I did not know this about rendering in Zbrush

CWR63 · September 16, 2019, 6:49pm

I am posting this in case I’m not the only user who was unaware of this - it has, for better or worse, doubled my rendering workload. The Render Menu:
Capture
Preview is on by default. Every once in a while I’d switch it to best and export the document to get that nuanced shading, but I thought that Best Preview Render must switch to Best automatically, right? It’s in the name.
Nope.
Here’s a BPR in Preview mode with Zhelong Ink NPR:

BPR in Best Mode with same:

(Fast and Flat are not really finished render modes in this case) So now not only do I have all these materials + colors x Non Photographic Filters…it’s all doubled by render modes. I have 340 renders of this freaking logo to comb through now…I thought fonts were bad. Speaking of which, nobody offers a comparable 3d chiseled font of this sort, so I may make up an entire alphabet of this when I have a spare moment - in like, twenty years…

Spyndel · September 16, 2019, 8:21pm

Hi @CWR63

Sorry you’re having some trouble!

“Best” render mode and BPR are two separate rendering modes. The Best rendering mode is a legacy rendering mode and can be required for some 2.5d effects. BPR is a later addition with its own separate settings, works only with live meshes in edit mode, but can be used in conjunction with Best Render mode for certain 2.5d effects.

Generally speaking, BPR is a better choice for rendering 3d models.

CWR63 · September 17, 2019, 10:09am

Well, they are both BPR…renders (sorry, it’s like saying ATM machine). Looking at the online manual there is now a notice about combining the best render with BPR, but when is the last time you’ve perused the manual? I’ve only used Zbrush for 3 years now, and have never done anything in the 2.5D part of the program, nor used the QuickSketch feature (which seem like legacy features of this decades old software). Pretty drastically different results, though, here are document exports: