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Hide and show UV tiles on a model

Working with very high resolution textures on models with multiple UV tiles will quickly use up limited graphics memory when all textures are set to display simultaneously depending upon the number and resolution of the paint layers.

To let you work effectively using models with multiple UV tiles Mudbox automatically optimizes the display of textures. When a model containing multiple UV tiles (with at least one paint layer) is open in Mudbox, only one texture tile on the model is set to display in the 3D View. The texture tile that gets displayed by default is determined by its proximity to the UV origin in UV texture space. That is, the closest tile to the 0, 0 origin is the tile displayed by default in the 3D View.

The remaining texture tiles are not displayed until you manually load them. Any unloaded texture tiles are automatically assigned a random color to indicate their unloaded state in the 3D View. Mudbox displays a message in the 3D View if you attempt to paint on an area of the model where the UV tile is unloaded.

Randomly coloring the unloaded UV tiles lets you:

- determine that Mudbox is currently optimizing the display of the UV tiles to save video memory. It also indicates that multiple UV tiles exist on the model if that wasn’t initially obvious.
- determine the location of each texture tile on the model in relation to one another and which parts of a model are assigned to particular tiles
- determine which texture tiles are currently loaded or unloaded on the model so you can selectively load or unload any texture tile(s) when painting as required.

1. To turn on or off the display of a texture tile on a model, position the cursor over the texture tile region and click the Up arrow key .

   This toggles the display of the textures for that one tile region for all paint channels on or off. When a texture tile is turned off, a random color appears in place of the texture to indicate that the UV tile for that region is currently unloaded.

   NoteThe default hotkey setting for toggling the display of texture tiles can be changed by selecting Windows > Hotkeys.
2. To hide all texture tiles on a model, press Ctrl + Down arrow key .
3. To show all texture tiles on a model, press the Ctrl + Up arrow key .
   WarningDepending on the number and resolution of texture tiles on your model, showing all of the texture tiles may rapidly use all of the graphics memory on your computer resulting in diminished interactive performance. Mudbox displays a reminder message when this may occur. To learn more about optimizing texture memory, see Graphics memory optimization.

Related topics

UVs overview

Prepare a model for painting

View painted images with UVs

Paint across multiple UV tiles

Troubleshoot painting

Memory and performance best practices