How to UV unwrap clothing in Blender

A UV map lays the garment out flat so a texture can be painted on it. Clothing is the easy case: cut it where a tailor would sew it.

What you need

• Blender
• A finished garment mesh with applied scale

Steps

1. Mark the seams. In Edit mode select edges along the real seam lines - sides, shoulders, under the sleeves, inner legs - and choose Edge > Mark Seam.
2. Unwrap. Select everything and press U > Unwrap. Each piece between seams becomes an island in the UV editor.
3. Check for stretching. Put a checker texture on the garment (or turn on the stretch overlay in the UV editor). Squares should stay square and the same size everywhere.
4. Straighten and arrange. Rotate islands upright, straighten hems and waistbands where it helps a fabric pattern, and keep matching pieces the same scale (UV > Average Islands Scale).
5. Pack. Use UV > Pack Islands with a small margin, so islands do not bleed into each other when the texture is scaled down.
6. Lock it in. Unwrap before rigging and before baking: changing the UV map later means redoing the textures.

Tips

• Fewer, larger islands are easier to texture than many small ones.
• Give the parts people look at - the front, the neckline - a little more UV space.
• If one garment uses several material faces, each face can have the full UV square to itself.

Next

• How to bake a normal map in Blender
• How to texture clothing in Substance Painter for Second Life

Words you do not know? See the glossary. All guides: how-to guides.

This page is a written overview. In the SL Designers video courses you watch clothing being made from start to finish, and our Blender addons take over much of the technical work.