UV Unwrap Conventions

• Use a checker pattern image while unwrapping to check for texture stretching.
• Trade off texture stretching with having more continuous UV's between adjoining faces; this will help prevent ugly specular seams.
• Try to keep UV edge breaks along an intended hard edge; again, this helps prevent obvious seams.
• Try to cluster adjacent model components in similar areas in UV space; it makes the texture easier to work with.
• If you can't see both sides of an identical set of faces at the same time, mirror the UVs!
• Try to maintain consistent UV space usage on all important areas of the model, so that texture scale is consistent.
  • With special-case models such as first person weapons or cockpits, if part of the model is always particularly close to the screen then more UV space should be used.
• Where UV space is limited, try tiling textures as much as is possible. In most cases this will mean subdividing the mesh but generally texture space is more precious than polygon count.
• Pack UVs as tightly as possible (while still leaving a 4 or 5 pixel gap around each part, to prevent seams showing up due to mip-mapping).