Ptex is a technique for per-face, multi-resolution texture mapping without the need to setup your UV's manually. While the paper by Brent Burley (Walt Disney Animation Studios) and Dylan Lacewell (Walt Disney Animation Studios & University of Utah) has been around for a while, last Friday, Disney released the project as open source.

It's been used on Disney's Bolt and Glago's guest and it's supported by Pixar's RenderMan. No more tedious UV unwrapping as Ptex applies a separate texture to each face of a subdivision or polygon mesh...

Reasons enough to check out the workflow video, have a look at some production model turntables or just start reading on the project's homepage!