UV layout after Rigging: Transferring UVs to a Rigged Model
Ideally you want to create a proper UV layout for your models, and delete all the history, before you rig it. In the unfortunate but not uncommon circustance that you realize you spend hours weightpainting on a model that has the UVs not properly laid out yet but should, these steps can help you.
- Out of an abundance of caution, save your scene with the rigged model under a different name (MyModelRigged_BackUp.mb for instance)
- Make sure your rig / model is in bindpose (undeformed)
- Select the bound mesh and delete all the history on it. Yes, including the deformer history, killing all rigging and blendshapes
- With the mesh selected, choose:
File > Export
to export just the mesh of your model - Through
File > Open
open up the file you just exported your model to. DO NOT save the file you just deleted the history in. - In this clean file, create a perfect UV layout.
- Again, delete all the history on your model
- Save the file (using incremented versions is always a good idea)
- Open up the scene with the rigged model
- Import the model with good UV layout
- If your rig uses blendshapes, apply the same blendshapes to the imported mesh.
- Bind the imported model to the same joints the rigged mesh is bound to. A simple smooth bind is fine.
- Select the mesh with the correctly painted weights, and shift select the newly bound mesh (the one with the good UV's)
- Copy the skin weights (
Rigging > Skin > [Weight Maps] Copy Skin Weights
) - You can hide and eventually delete the orginally weight painted mesh
Done!
Needless to say you may not move your model during the process, right?