ZBrushCentral

Create a 3-D relief from photo

Hey all, I am a new z-brusher and have just gotten into the tuts. My mind is a spinning now! This is one crazy app! But looking really cool so far.

Here is my question, would it be possible to take a good photo of a human subject and create a good quality relief type sculpture of it???

The reason I ask is, I am a toy sculptor and model maker for the toy industry. I use Rhino, Light wave, Free form and a littel Maya for all my work in toys.

I model the parts, sculpts or models in one of the apps I use now and all the parts are then milled on my CNC milling machine. If you would like to see some of my work check me out at www.bnt4cncrp.com

I would like to know if there is a way to use the Alfa channels and misc. functions in zbrush to create a 3-D relief’s of say your kid and you or hub or wife type of thing. Or by using existing pictures. “ I know YA RIGHT! Ha! The model would then be milled and framed to create a 3-D picture, at least this is the concept.

There are other apps on the market that do this type of thing BUT just dose not get it right. Maybe zbrush could do it. HUM!

Thanks Much
Bill B

Sorry my web site is

www.bnt4cncrp.com

just typed it wrong.

Yes. That is the simple answer, always is.

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=021784

Some people have also posted heads modeled from images.

I’ve taken the final models and exported as OBJ then through various apps that create STLs for me that then get returned as wax models. Always nice to have your creations in your hands. :smiley:

Any image can make an Alpha :slight_smile:
You have an automatic function Make3D from an Alpha :rolleyes:
So…
Pilou
Ps For your bad adress you can Edit your post :slight_smile:

Since I am new to zbrush I am really excited to see how this might work. Would anyone be interested in illustrating this for me with a quick screen shot of how it might work.

Thanks

Bill,

I have sent you an email through the link to send email. I did not get any confirmation that it was sent, so if you did not get it, please let me know.

Regards,
Chris

The main difficulty with this is getting the alpha that zbrush would use in the first place.

A photograph, even b/w and not considering lighting directionality, of a person’s face is not the same as the grey-scale alpha that would need to be used to recreate that face.

ZB won’t convert a photo into an alpha that can accurately reproduce a face, but if you could generate an alpha that can, then ZB would be able to use it.

what i hear from your question is not really a zbrush issue. Eyetronics can take a picture with a camera that also projects a very fine grid across the surface of the object which is then used by their own software to create a 3d surface. and there are other scanning methods out there like that but zbrush will not take a photo to 3d. you would have to sculpt it from the photo and that is no different than any other program.

looked through your site. very intersting work. I would love to pick your brain about what you do as i am very interested in rapid prototyping for my digital sculptures.

best,

r

The dream of every zbrusher : a 3d printer!

I’ve played with this and the problem is that camera’s can’t take what essentially needs to be z-buffer frames of the persons head.

The best way I’ve found is to use it as a stencil and make the broad gradient type relief based on that(in the shape of a head) and then fill in the details with a smaller brush size or a custom created alpha from photoshop.

The details of hair, eyes, ears, ect are all easy to map depth to in photoshop because there isn’t much depth change, just small details…

Finally using the photo as a guide, use the custom alphas to paint in the eyes, nose, ears, mouth ect in the right spots, and you have a pretty clean relief.

Not plug and play, but doesn’t take too long once you get the hang of painting the initial relief, getting the edges and flow of the mesh down.

You could use Poser5 to take front and side shot of the head to get the basic shape laid out and kinda looking like theperson then export the head, neck, eyes out as obj.

import that into zb, up the subd a few times, sculpt any extra details you might need, then set the model to face you, snapshot it to the canvas then use mgzgrabber tool to grap up the screen…it will create a depth alpha you could then use to create a 3d tool with.

Or something like that. The thought just occured to me so havent had a chance to try it but it should work. Maybe hahaha.

well here’s a quickie…poser5 to zbrush

sorry i didn’t have any pics front and side of someone famous so you could “see” better but should give you an idea.

posertest3dalpha.jpg
hopefully the crappy crunching of the pic doesn’t kill how it looks too much:D

the pics with red arrows indicate the alpha with various different alpha curve settings so you can see how you can make it better or worse for doing the make3d from alpha.

Obviously the face on the right is the poser model, at about 250000 polys, I couldn’t subd anymore cuz this computer is a tank. I then snapshot it to canvas, and used the grabber tool to get the alpha.

the face on the left is the make3d result using that middle indicated alpha.

Dont know if that helps at all but there it is.

ps…if you have a front and side view of someone, either send it to me or post it here and I will give it a go for ya and post the results. Keep in mind it will be done quickly cuz this is my busy time of year.

Hey all,

I thank you much for the input on this subject. As I suspected only in a perfect world. However based on some of the answers I’m not sure I got my point across. What I am looking to do is create a very shallow relief of the subject matter.

Here is the scenario. I want to take an existing picture or take a new picture of your spouse and you or kids type of thing with a nice background. Bring it into zbrush and create a very shallow relief at an approximate picture size of 4x6, 8x10 with a depth of say no more than ¼ - 3/8 thick. The subject mater and background would then be processed for cnc milling of the final composition framed and bam! instant 3-D photo. Of course I want this to happen on the fly inside zb with very little Photoshop or manual manipulation of the picture. Ok stop laughing!

I am not looking to create a full 3-D object here. The idea is to think 3-D photograph. Am I still dead in the water? Or could zb do a variation of this? In fact the final image could actually be somewhat sketchy in nature and have an artistic flare to it, almost a oil on canvas type of feel. I am not looking for extreme accuracy It may not be necessary, however the identification and likeness is key.

So what do ya think? :+1: :-1:

Have you tried bringing the photo in, applying to a plane mesh and suddividing a few times and using the layer brush to add the depth, make sure you only add it in Z, not X and Y. Then make a polymesh out of that, to redistribute the polygons more evenly. In essence that would give you what you want and an OBJ can be transformed into milling machine data through various software apps. Very similar to the approach I posted with the link to matte paintings the Spaceman started.

Even as a relief, I think the same limitations would apply because the alpha generated from the photo would not give the necessary elevations to reproduce likeness. This would also be highly dependent on how the subjects were lit when they were photographed.

As an example, say the subject was lit from the side with a bright light, one cheek would be bright in the alpha and thus raised high in the relief, whereas there would be a dark shadow on the other cheek from the nose. This shadow would be dark in the alpha and not raised much, if at all.

Another example would be highlights; on a face the brightness of highlights is often the same on the nose, forehead, cheeks etc. These would all then be of an equal brightness in the alpha and, therefore, raised to the same extent, which clearly wouldn’t be correct.

There is some software available that will generate 3D head models from photos but I can’t recall its name, although it did have the word ‘face’ in it. If you could find that you might get a better idea of what would be involved to accomplish what you want.

Linked on spiraloid a while back. If it works it’s pretty neat, but then you wonder why no-one else is doing it… anyways:

http://www.di3d.com/virtualclones/vc_3dphotos.html

Animation

Yes there is a way to do it but since you are going to be cutting it on a Mill you are going to need a VERRY fast computer for Master CAM to read that file. To get very good results you are going to need a mesh in excess to 1,000,000 polys to look good. As far as bringing it into other apps you can decrease the resolution a whole lot by using displacement maps but as far as i know there is no way of doing anything like that in cnc. We use a Haas VF2 mill here and ive had pretty good results cutting some poly stuff that ive created in Maya but Master Cam usually farts out with anything over 10,000 polys but we are using some dinosaur computers too. Im not shure what Cad Cam program you are using but you may want to check out how well it works because Master CAM is kind of a RAM hog but what you are using may be a lot more ram friendly.

As far as using a picture goes yes it can but you may need to do a few things before it will work right. First it needs to be greyscale. Secound there cant be any lighting imformation. What you are going to have to do is bring it into photoshop and kind of paint over the values which you need based on distance instead of lighting very simular to what was in aminuts reply. So with that said I personally think that it would be easier for me atleast to just model whatever you need from scratch and do it that way. by doint that you can also use the mesh in projection master to create a relief that way and you should get much better results without too much time diffrence. Another option depending on what you are trying to use this for is to just do some regular 2d line drawings and create your tool paths that way. If it is going to be used as more of a piece of art or something like that that may be a way to go. It will have more of a abstract kind of look to it but sometimes that will acually have a better impact on what you are going to create. Ive done it that way many times and in certain cases it acually looks better. Also by doing it that way it makes your tool path creation a heck of a lot easier and will cut down you time on the machine from taking a few hours to taking a few min.

Good luck,
Karl

Hi Bill,

We spoke on the phone a couple of weeks ago if you recall. I’m in Ohio and I’ve got the MDX 15 if that helps to jog your memory.

Anyway, I have had the same idea, but I haven’t put much thought into it yet. One thing that has occurred to me is that I could use the function in rhino that can turn a picture into a relief. I suppose you’ve tried that and found it unsatisfactory?

Hey Bill, Ya I remember. So ya man I am actually trying to figure this out I am dam close. I just recently discovered ZB to add to my never ending list of modelers I use. ZB is one of the most amazing apps I have used and seen yet period. I would like to shake hands with the development team.

But anyways I think with a MDX-15 it will do the job but with way to many machining time. And running it in Modela 4 will KILL YOU, you will never get tool path gen times up fast enough to make it profitable. I am doing some testing now and I have a machining time of about 1hr and 15 min. NOT BAD AT ALL! The part size is your basic 4x6 picture size. I may be posting images on the form soon.

As far as Rhino is goes it will not happen, I have been scouring the application world for along time now. I have tried other apps that claim it can work but just dose not do it. And they are really high cost apps. ZB may just be the ticket.

If I make this all happen I am taking BNT Studios on the road, fairs, Venice beach, the mall ect. Type of thing. I really think I have something here. I know I’m not the first to think about it but I WILL be the first to do it if it all works out. All I have to do now is learn ZB in and out, as I now only have the tip of the ice burg. I really don’t know what the hell I am doing with it now.

Hey, you keep in touch if you need any help on the cnc side of things.

Did you check out the jewelers burs yet.
Bill B
BNT
www.bnt4cncrp.com