Why One Simple Knife Took Me Hours to Unwrap

I thought the model was done. Then UV unwrapping completely slowed me down. This was the most mentally exhausting part so far.

This post is part of my daily learning journey in game development.

I’m sharing what I learn each day — the basics, the confusion, and the real progress — from the perspective of a beginner.

On Day 37 of my game development journey, I struggled with UV unwrapping a knife model and learned why UVs are hard for beginners.

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What I tried / learned today

I spent more than two hours unwrapping a single knife.

The knife had multiple parts:

• Blade
• Sharp edges
• Handle

But everything shared one UV map, which made things more complex.

I learned that complex shapes need planning, not just quick unwrapping. Hard edges and sharp corners especially need proper seam placement.

I also learned that:

• One UV map controls the entire mesh
• Poor seam placement causes stretching
• Clean UVs depend more on thinking than speed

What confused me

I was confused about:

• Where exactly to place seams
• How to separate the blade and handle properly
• Why UVs were overlapping
• Why textures stretched along the knife edges

The most confusing part was this:

The model looked fine in 3D, but terrible in the UV Editor.

What worked or finally clicked

The biggest realization was simple:

Seams are like cutting paper before flattening it.

Once I treated the knife as separate parts instead of one solid shape, things improved.

I understood that:

• Each major part needs its own UV island
• Knife edges need extra seam care
• Rushing UVs only makes the result worse

Checking the UV Editor often helped catch problems early.

One lesson for beginners

• UV unwrapping takes time and patience
• Mark seams slowly and deliberately
• Unwrap in parts, not the whole mesh at once
• Use a checker texture to test stretching
• Struggling with UVs is completely normal

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Slow progress — but I’m building a strong foundation.

If you’re also learning game development,

what was the first thing that confused you when you started?

See you in the next post 🎮🚀