OPEN UV EDITOR
1. With Model selected, In the top toolbar go to UV > Open UV Editor.
2. This will open the UV Editor window and the UV Toolkit.
REMOVE EXISTING UVS
1 Clear the existing UVs by going to Edit Delete in the Editor Menu bar.
2 Select the object, and in Editor menu choose Create > Camera Based. This will give fresh UVs for the object.
CUT SEAMS (BY SELECTING EDGES)
1. Select the edges you want to cut
2. In the UV Toolkit, expand the Cut and Seam Dropdown and choose Cut
3. NB Shift + R Click in the UV editor will open a menu to quickly locate the Cut command.
CUT SEAMS (BY SELECTING FACES)
(Just using the cut command wont work when you are in face mode. If you make a selection to cut, it will cut them all separately, and also wont detach them.)
1. Select the faces you want to cut away
2. Click the ‘Make UV Shell’ button underneath Cut.
3. Use the Move tool to drag the separated piece away.
This will detach them successfully in one piece.
UNFOLD
With your segment selected in the UV, choose Unfold from the Unfold tab in the toolkit.
This should straighten things pretty well
Shift R-Click and Choose UV (?) IF IT DOESN’T SELECT IN THE UV AUTOMATICALLY.
Tiny grid button at top of UV Editor can show grid squares to check for stretching
WELD
Select an edge to be stitched back together, and in the UV Toolkit choose Cut and Sew > Stitch Together.
REPACK
In UV Toolkit, scroll down to Arrange and Layout, then click Layout.
FIXING DISTORTION
You can use the Check Distortion tool to see which parts of the model are distorted (they will glow red)
This is a little button along the top of the UV Editor.
You can use the smooth tool to relax out red distorted areas. This is found in the Tools Menu of the UV Editor (Not the main maya menu)
CREATE QUICK AUTOMATIC UV LAYOUTS
This is the quick nasty option, that will not give us nice optimised uv shells, but will work if time is short.
With UV Editor open, Select All polys
UV Editor, Create > Automatic
CTRL + U – Unpin (relax) it
CTRL + L – Layout.