i everyone,

Just wondering if something is possible.....

I have a model of a clothing set  for Daz M3, but this question could be applied to any figure.

I want to make a set of textures for a bodysuit that fits M3, but the mapping is somewhat difficult because the map for the model looks like this, when opened with UV Mapper, right out of the downloaded zip file. The separated arms & legs make it difficult to work with.

Ideally, to make it easier to use, I'd love the map to look like this

I know I can do it in my computer, by simply using my mapping software and changing the projection, of the .obj file. The question is, if I want to make a set of textures for sale, is there a way I can make the textures usable by a purchaser, without them having to change the projection? I mean can I make a texture for this clothing set, using my modified projection (below) that will fit onto the model? I'm thinking the answer is no. Can anyone confirm or deny, please?

Hmmm, don't know. A guy named vilters was playing around with that idea and seemed to have some success with it. What I do know is that you can paint or texture that model's current uv scheme seamlessly in a 3d app that has painting functions. I use Carrara pro and zbrush in combination with photoshop to do texturing and displacement mapping. Blender has pretty good 3d painting capabilities, don't imagine it would be too difficult to find methods to easily import the mesh into there, paint, and generate a layered .psd from the results. Most 3d painting functions allow you to use custom alpha and image based brushes, including converted .abr's (photoshop brushes) in addition to stock native brushes, and varying types of fills.

The model needs to have the same UV layout that the textures have in order for the textures to work on it.

If there's a way to redistribute the new UV set without redistributing the model itself, then it might work.

I can tell you just by looking at it that the map you are wanting to use has stretching and bunching in the UVs, which will make the textures look less than great.

The way the model is mapped in your first example is much more logical. It's laid out like pieces of cloth, as most clothing should be done. The island borders would make it easy to create seams and stitching in the texture like real clothing has. The only problem area looks to be the torso, not being symmetrical.

don't know if the polycount is to high 

https://www.allegorithmic.com/products/substance-painter

 http://quixel.se/

might work .

then there is the 3D painters named all ready.

M3 days they textured with 2D app's that is a real paint .

there was a 3D painter related to max but it's extinct now n I forgot the name .

there's blacksmith n some othere app's for painting but I don't know nothing about them.

but if you change the map on the mesh your asking for trouble.

but ya can stick it together to 2D paint on it and then put it back to the meshes uv's.

today meshes can have layers of uv maps. 

Designing your textures around that new mapping would be a bad idea for a number of reasons. Firstly it would only work on your own modified obj file, unless you can distribute the new UV data with the product. Secondly, as Ambientshade says, the new UVs will cause a lot of smearing of textures. The result will look shite, a lot worse than a few visible seams. The existing UVs are unwrapped, whereas the new ones from UVmapper are projected, which just doesn't work for cylindrical objects like torsos and limbs. Apply a UV checking texture like this one to both versions and see for yourself.

modo_uv_checker.jpg

UVmapper is a handy utility for generating templates from existing UVs or fiddling with material groups and stuff, but for actual UV mapping it's a bit last-century, there are way, way better tools for the job.

The third reason is UV efficiency. If you apply a texture to the obj using the existing UVs, 60% of the pixels in the image will end up on the model. That's not particularly efficient, better packing by rotating and scaling all those existing UV islands to reduce wasted space would have allowed 75% of the image pixels to end up on the model. But on your remap, only about ten percent of the pixels land on the model. That means your textures would have to be twice as wide and twice as high in pixels just to look the same as the existing UVs. And that's a big step backwards.

Ieally, to make it easier to use, I'd love the map to look like this

Ideally... no. :)
Ideally, you want the UV to be mapped so that each "face" in the UV occupies the same area as it does in the topology of the model. Your straight, flat, project does not do that. Instead, each face in the UV only occupies the area viewed in the flat projection...This is fine for one flat polygon, or group of polygons, with nothing much going on in the y axis (relative to the surface of the model) for instance. But, for this organic shape, that is exactly the "worst" UV Mapping scheme to use. :) (Well, kinda the worst, at any rate.)

The UV map supplied isn't a bad one. It appears to obey the area rule, as much as my poor eyes can tell, at any rate. But, yes, it will be difficult to texture with, for instance, a patterned map, since lining up the pattern's flow would be tough to do in a 2D application, like Photoshop.

However, yes, you can "remap" an object. But, the important thing is that you don't want your user to remap the existing object! That would be A Bad Thing ™ because they couldn't then use existing texture sets for that object.

What you do is this:

1. Instruct your user to copy the original object file, manually, and put it in a separate directory. Ideally, they would put it in a directory you already supplied them and which your .cr2 file points to, the file renamed according to your conventions, which the user must match, so there is little room for error.

2. Instruct your users to download the free "UVMapper Classic/Light" version.

3. You will supply a .uvs file which contains the new UV and Material Zone information for the altered model. The user will then load up the copied object in UVMapper and load up the new .uvs file you supply and then save the object. (Be sure to tell them not to save over the original! Tell them five times if you have to!)

After that, your new UV will now be applied to a copy of the model and that copy is what your .cr2 references. (An added precaution.) From there, as long as they have named the file correctly and placed it in the correct directory, your .cr2 with new mapping will work just fine and any materials that you assign to it from presets you have created should be fine, as well.

Note: DO NOT COPY THE ORIGINAL CR2 TO USE AS YOUR ALTERED ONE! This is "wrong" so don't be tempted to do it. :) Yes, you can use the rigging references, but AFAIK, CR2s can also contain material settings and other information and I don't know if this one does or not. You don't want a conflict between what/where the CR2 is placing mats/other and where they need to be placed according to your new mapping. So, make sure your CR2 is stripped of all that, beforehand, so you have a nice blank CR2 with just your rigging/base geometry info in it. (ie: Using "dev" CR2s, for instance.)

Mmm, definitely use a blank .cr2 with the materials stripped out (they're located near the very bottom of the .cr2, near the weld statements) otherwise your clothing item will load with both the new material regions that you assigned and any original material category statements in the material room. If you strip out materials in a .cr2 in order to create a blank be careful not to delete the Preview material otherwise your figure will load invisible in your scene, something to be aware of.

 This thread just answered a whole slew of questions I had. Great information here.

Wow! This is all good info - some of it seems a bit over my head, for someone such as myself who is just an occasional 3D hobbyist, wanting to branch out and become a vendor. But all-in-all, everyone here has confirmed my theory, which is to say that changing the projection isn't possible without messing up the texture. Definitely going to look into both Quixel and Substance Painter, both of which are radically different from my past methods of texturing a model. Thanks for all the help!

it's called "create perspective UVs" in poser, or planar in UVmapper.  these were default mappings in P2 - P4.  causes texture distortion.

BTW, another application that lets you paint seamlessly directly on an object, and also view/paint diffuse/specular/bump in UV mode is Adobe Photoshop. Right-click the .obj and open in PS, but a few words of advice:

• Every texture is a virtual file tucked inside the .PSD / .PSB you save. I recommend saving as .PSB because it has fewer file size limitations. 
• PS will eat a chunk of scratch disk while you're doing this, so save/quit/restart PS periodically.

Photoshop also saves my work files at like 250mb or something. 9mb obj, couple mb worth of textures and a quarter gig PSD file. Or maybe I'm doing it wrong.

You're not, it's ridiculously huge. It saves a lot of stuff inside it including history. Still, the ability to use PS's tools on a mesh makes it (nearly) worth it.

I usually just paint on layers in Carrara with converted photoshop brushes and then import into photoshop to touch up there, then back to Carrara if necessary (it will load/export layered .psd onto the object and supports layer styles). I use photoshop cs (8), the 3d tools weren't introduced until cs2 I think. Good to know about that file size thing whenever I eventually switch over to CC. You'd think with photoshop being such a premium app that it would be comparable or superior with 3d painting efficiency.

Substance painter looks really cool, and not that pricey to boot. Won't run on my ancient mac though.