ZBrushCentral

Questions About the 3.5 Tips & Tricks

We have now created a Tips & Tricks section on the ZBrush Wiki, and you can read the announcement about it HERE.

This thread is for asking questions regarding the various helpful hints found on those pages.

When posting in this thread, please use the following guidelines. Posts that do not use this format will be deleted!


  1. One question per post!
  2. Begin your post with, “Question About XX”. Use the Contents line number (for tips) or artist name (for tricks). For example:

    • Question about Tip 2 (This would be a question about Brushes in version 3.5R3)
    • Question about Joseph Drust (This would be a question about Joseph’s mini-tutorial on using the ReMesh feature.)

  3. Ask your question. Be as specific as possible, and include images if necessary.
Remember: This thread is for clarification of existing tips & tricks, only. Please be sure to limit your questions to only those subjects covered by the Tips & Tricks pages. If your question is about something else, please post it as usual in the Questions & Troubleshooting Forums.

Also, all tips & tricks assume that you are using version 3.5R3. If you are on a PC and using an earlier version, please upgrade by submitting a ticket in the Upgrade category at http://support.pixologic.com.

Do you have a tip or mini-tutorial that you think would be helpful to the community? If so, please submit it to 3.5tips@pixologic.com. Not all user-submitted tips and tricks will be accepted. In order to improve the chances of your submission being accepted, please make it as clear and detailed as possible. Please only submit one tip or trick per email.

AWESOME!!! Thanks pixologic!

For Geert Melis, subeject: Think positive? Try Negative!
Can you make a fool proof guide on how to do those awesome negative “molds”??
Thanks a lot, you rock
Arkon74

Have attempted using this workflow with the default Demohead & polysphere with unexpected results.
Specifically - in edit topology mode when attempting to use the Shift key to add new zspheres it defaults to the smooth1 sketch brush & performs erratically. Either has no effect or places new zspheres in unwanted locations.
Running 3.5R3.

What is the exact difference between the various polish brushes in 3.5 R3 (polish, polishB, polishC, polishD, hpolish, mpolish):qu:

I am also wondering if the answers should be uploaded here : http://www.pixologic.com/docs/index.php/Brush_Types

Thanks in advance, and Happy New Year!

Is it somehow possible to mask or hide polygon loops? UPD: Found the answer. http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=77257&highlight=loop

Hi

please provide me the exact steps to use GOZ and I work with ZBrush3.5R3 , then import in maya .now how can I get exact output like ZBRUSH3.5R3(sculpting,material) with GOZ?

please provide me any tutoriul with step by step process…

and from where I can get the helpfile of ZBRUSH3.5R3?

Thank you. I'm waiting for your response. Surajit Sen India 3D Character Artist-Sculptor-Instructor [email="Sen.surajit@yahoo.co.in"]sen.surajit@yahoo.co.in[/email]

:smiley:

Hey, (hope this is the correct place for this post)

Im looking for poly painting tips in 3.5. I used to use the Layer brush, color spray with alpha 07/08 for more of my painting in ZB 3.1. I really liked the way it blended colors smoothly.
Using the same stock brush and setup in 3.5 (R2-havent installed R3 yet) gives very different results and makes its hard to paint and blend colors with. I tried using the the Standard brush with color spray and same alphas but it doesnt blend nearly as well and the brush seems to lack, or is slow, on its spray.
I would sculpt all my details in 3.5 then bring the model over to 3.1 for poly painting, but Ive had issues loading 3.5 models in 3.1.

Does anyone have any good tips for poly paiting in 3.5?

On another note, being that Im on R2, will R3 plug-ins work or will I need to install R3?

Hi there, somewhat new here.
I had a question about masking and the lasso tool.
In the tutorial by Jeff Felingo about 3d printer he uses the tool not as a square, but abit more controlled and easier to choose parts. I tried all possible combinations, but no result.

Thanks in advance.

Hi there,

Geert Melis showed an image of a Mold at the end of his tips. I tried to reproduce that.

I have a cube in the first layer and the demo head in the second layer set to subtract. When i hit the remesh button i always get my original Cube, as if ZB doesn’t see the second layer (yes the layer’s visibility is switched on).

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Dirk

I’m with Surajit! We need more feedback on this!

I too need some step-by-step info on this. Every time I try to export my Object, Displacement Map, Normal Map and texture map into a “.ma” format, I can never get the Shader network to automatically happen. I get the Object. And i can see the Displacement Map, Normal Map and texture map ready for use in the hypershade window for my scene; however the shader network isn’t built. WHY? I know this is supposed to be ready for me to use, but it’s just not there. The only feedback I’ve been given is that I should reinstall my Maya app. But from doing that, nothing. Openning or importing seems to not make any difference.

What’s up?

Apologies for the late replies in this thread. :o

Rozzetti,

Don’t hold Shift to add new vertices when creating new topology, simply click on the subtool.

pOiNtPuShEr,

More information about sculpting brushes will be available in the online documentation very soon.

surajit sen and RyDarling,

There will be some more information about the workflow between ZBrush and Maya very soon.

AA-ron,
The Stroke palette has some useful adjustments for the Spray stroke. For example, experiment with the Color and Flow sliders. Also, if you haven’t updated to 3.5 R3 you should do so as the plugins are included with the installation (and won’t work properly with earlier versions of 3.5).

Tyki_Mikk,
Switching on the Lasso button (in the Transform palette or bottom right of the UI) will mean that masks and selections can be drawn freehand. Hold Ctrl to mask, Ctrl+Shift to select.

dsoellbuster,
You need to make sure the subtool remesh icons are set correctly. If you don’t want a symmetrical remesh, turn off the options on the Remesh button. Also, the order of the subtools can affect the result.

A tutorial on this will be posted as soon as possible.

HTH,

Just remembered, Can anyone point me in a good direction learning ZSpheres II. Specifically, I need info regarding better control of my poly count. I can’t get my model to have low resolution in some places and a higher resolution in others. Also, I’m working with a full one-piece model. So when it comes time for needing to put things like pores and fine detail, my system won’t allow it. Yes, I’ve already tried to increase the tolerance of the per/object poly count max in the preferences. And Yes, I’ve already tried to work with the resolution setting when using the adaptive skinning (converting to poly’s). Is this the point that I need to consider retopo? If so it would be new to me.

I’d like to get my model up to at least 20 - 25mil polygons.

I’ve looked everywhere for a start to finish production flow for this.

I’m hoping this can be found in the new book from Scott, Paul, and Eric. It’s on my Amazon wish list!

Anyone?

i would like to understand the boolean functions better, i spent all day trying to get something simple to work until i figured out that you need to have the subtools in a certain hierarchy, please elaborate on this.

RyDarling,

I think that probably the best method for having a greater polycount in some parts of your model and not others is to use the re-topology tools. Unified skinning will always tend to produce a high resolution mesh. I agree that some in depth tutorials for ZSketch and ZSpheres II are needed - we are working on expanding the documentation.

spaceboy,

Good point, this needs clarification in the docs. I’ll get to it ASAP.

I just spent the last week re-topoing my model. It’s nice being able to do that with projection and everything. However, I found that there wasn’t a whole lot that I couldn’t have done in Maya. Infact, I found that I was missing Maya in some aspects, i.e. creating edge loops, the vectors not always shooting to the main ZSphere imedeatly after deleting a vertex, like it does in ZBR. not being able to identify edge borders. I’m hoping that the re-topo comes with much more control in the next version.

:rolleyes:
As for everyone giving you (Pixologic) a hard time about ZB4, kick it down a notch!!! Being in there face about it at this point warrants a rush on their part - meaning great things take time and are worth the wait. Is it not good enough that you’ll all be getting ZB4 for free? Our line of work comes with a great need for patience. The last thing we want is to make them create an unstable product!

Hi, I’m new here and to ZBrush. I’ve almost no experience with 3D softwares and never did nothing with them but everything seems to flow smoothly when I play with ZBrush.

This is my forth try, made with no real sculpting skills, just some an average drawing level and a few speed modeling videos on YouTube.

My question goes about the active points management. I’d wish to keep working on the troll head but that’s just the head and its over its limits and it’s not even that detailed (the demo head is much better and it’s only 70,000 total points large). The idea is to add a neck, shoulders and a jacket but I don’t know how to keep adding details without exceeding that number. I’ve tried to export it to Rhino but it’s far too heavy for it (it didn’t load after 15 minutes, while human head did it in 2). Maybe it’s something easy and obvious to resolve but I haven’t figured it out yet.

Whow I save a tool 3.5 r3 in a ZTOOL 3.1?
is possible?

Melis09.jpg

Tips and Tricks. Geert Melis doesn’t explain how this is done. Just pictures of it. I did it before, but now I’m back in zbrush I seem to be missing some step cause I have tried masking, yet the subtool mesh goes right through it instead of forming to it.

http://www.pixologic.com/docs/index.php/Geert_Melis

This uses the Remesh All button.

In my example:

  1. The polycube is the top & selected subtool.
  2. The head subtool has the ‘Subtraction’ operator selected.
  3. The Remesh All button has symmetry turned off.

A higher Res slider value, say 512, will mean more detail is captured.

remesh.jpg

HTH,