I have come to that stage where I have to texture my model of the HMS Victory and am having a few problems with it.

I have some good photos from the ship but in order to get them to fit my UV map I have to scale them down quite a bit. Once I have done that all the lovely detail has gone and all you see it just blocks of murky colour. I have also tried to scale my UV map up but by the time I get it big enough it is too big to manage and I am convinced there must be a better way.

I have also had a look at the maya's own textureing system but either it can't be done or I don't have the skill at this stage to be able to do it (i think the latter might be true)

I have also searched on the Internet for some decent pictures but none of them seem right and I also get the same problem as I do with my reference photo's

How you people out here go about solving this problem. I have posted a picture of the actual hull of the HMS Victory.


P.S. The picture I have posted here is 800 x 600, the normal size is 2272 x 1704. So you can see why I am so egar to make use of this picture because of the level of detial it could give me.