Quality question!

[Pat]

Hey.. :)

I have studied Pixolator's fantastic modelling script that comes with Zbrush. I see that he models and textures the object in the standard document size (640 * 480). When he is doing the texturing I see that he is using a pretty big texture-image (about 2000 * 2000). I understand that this is because getting better details! That is really the way to go!

My question is:

If I work this way, and save my texture and object, open up a new document (2000 * 2000) and scale the object with the texture to that size, will it be any quality losses here?????

I mean, I know that I can scale an object without any losses, but I know that I shouldn't do that with a bitmap file!

But when I did the texture, it allready had a big size (2000 * 2000).

Would really appreciate some help from someone who knows about this!

Thanks!

[aurick]

As you've said, the larger the size of the texture, the more detail that can be worked into it. When a texture of very large size is wrapped onto a small 3D object, some detail is lost in the process -- there simply aren't enough pixels to show it. When the same texture is applied to a large model, it gets to where it depends on the total surface area of the object. The larger the model, the larger the texture will have to be before it starts to get the kinds of distortions that you're talking about. As a rule, there has to be a pretty large discrepency in size before the effect really starts being noticable. But it is possible.

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/zbc_uploads/user_image-1012779220vug.jpg

Here's an example where I took the Jelly Beans texture that comes with ZBrush and wrapped it onto a sphere. The sphere on the left is small, and you see very little loss of quality at all. The one on the right is huge, yet even at the equator where the distortions would be the worst, there is still relatively little jagginess showing up on the edges. It's obviously not as crisply clear as the small sphere's texture, but bear in mind that this is a texture of only 256x256 applied to a sphere with a circumference of approximately 3140 -- 12 times the size of the texture!

The bottom line is that a 2000x2000 texture will suit most of your needs quite nicely. The only time that you might want larger is if you are dealing with a huge canvas that is dominated by a single object.

[Pat]

AHhhh...thank you Aurick!

Now everything became really clear! And thanks for making an image just to make it easier for me to understand, appreciate it!

Sincerely
Patrick

[DeeVee]

Thanks Aurick, that was explained as clearly as good crystal. You do have a talent for passing on information in a clear and concise manner.

[drjjwow]

looks like you got some pretty cool tips from aurick.. thanks aurick