This week I sorted out UVs on my sword, and started texturing.
To sort out my UVs, I used a variety of ways to make sure they were working well and ready for texturing. I went through each part of my sword individually and did this. In some cases, I used a planar UV tile, some I used a camera based on some faces. I cut some parts of the UVs so that I could lay them out differently, as they did not follow the UVs correctly. I also used the unfold and straighten UVs tool a lot to work these out correctly.
The most difficult part of the sword to UV was the dragon wings. The topology on these were the most complex to I had to play around with the different tools until I had UVs I could work with.
I then was able to start texturing on Substance Painter. I started with the blade. After trying multiple metal bases, I found a material I liked for the blade.
I then added scratches by hand using a paint layer.
After creating multiple scratches, and details, I exported these textures to maya, and sorted them out on the hypershade editor, putting all the correct nodes into the right inputs.
I then added a hdri to view this texture with the right lighting I wanted. To match the texture in adobe substance painter, I had to export the triangulated mesh model.
I checked these textures on the render window.
One thing that stood out to me is that I felt like the indents were too harsh. I selected faces and brought them up to a closer level, so that these were more subtle.
I was happy with my blade, and ready to texture the rest of my model next week.