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Zbrush 3.1 too Maya 2008 Displacement and Normals - My first tutorial :)

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I am faily new to zbrush and had quite a bit of troubling working out how to get my work out of zbrush and into Maya 2008. Now i have figured out a way I think might be useful to others and decided to make a bit of a tutorial. First i recommend using this link to setup and export your displacement maps.

Please note this is my first tutorial and apologise for its lack of pictures etc. Let me know if your having any problems I am no expert but will try.

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=43264&highlight=.map+converter

Now because you will have trouble rendering anything above 3-4 subdivisions in maya here is a bit of a work around that gave me good results.

Once you have the displacement working in zbrush:

  1. Say you have it subdivided twice with your displacement and are still missing a lot of fine details. Go into zbrush and match the geometry division to the ones your are getting with your displacement in Maya.

  2. Delete the lower divisions and go to zmapper and export the normals from that level.

In zmapper

-Click on open configuration choose Maya_TangentSpaceNode_BestQuality.zmp

-I usually move the seam over paint just over half way.

-You can increase your samples and subdivisions too, changing these does take longer to generate but will get better results. I usually use samples at 2 and subdivide at 3

-make sure flip vertically is selected as maya works this way.

-click create normal map… now wait a bit

-once it is done go to the texture menu on the top bar TEXTURE>EXPORT and save it somehwere nice.

  1. Ok back in maya with the displacement working open the texture you are working on in the attribute editor.(by double clicking on it)

  2. Youwill probably notice the displacement has taken up your bump slot this can be broken and shouldnt affect your displacement map. Right click on bump and choose break connection.

  3. Now that it is free add a file node and select you normal map from zbrush. (I am already assuming you have UVs otherwise none of this would work)

  4. Now go to the bump node that is linking to your normal map file and there should be a drop down box that says BUMP. Click on this and change it to TANGENT SPACE NORMALS

Now using mental ray hit render and it should be looking pretty much how your model looked in zbrush.

Good Luck