ZBrushCentral

Shadow Box Question

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Hello,

I am watching the youtube video on ZBrush 4 - ShadowBox and Clip Brushes (video link here)

At 3:28 into the video. it appears that the shadow box is turned off when he draws a rectangular mask to protect the left half of the object. He then flips the object and begins trimming.

  1. Do the clipping tools work with shadow box off? It doesnt seem so. So then how he he trimming with no shadow box at 3:28 in the video? (Or even before that actually).

  2. I don’t see how the rectangular mask he lays down protects anything since I assume he is clipping by holding control alt to remove masks from the shadow box (which isnt showing…)

Help!! :lol:

#2

"1) Do the clipping tools work with shadow box off? It doesnt seem so. So then how he he trimming with no shadow box at 3:28 in the video? (Or even before that actually).

  1. I don’t see how the rectangular mask he lays down protects anything since I assume he is clipping by holding control alt to remove masks from the shadow box (which isnt showing…)"

If you are working with a copy of Zbrush this is an easy thing to test for yourself, and probably a good way to retain information. The simple answer is you must turn the shadow box off to use the clipping brush or you will clip the shadowbox. Note that the shadowbox itself appears as a tool/mesh/object in the subtool subpalette of the tools palette. Give it a try it won’t break your computer and you can press CTL Z to undo.
So if you want to use the clipping brushes, “hide” the shadowbox by turning it off and clip or mask and clip. You can also re-show the shadowbox and continue to draw out masks and repeat this process until you’re happy with your results, but each time (at least in my experience) you return to shadowbox, you mesh “softens” a bit more.

#3

In case anyone else is as wet behind the ears and as dense as me, here are the things I missed in that video.

He does actually turn off the shadow box.
He changes from clipping in shadowbox with alt-click (mask) to clipping outside of shadowbox with shift click (clipping tool).