Hi 
I have a mesh that I have imported from 3dsmax as a tool and I am going to make a high poly version of it for making a bumpmap for the mesh. My question is I have a design that I made in adobe photoshop and I want to imprint it on the side of the mesh. I imported the image into the alpha palette succesfully, however, I am stuck on how to go about imprinting the image into the mesh without loosing control of the mesh.
Thanks!
After importing the tool, draw it into the canvas, and set draw mode. If you need more polygon resolution, subdivide the geometry more (Geometry pallet.) From your brush pallet, select the clay brush; from the stroke pallet select “drag-dot”; from the alpha pallet, select your imported alpha pattern.
You should then be able to drag a copy of your alpha around the surface of the object. Wherever you let go with the drag-dot stroke, the alpha should be imprinted on the surface of your model.
An alternate technique would be to apply your alpha as a mask. This can be done by selecting your alpha with any of the sculpting brushes and dragging our a rectangular mask. Once you have masked with your alpha, you can then use “inflate” tool from deformations tab in your tool pallet to get a regular amount of deformation around your alpha.
Either technique (as long as you stay in “draw” mode and do not “drop” the tool–your model) will leave you in control of your mesh. You can then re-export your deformed mesh into Max or generate maps from it.
HTH,
-K
And yet another method would be to use the alpha as a stencil (via the Alpha>Make Stencil button). You can then move, scale and rotate the stencil by activating the coin controller by pressing spacebar. You can also make some modifications to the stencil via the Stencil palette. (For example, it can wrap onto the model.)
You can sculpt through the stencil.
hi,
i am having a question regarding alpha masks:
in zbrush 2 it was possible to drag an alpha mask not only from outside the object but also while the mouse pointer is on the object: the way to do this was to switch to move mode.
since zbrush 3 (or so) move mode brings the topology-alpha mode with it, it does not allow to drag alpha maps as described above (from a point which lies over the geometry).
I hope there is a way to apply alpha masks as in zbrush 2 move mode - without using a stencil
is there a way to do this?
I hope, you understand my question…
regards m