Strectching textures over several prims??

Hi,
Is it possible to apply a texture to a number of linked prims?

For example, I make a wall of 12 10x10 prims, 4 along the bottom, 3 high. I want to apply a texture to this, so that I can use it as a background - a landscape photograh for instance.

The only way I have made it work is to cut up the image in Photoshop, then apply each section to a separate prim - takes ages!

Any thoughts on a quicker way - I'm sure that there must be one.

Thanks,
Duder

You don't have to cut the picture in photoshop. You can drop the same texture on different prims, and use the 'repeats per face' and 'offset' settings to match different parts of the picture.

I used this technique to make a skirt with an image on it. The image is divided over several skirt plaids, but it is only one texture.

Meni.

Hi Meni,
Thanks for the reply.
I tried your suggestion, but I I could do was get it to repeat over the prim - rather than stretch the single texture over a group of 9 prims. I can see how the 'tiling' wouold work well for a fabric print. Am I misunderstanding you?

Thanks,
Duder

Me again ...
Sorry you were right, it is possible by setting the repeats into the negative area - ie 0.100 - but I found that it was really tricky to line up an image split over 24 prims, and the quality really deteriorated.
Cheers,
Duder

Edit: looks like you were quicker in figuring things out than I was in writing my post Mayhaps it'll still be helpful to someone.

Hey Duder,

I quickly put together a few snapshots to illustrate how the repeats / offset thing works. It'll show you how to stretch an image to fit over 4 prims (2x2 grid) - to make it fit on a larger grid, just adjust the numbers.

First I apply the texture to the prims:


Then I change the repeats, to make one image fit over two prims, each prim will have half the image length-wise, and half the image height-wise, so I'm setting the repeats to 0.5 and 0.5:


Now the textures are still centered on each prim, so I change the texture offset for each texture - -0.25/0.25 for the upper left one, 0.25/0.25 for upper right, -0.25/-0.25 for lower left, 0.25/-0.25 for lower right. Of course the numbers will be different if you stretch the texture over more prims.

With your example of 12 prims in a 4x3 array try setting the horizontal repeats to 0.25 and the vertical to 0.333 on each prim. One quarter of the horizontal picture and one third of the vertical picture will appear on each prim. Initially you will get the same bit of the picture on each prim. So you use the offset buttons to scroll the picture across each prim until you have the correct segment on each. You have to do this manually for each prim, which is fiddly and takes time, but it can be done. I think there may be scripts that can do it, or if you look at this thread:

/109/4f/169436/1.html

Robin Sojourner has a wonderful patterned texture that should help you set up the repeats and offsets before replacing it with your picture

Wow - thanks for the in depth tutorial Jackal, really nice of you.

I visited your store in world - some lovely stuff there and a great store design too.

BTW, after reading these posts, (and you can tell I'm not a builder) I've worked out a much better way to solve this: you simply type -

"Can anyone make me 4 big panels, 6 prims wide, 4 high, very thin, each textured with a single image from RL? These are to be used as backgrounds in our machinima studio. Paid work - thanks"

And see what happens

I know it's in the wrong forum, but maybe worth a try.

All the best,
Duder

Wrong forum, yes - but I'm working on rolling out a whole line of these things with nature photos as landscape background screens for my store because there seems to be a decent amount of demand for them, and plenty of people don't want to mess with aligning textures and figuring out offsets.

I'm sure that you can hire someone to do it for you. But I'm at my RL job right now so I can't do it for you today.

Whoops, I just realized, speaking of wrong forums - I just announced a new product. All mixed up today we are yes.

I would recommend texture align. Great tool

http://www.slboutique.com/index.php?p=buy&phrase=texture%20align&n=0&itemid=169365