonymous_user_a006f79c]

@ixicalibur

anyway, more to the point, uv maping and texturing a 3d model you create is a very basic step in game art and development, if you find this difficult, perhaps game creation isn’t for you.

If it’s that simple why do I constantly see exposed UV seams / warping / texture issues in AAA games? Most these artists are far from unskilled newbies, in a lot of cases it ain’t how good you are at texturing it’s how good you are at hiding issues. Plus you have to take the bigger picture into account, in a collective scene chances are it’ll go unnoticed and if you prototype lighting then you can hide stuff in shadows etc.

Material knowledge goes a long was as well, in some cases you don’t even have to use textures…

Personally I don’t believe it’s “difficult” as such, more along the lines of excessively time consuming. I tend to try and automate UV’s and use procedural / changeable materials as much as possible, also this is one place where dynamic lighting helps :)…