Regards All,
I am using Zbrush 2 on a character I am rigging in Maya. I have to have the UVs set before I finish the rig so I was wondering if I can just use Zbrush to automaticly set up UVs on the model, export it to Maya rig and animate then paint my displacments later and apply them to the model.
I dont need to add any color or anything just the displacment map generated from zbrush.
Thanks,
Scott
PS anyone know when a manual or other pdfs will come out?
Yes, you can use ZBrush to assign the UV"s. What you would need to do is export the remapped model from ZBrush so that you can start rigging it.
When you assign the mapping, do not use an AUV Ratio other than 1. This will prevent seams from showing up in the final displacement.
Regarding the manual, it will be coming out any day now.
Matthew you rock!
Pixologic has the best support ever!
Scott
I’ve had problems trying to import Zbrush AUVtiled .obj into Maya 4.5, so be sure that you test out the UV layout before you get started with displacements etc.
I attribute the problem to the fact that AUVtiles have a very large UV vertex count, and Maya crashed often during import of large polygon count models. I did a tutorial, now obsolete, that fixed this problem for me. It’s actually quite similar to GUVtiles, although not as nice as GUVtiles. You can see it :here:
AUVtiles do work quite well in Maya though. The problems I ran into were on models that had a lot of polygons, like 200,000+ polygons or more. I actually successfully imported a 900,000 polygon model into Zbrush 1.55, but when I assigned AUVtiles too it it no longer would import into Maya. If you look on my site you can see an Ent that I made in Zbrush. The texture, displacement, and other maps, all AUVtiles, works quite well. In fact, I even used a layered shader to apply a different texture map on the Ent, the moss. I was impressed with the results, and I am sure others will be too once they find out the ease of AUVtiles.
My only advice is to check the model in Maya before you go into detailing the model in Z2.
PS: I don’t know how this would work, but it might be worth the experiment. You can have multiple UV sets on your model within Maya, so it might be possible to use Z2’s GUVtile map for a displacement map, and a custom map for the texture. I’ll have to do some more research on it, but I believe that might work as well.
I may be doing this wrong but I tried a quick test. I imported my object to Zbrush. In the projection master I painted a color stripe and a letter on him, picked it back up and went to tools>trexture. I set it to AUV tiles and left the ratio to 1. Exported the model again and imported it into maya. I check the texture and it is distorted.
I assumed that if this basic test worked then I would know I was doing things right when I went on to the more in depth process of creating my displacments since they would use the same UV set in maya. I am new to this so my apologies if this is insanely stupid : P
Scott
Looks like you got a few steps out of order, is all. Here’s what to do:
Create or import a mesh.
Create or import a texture. (Optimal size is a power of 2 such as 512x512, 1024x1024, 2048x2048 or 4096x4096)
Assign UV mapping (if you’re not using an imported mesh with mapping already assigned). For example, to assign GUVTiles you would press Tool>Texture>GUVTiles
Use Projection Master to paint the texture.
Export the mesh (if you’ve assigned UV’s to it in ZBrush) and the texture. You will probably have to flip the texture vertically for it to wrap right in your other program.
Basically, the UV coordinates must be assigned BEFORE painting the texture, rather than after.
Hope that helps!
hi my names louis and in new to zbrush … i have a question … age old one by the looks of it . i have brought in a maya obj file. assigned a texture (chequre) everthings perfect . when i use projection master to paint… guess what … when i pick back up its all distorted …arrrrgh please help
hey louis I’m having trouble bringing in obj’s from maya into zbrush.
do I need a plugin?
thanks mate
since you didn’t state what the trouble was…
try importing by using the polymesh tool…the star shaped one…choose that tool, then go to the tools menu and go down til you see import…there you will have some options for importing…like turning merge on or off…setting weld, turning tris 2 quads etc etc.
most times setting weld to .01 and tris2quad to somewhere between 34-45 works great for me. hard to say without knowing exactly what your problem is tho if this will be your solution…but something to try.