noob help

[chan1234]

Hi all,
I'm new to Zbrush2 and am having some trouble getting going. I've watched all the tutorials and downloaded the guide (which was great), but i'm still a bit confused on a few things. i do most my modeling in max and i want to import my models into zbrush2 to paint high detail displacement maps. i know how this is supposed to work in broad theory, but after watching a few zscipt tutorials, i get to it and i find that the standard drawing tools end up displacing too much surface even at zradius 1. simple stuff like pulling out horns/moles and the like are easily accomplished, but when i try to get in there and sculpt finer detail like crow's feet and wrinkles on the lips and brow, i find that the smallest zradius is too big and does not create the fine detail i'm looking for. so my questions are as follows:
1. is this a job for the projection manager instead of the standard tools/brushes? or is there yet another tool that i'm neglecting here?
2. or am i just not using the standard tools correctly?

also, i understand that zbrush2 can assign UV's automatically. anyone know what that zscript tutorial is named? i couldn't seem to find it.

thanks in advance for any and all responses! zbrush2 is looking like a killer app and i'm excited to start tapping it's power!

-chan

[aurick]

1) If your smallest radius is too big, then what you need to do is scale your model larger. This is accomplished by using the Tool>Deformations>Scale slider (which increases the true scale of the model, rather than simply drawing it bigger on the canvas). This will have the effect of making the brush smaller in relation to the model.

2) To apply a UV mapping within ZBrush, first create a base texture of the size that you want and apply it to your model. Best results will come when the texture is a power of 2 (256x256, 512X512, 1024x1024, 2048x2048 or 4096x4096). With the model selected, just open the Texture palette, set the dimensions that you want, and press New. Now go to Tool>Texture and press the button for the mapping type that you want. AUVTiles and GUVTiles will be your best bets under most circumstances. That's all there is to it! Your model is now UV mapped.

[chan1234]

thanks for the quick reply!! gotta love the zbrush community ;)

[chan1234]

btw aurick, so your post implies that fine detailing can and should be done w/the standard tools? if so, then, in your opinion, when working on a character/organic model, when should the projection master tool set be used, if at all? thanks again!
-chan.

[aminuts]

Hi Chan,

I think it's more a personal preference thing. Some prefer to stay in edit mode for all detailing and some like to use features like alphas and stencils etc in projection master for their fine detailing.

You should try both ways and see what suits your work style/flow best.

[chan1234]

cool. again, thanks for the tip. one more question if i may :)

i've noticed that when i subdivide my model a few times < even as few as 3 times >, i get a "dotted-line" effect when i use the standard tools. i assume that this is due to the fact that my machine doesn't have the resources for zbrush to sculpt continuously, but i wanted to make sure this wasn't something else. to be honest, i'm surprised i'm having trouble getting smooth sculpting due to the fact that at subdiv level 3, i'm still under 200K polys. my rig is a AMD Athlon XP 1900+ w/512 Mb of PC2700 ram. my machine is def. a bit long in the tooth, but i thought it would be more than able to handle < 200K polys. my only other thought was that i didn't have enough subdivisions to give me a smooth line when using the standard tools. i went a head and subdivided another time to give me a poly count of a bit over 740K polys. this resolution still produced a dotted line effect when sculpting. i went ahead and hid all but a small portion of my mesh < using Ctl+Shift Left click-drag> and this didn't seem to solve the problem. so, is this just a situation where my machine isn't up to snuff? or am i not using the correct tools? i watched the zscript tutorial for free hand sculpting and it there doesn't seem to be anything to it. just choose one of the standard tools and heap mass on in zadd mode or remove it in zsub mode. the tutorials get smooth sculpt 'lines'...i just don't know why i can't. well, i hope this ramble made sense. :)
-chan.

[aminuts]

sometimes I can't get smooth lines either..seems the higher the rez the worse it gets...but ... shoot....there is a setting....in i think stroke menu.....mouse settings...you can up that but it (well for my dinosaur computer) kind of has a slower response time but it may solve the problem......otherwise you either have to draw in sloooooow motion or use Projection master to accomplish what you want.

[mahwok]

ok, now that i had a little testdrive on a spanking new intuos2 A4 (the huge one, for all you non-metrics :) ) i have to admit that it's way better, more responsive, more precise and just feels better than the aiptek ...
it's 350 EUR, but worth it!