some questions

[jubei]

Hi

I'am new and I am making first steps with zbrush, and although I like the program, its very impressive, I got some problems with navigation and 3d modeling. One of the biggest frustrations I've got are:

1.
Moving the object messes the rotation of the object, I was following the pixelators head tutorial (nice tut btw :) and when I first wanted to move the object it just flipped and changed it's rotation, face of the head that was looking at me now is facing the bottom, yes I could move the object but I had to rotate it back to original postion so I could continue working on it, is there anything that I am doing wrong here??!!

2.
My biggest frustration is that sometimes while I am working on the object, I am in edit mode then I choose rotate or move, do some moving and rotation and sometimes object wont go back into the edit mode, edit mode is no longer selectable. It only allows me to create new object, but the old one is there and I cant seam to be able to select it and enter the edit mode again... what am I doing wrong here... I've worked with mayor 3d packages for years and I'm used to being able to easy select the object and work on it. In ZBrush it offens happes that I "loose" the object I am working on and can't select it again and enter the edit mode... any help here?!?!

3.
When in edit mode, I press r for rotate, it stays in edit mode and rotate tool is selected, I try now to rotate, nothing gets rotated, do I have to exit edit mode manualy then enter move/scale/rotate to be able to these operations on the whole object, or is there shortcut that exits edit mode and enters m/s/r that works on the whole object?
It's annoying to have to exit and edit every time I am going to m/s/r the whole object so I can get a better view and then go back into the edit to work on it...

4.
Shortcuts for undo and redo work but the buttons left in the menu are not clickable??

5.
btw, what is the shortcut for panning?

I wish it was easier to navigate when working with 3d in ZBrush, otherwize it is a great program, and I'd hate to give up on it because of the frustration I get with navigation in its "3d space". It should be more intuitive and easier or is it just me?

Thanks alot for any suggestions or help...

[Digits]

Welcome jubei to the forum

Whew! lots of questions! We have all been there, done that. First off, the best way to get a handle on the program is to go thru all the available material. I see you found Pixolator's head tutorial but there is alot more basic stuff in the Quicklinks (located on every forum page) and there are more tutorials that I have linked to at my Z-Place website (link below my sig) Once you get used to the Zbrush way of things you won't have any problems.

briefly

1. The object flipped because you drug inside of the Gyro, This allows you to "Roll" and object over others which is a quick way of placing an object in Z-Depth. What you want to do is to drag the "Grey" part of the gyro, this will move the object in a straight X and/or Y direction.

2. When working on a object you can be in Transform/Move/Scale/Rotate mode without losing your 3D object. Once you have selected another tool, such as a brush etc.. the object that you were working on is snapshot to the canvas and ceases to be editable. (There are tips in the Quicklinks for ways to recover from this, layers, markers etc..) I suspect also that if you are quickly using the hotkeys "T W S R" maybe you are losing track of your edit mode and actually turning off a mode, then when you click it is on the canvas and you actually draw another one of your objects. Slow down and look at the cursor it will tell you what mode you are in. Gyro or a Red Circle you are in a Transform mode

3. I take it you are in Transform "T" mode and you press the R for rotate. Nope! In "T" mode you can Draw,Move or Scale. To rotate your object in "T" mode (while red circle) drag outside your object, this will rotate it, or you can do a quick "T" (get out of Transform) and press "R" for GyroRotate

4. hmmm, you got me, have you gone to document settings (can't remember name of pallete) and specified your configuration for the number of Object and Document Redos? I set mine for 32

5. The easiest way to pan the canvas is to press the "SpaceBar" and drag the canvas
To Zoom press the "+" key or "-" key

Like I say read all the available material and get the docs from Pixlogic. It looks like updated Manuals are on the way

Hope this helps

[Muvlo]

4. I thought I'd mention that there are two sets of undo/redo. One is in the Tool Palette, one is in the Edit Palette. The keyboard shortcuts check what mode you're in and operate the proper set. Hope this may help? :)

[upham]

Hey Jubie
Comming from a 3D background, I was a little confused about ZBrush. I wrote my conclusions in this (http://www.pixolator.com/zbc-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=000691) thread. Check out my diagrams that explain the ZBrush 3D space. Basically you don't have a full 3D world like you do in a 3D package.
Upham