UV unwrap help

Hi hi! Firstly, i want to congratulate you on your BEAUTIFUL hair! I'm really impressed since you mention this is your first creation from scratch. It's pretty great AND LOW POLY which is a-ma-zing. Most users have a really hard time doing this the first time, so you nailed it! :D

Secondly, you should set up your workspace:

- I would clone a base game hair that looks similar to your hair (it's going to make it easier to map depending on how the texture has been laid out). I personally cloned the "long straight", but you can pick any other you want later, this is just to have a general idea where to place and how it's going to look.
- After cloning, export the texture. Go to blender and insert the image in blender going into "image / OPEN IMAGE"

- Luckily you have all the parts in different groups and that makes it a little more easy to do! Now you need to select each part, apply the texture and create/position the UV:

A) Select the first piece (either from the list) or by right clicking it on the 3D view in object mode. Go to MATERIALS , and select from the drop down menu "Base texture".
B) Go to the next tab ("Texture"), Scroll down to the second drop down menu and select the new texture image. NOTE: In the image the texture is displaying correctly because i mapped that part already prior to this. But it'll look like this once mapped. If it's not mapped, it will remain white, don't worry about it.
C) Unselect all these three to see the texture (once mapped) more clearer.



Now, you need to actually map the piece. Go into EDIT MODE, press A to select all and position the camera so that the piece you're working on is fully in front of you (not on the side). If i were to map the next piece to the one shown in the picture i would rotate the camera so it is position just in front of me. Then go to UV tab, unwrap and pick "cylinder projection".



This is the way i suggest by testing it all the UV mapping methods.

- Once you apply the method, you'll see the piece mapped in the UV screen. From there, position the piece accordingly inside the texture. You'll see it update it live on the 3D view.


Additional notes: 

I recommend using the PROPORTIONAL EDIT tool to mold each piece if needed if you need any of them having more curves. You can check out THIS VIDEO to learn how it works. It shows on how to apply this on your mesh but the mechanics are exactly the same for UV editing.

I'd do all pieces and ONCE i'm happy which how the mapping is done, join them all. I suggest doing back up of this just in case.D

I'm with Inabadromance here, this is pretty impresive for your first hair mesh . I think it looks awesome!

hair meshing must be one of the most complicated things to do on this game (the first one would be doing objects with animations/complex animations). I don't have the patience to tackle a project like that.

yay! that's pretty nice. you've learned the basics and that's going to help you out a lot. uv might be tricky depending on each mesh. I suggest playing with propositional edit, and flipping the directions of some strands to make it look different. but you're good to go, good luck!

EDIT: i have another problem. i'd like to do the uv_1 but whenever i try (with data transfer) the hair deforms with the shoulders (and upper chest width in general) and i don't want that and whenever i try to edit it it ends up even worse. could someone possibly help?

here's the new blend

(btw i edited the initial mesh and decided to make it a male hair)

may i know which hair you used as base for data transfer?

yeah i know x) it was supposed to be a male hair since the begining but for some reason i used a female base at first.
it's supposed to be a hair of a specific video game character i love.