Hello Keith,

I don't know carrara and 3d-coat at all, but I more less see what kind of trouble you have by trying to paint on a object coming from MoI.

First, I would suggest few things.

About your giraffe model, I know your goal is to learn MoI, but it's really the kind of object I will never do with nurbs.

-1 Because it will take something like an half hour to build this model with a polygon software like Sillo.
-2 By using polygonal subdivision technique, you basically create a low res 'cage' structure, with few polys, so it's easy to handle it, and it's easy to create/adjust the uv's.


Because the key to have a good object to paint on, it's to have good uv's ... by good uv's I mean no stretching, and less discontinuity as possible.
(and no 300 little uv's pieces that cross over each others) There are a lot of tools in you poly software to adjust the uv's, and you really need to take some times to learn them.

If 3d-coat it's something similar to Zbrush, so a displacement painting tool, then I really thing MoI is not a good modeler to provide good models to paint on.
Preparing a model for this kind of software require to follow some rules, like a good uv structure, but also a regular polygon structure in the topology.

DeepUv it's an old/dead software to tweaks you uvs, it was available as plugin but also as standalone version.
Deeppaint is also available as standalone, and will 'only' allow you to paint on your model ... it's quite old now too.
Zbrush can be used as a 3D painting, but also as a displacement painting ... if you decide to sculpt with displacement painting, your object will be subdivided, and
the topology is important to get a good painting experience.
Mudbox is a pure displacement painting, with a more 'standard' interface than zbrush
Bodypaint seems to be a great tool to paint and uv's your model.

Now just a final work, I'm not saying you can't texture a model coming from MoI, but there is a big difference between texturing an object and paint on it.
Moi creates a good uv's base, all you need is to packing them, to remove every stretching in the uv's, and keep a proportional resolution between every uv'spieces.
That's offen enough for generic texturing work, like wood, concrete, rocks etc ...