Pixologic Release - Reference Image 2 - The New Image Plane ZScript

[ryankingslien]

refImageTitle.jpg (http://javascript<b></b>:zb_insimg('40726','refImageTitle.jpg',1,0))

Pixologic is releasing a new extension for ZBrush 2: Reference Image 2!

Reference Image 2 provides an easy way to use reference images while modeling. The eight view buttons means that up to eight separate images can be used. The buttons are named for the six orthographic views and two custom views.

Model in ZBrush with up to 8 reference images
Switch quickly between views with one button press
Save and Load Reference Image projects
Quick set up with default positions
Many options including thumbnail display of all 8 views
Based on MarcusCivis's Refence Image 1, this enhancement makes using image planes in ZBrush 2 a snap!

10-02-06: Rev 2 includes a fix when loading a texture from disk.

For installation and documentation visit the Reference Image 2 page here (http://www.zbrush.info/site/index.php/Reference_Image_2).

Coded by Marcus Civis. :)

Happy ZBrushing,
The Pixologic Team

refImageThumb.jpg (http://javascript<b></b>:zb_insimg('40727','refImageThumb.jpg',1,0))

[mathieu77]

thanks you very much, one more cool update. And always for free; amazing!Matt

[Erklaerbar]

you should hire Marcus;) . Zbrush is only half fun without Marcus Plugins. Thank you!

[pOiNtPuShEr]

Very cool. Thanks :D .... now, about 2.5???? ;)

[DMerchen]

This is great. Will these still work in 2.5? Thanks again.

[Scott Spencer]

NICE!
im glad to see this finaily released. Lots of hard work went into this one guys, thanks a million!!

S

[Atwooki]

EXCELLENT! Thanks Ryan and Marcus :D :tu:

Chris

[aminuts]

Cool....Thanks Marcus! Superb as usual.

[bicc39]

Yeah!!!! Mr. Civis:tu: :tu:

[Moochie]

Wow great. Thank you! Was this really posted a week ago and we all missed it?

[Giantsun]

Yep, we are that distracted. ;)

[punchatz]

This is a must have, even if just for the memo cams (snap shots)

Thanks!!!

Greg

[chadtheartist]

Absolutely fantastic script! Thanks for sharing this!

[tez]

Thankyou for this, very helpfull.:D

[jumpingjellybean]

This either doesn't work for me or I can't follow the simplest of instructions. (probably the latter)
I select my 3D tool, hit the Front button, and my model isn't placed on the canvas, a plane is instead. What did I not get here?

[marcus_civis]

Thanks for the comments guys. :)

jumpingjellybean,
I think you may have accidentally stored the plane instead of your model. Try this:
Make sure your model is selected, you can even draw it on the canvas and enter Edit mode (hotkey 'T') or activate the gyro.
Click the 'Reset All' button and choose the 'Reset Model' option.
Click the 'Frnt' [Front] button and proceed with setting up your views.

HTH,

[jumpingjellybean]

Yep, my bad! Thanks for that.

[baker17]

hi...

this is a great plugin... but its not workin right for me :(

i do exactly as the instructions say, but when i load image... it either wraps onto the model.. or a get a blank background with a transparent model?? my images im trying to use are jpg so i don't think thats where the problem is... any suggestions as to how i get the reference image to show?

[SNARK]

Thanks for the hard work, Marcus. Great utility. Before I install this new version, do I need to uninstall the old version or will this install over the old? If I have to uninstall it, how do I do that? Thanks!

~S.~

[marcus_civis]

i do exactly as the instructions say, but when i load image... it either wraps onto the model.. or a get a blank background with a transparent model?? my images im trying to use are jpg so i don't think thats where the problem is... any suggestions as to how i get the reference image to show?

baker17,
Sorry the plugin is giving problems.

Are the jpgs you are selecting ending up in the Texture palette? If they aren't then perhaps they are of a type ZBrush can't handle and that would explain why you are getting blank backgrounds with a transparent model.

The image sometimes wrapping on the model is a 'feature' of the plugin that I will get corrected very soon. In the meantime simply select 'No Texture' in the texture palette before pressing the Store Position button.

SNARK,
There is no need to uninstall the original Reference Image; the two plugins are completely separate. However, as you probably won't want to keep both on your system (though note that the new version won't load any project files from the original version), uninstalling the original is easy enough:

Delete the RefImage.zsc file from your ZStartup/ZPlugs folder.
Delete the RefImage_data folder (and its contents) from your ZStartup/ZPlugs folder.

That's all that's necessary.

HTH,

[SNARK]

Thanks, Marcus. We all appreciate the work you've done to make life a little easier for the rest of us.

~S.~

[baker17]

thanks marcus... will try it out. :tu:

[calum5ZB]

Thankyou for making my life better!!

[SNARK]

Marcus,

Here's what I get when I use the new version. When I open a new document ('Double Size'), I go to the Plugins dropdown and open the new RefImage utility. My first move is to load the background image I wish to use. When I push the button to do this I am allowed to browse for the image and select it and it appears in my document. However, as soon as my background reference image appears, so does an error box (which I have posted). If I press the cancel button on this first error box I get three more error boxes (also posted) after which my background image remains and I can draw my tool over it.

When I first draw the tool (a head model) it appears as an empty white matte, defaulting for some reason to 'Current Material' with 'Flat Color' and the '00' brush and 'Current Alpha'. If I change the material to something like 'Polkadot', I am unable to achieve transparency by going into the materials dropdown, adjusting transparency then going to the render dropdown and unchecking 'Flatten', as I was able to do with the old version. I am able to adjust those settings but they have no effect on the model.

If I choose a view to store, my background image is stored as a distorted texture. The image is squashed horizontally, not an enormous distortion but enough to be clearly inaccurate and unusable as a guide.

So, right now I am just loading my image each session and working without transparency.

Also, when I view the unzipped file structure, there is only one .psd file in the 'Images' folder but there are nine .psd files directly under the main 'RefImage2_data' folder along with a single .ztl file ('RI_labels'). Is that correct?

Suggestions?

~S.~

Here's my machine specs:

Microsoft Windows XP

Home Edition

Version 2002

Service Pack 2

Dell Notebook 16000

Intel (R) Pentium (R) M

Processor: 1.5 GHz

1.5 GHz, 2 GB of RAM

RefImage 1 copy.jpg
RefImage 2 copy.jpg
RefImage 3 copy.jpg
RefImage 4 copy.jpg
RefImage 5 copy.jpg

[marcus_civis]

SNARK,

All the error messages suggest that you have not installed the plugin correctly. Please check that your installation matches the structure outlined here: http://www.zbrush.info/site/index.php/Reference_Image_2

Note that the folder RImage2_Data (which should be in the main ZStartup\ZPlugs folder) contains a number of files and also two subfolders :
allView containing 2 files:
allView.zmv
tmp.zmv
and images containing 1 file:
0.psd

HTH,

[SNARK]

Thanks Marcus.

I downloaded the zip again. It is installed where it is supposed to be. Now, it doesn't show up in the ZPlugin dropdown unless I first go into the ZScript dropdown and browse for the .zsc file. When I manually open this, the utility appears in the ZPlugins dropdown. I have to do this for each session. Transparency is working now.

When I try to save a model position, for example when I line up my model and press the 'store front position' button, my model flips upside down and backwards and centers itself in the middle of my screen. And this is the position that is stored, not my careful line-up.

Your site for the plugin says there should be a file - RefImage2_verA.zsc - but the file in the download is actually - RefImage2_rev1.zsc - is this the same file? If so, then it is where it should be. I must be doing something wrong but I cannot find it yet.

Clues?

~S.~

[Tom Andersen]

:tu: :tu: :tu: :tu: :tu:

Thumbs up for mr civis, AGAIN!
His scripts are the best!

[marcus_civis]

SNARK,

I'm sorry you are still having problems. Can you either post or email me a screenshot of your ZPlugs folder in Windows Explorer? I really think that this is an installation issue. With a correct installation there is no way you should have to manually load the .zsc file. If we get the installation sorted then we can address any other problems.

On your comment about the name of the .zsc file, that's an error in the Wiki which I'll correct. Thanks.

[doron]

if this thing is not an integral part of 2.5, then i will have to stay with 2

[SNARK]

Hey, Marcus.

Here are screen shots of the file tree. Thanks for having a look.

~S.~

RefImage 6 copy.jpg
RefImage 7 copy.jpg
RefImage 8 copy.jpg
RefImage 9 copy.jpg

[marcus_civis]

SNARK,

Thanks for taking the time to post the screen shots. Somehow an extra folder has been created and that's causing the problems. Check out my screen shot to see how the installation should look.

RefImage 6 copy2a.jpg

[SNARK]

Thanks, Marcus.

Everything is working fine now. Funny how that extra folder got in there.

Could I ask a basic question about tools and drawing them on the canvas? When I draw my head tool on the canvas it appears back to front and tilted with the head more down than up. It is a simple correction to re-orient but I wondered if there was a way to control this, a way to instruct the model to appear face forward and vertically alligned. Is this a center pivot issue?

~S.~

[vlad74]

Thank you Marcus.

[marcus_civis]

SNARK,

I'm glad the plugin is now working correctly. :)

Until you press the Store Position button the plugin bases its default positions on how your model is oriented in the Tool>Preview window. So it helps to check that the 'Front' of your model is as you expect in the Tool>Preview window before using the plugin. If it's not, adjust the model's orientation in the Preview window and press Store. The initial Front, Back, Left etc. positions should then be as you expect.

HTH,

[Leo_mG]

Hi Marcus,

Everybody has already said it, but thank you for such an amazingly helpful tool!

Leo.

[Dansh]

great logic zbrush script,ths for share.

[Scott Spencer]

Hey Marcus and Ryan,

Any word on getting a 3.1 version of this script? I like how it lets you load different images per "image plane" and stores multiple model positions as well as project files.
All around great tool!

S

[marcus_civis]

Hey Marcus and Ryan,

Any word on getting a 3.1 version of this script? I like how it lets you load different images per "image plane" and stores multiple model positions as well as project files.
All around great tool!

S

Hi Scott,

Yes, an update is in the works, though with slightly simplified functionality & combined with the Image Plane plugin.

[DR GRiM]

Hello Marcus,

Will your plugin (which I liked in 3.0) will improve speed in any way? So far, using image planes slows down to a crawl my computer (3 gigs of ram + AMD X24600+GeForce 7900GTX 512). I couldn't help notice ZB subdivided imageplanes and lowering the res of the plane will pixelate the picture as well.

Isn't there a way around this? I am thinking this way of handling pics is bound to the ZB engine, but it's troubling to use references, especially if I need to activate the "double" feature in display properties rollout. 10k for 2 planes seems a tad too much IMHO.

Sorry for the rant and drift. I admire your comittment to ZB and hope you can get a better version of the plugin to make our lives easier. Some of us rely on reference (I am an illustrator, if you wonder).

Cyas.

[marcus_civis]

DR GRiM,
If you are using the polypainted subtool method then it is necessary to subdivide the plane, otherwise there isn't enough resolution for the polypainting. But there are other ways of modeling with reference images and the new version of my Image Plane plugin will allow those options.

[spaceboy412]

dr.grim, if you dont want to use the polypaint method just use a low poly plane and add a texture.

[DR GRiM]

Marcus: Thanx for your reply! Hope it will come out soon.

Spaceboy: I am afraid I am too much of a newbie to know of other ways of painting in ZB. I'll have to look it up. What is it named (the other way of painting that is not polypaint)?

CYas.

[Knightstrikes]

I'm currently a new user of Zbrush. I can't wait to start
using this reference image plugin, but it doesn't work on
me. I follow all the info on installing and it's there on the
zplugin and I see all the tools (front,views, etc) but when
I hit to load image. It doesn't load? It gives me an error.

Please help, thx in advance

Knight

I'm attaching what the error looks like. At first, I tried
Image Ref 1. Because I didn't know there was a two.
But still, same error. Thank you for your help.

[M i c h e l]

I would give you a personnal advise : never ever use a script or tool that is NOT for specificly ZBrush 3.1.
I mean don't use anything that had been created for ZBrush 2.0 and even ZBrush 3.0.
You can have weird results !!!!!! maybe destroy your ZBrush app.

But its only personnal ......

Michel

[marcus_civis]

Knightstrikes,

I'm afraid that there isn't a version of this plugin for ZBrush 3.1 at the moment. Until a version is available I suggest you try Image Plane 3 (http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=46396) which will let you load a background image behind your model.

Note also that plugins/zscripts in this 'Archived ZScripts' forum are for earlier versions of ZBrush and may not work with 3.1.

HTH,

[Knightstrikes]

I look forward to the new updated version then. Keep up the great
work guys. You guys rule! :D

Thx,

Knightstrikes

[raulxpt]

Where is the documentation for this tool? It seems really cool and i want to try out! but the link points back to pixologic.com! arg! :(

[marcus_civis]

raulxpt,

Please see my post #45 above.

[rsmith3d]

Are you saying that a plug-in available in the main download page on the Pixologic site doesn't work with the current version of Zbrush? (!) And to discover this information requires searching through pages of forum messages?

This is more or less exactly why using a Pixologic product can be so infuriating.

[marcus_civis]

Are you saying that a plug-in available in the main download page on the Pixologic site doesn't work with the current version of Zbrush? (!) And to discover this information requires searching through pages of forum messages?

This is more or less exactly why using a Pixologic product can be so infuriating.

No that's not the case. The Download Center is in need of updating but it does clearly state at the top of the page that the plugins listed there are for ZBrush 2. Additionally plugins listed here at ZBC in the 'Archived ZScript Utilities' forum are for older versions of ZBrush and won't work with the latest version.

[rsmith3d]

Whoops, missed the asterisked text at the top of the page saying that none of the plug-ins available in the download page are of any use to anyone.

I'm sure this is how other top-tier professional 3d software companies are run as well. In truth, this kind of crap only works when you've got no real competition. I wonder how long that will last?

- Rich Smith