Is there a way to add alphas to the default alpha palette in zbrush 4? As it stands I am having to import each one, instead of having them load at start up.
I saw there were some plugins but for older verisons of zbrush, I tried using them but they didnt seem to work correctly with zbrush 4. They were Gnomons Alpha Library and alpha and texture loader.
Place them in the ZStartup/Alpha folder and they will appear at the bottom of the Alpha container under the default program Alphas.
The default program Alphas live in the ZData/Alpha folder, but you don’t want to mess with these. From my understanding it will effect your programs performance if you add to this folder (someone correct me here if I’m passing along incorrect info on this here.)
Your other option is to put your Alphas in Lightbox. This is done by putting them in the ZAlphas folder. If you don’t have this folder when you open the program folder, you can just create it. Place alphas there and go to lightbox and hold down shift and double click on the alpha image to send it to your alpha palette.
Note if the alpha gets sent to the texture palette its because its not a true greyscale image (its and RGB image). In this case just go to the texture container on the left of your workspace and click “Make Alpha”. Don’t forget to then export that corrected alpha thru the alpha palette into the folder you placed the RGB version. I’d then delete the RGB version from the folder to keep things simple.
Thanks for the reply.
Perhaps I did something incorrectly, but I have the alphas in the zstart up alphas folder as show in the attached image. Yet, the alphas do not appear below the default ones. Please see image below.
Id prefer to keep the alphas I add in the alpha palette than use lightbox.
lol, you picture isn’t showing here up either! Please repost your image.
Oh, and also check to see if those alphas you added are in greyscale or RGB mode. If they are RGB they won’t show up. Pixologic considers those to be textures not alphas. Convert them and they will appear. (also check the extension. I know PSD files do (I always use photoshop format with Zbrush), some others might work, like JPG, but not all do. Do some searching on the docs if you think that may be your problem.
How do I verify if the image is in greyscale or RGB mode? If I open the .psd it reads concrete.psd (RGB/8*). There is no color information though, its definitely in greyscale. Is there a .psd file type extension you save it as to get it to greyscale?
Also these are official alphas downloaded from the online zbrush alpha library, I would suspect they are already formatted correctly to work with the program.
You need to go into Photoshop with the file open and go to IMAGE > MODE, and if greyscale isn’t checked…check it then save the file.
I’m guessing most viewers allow you to set your file to a greyscale pretty easily. IrfanView which is an excellent free (but donate!) program, for example: IMAGE>Convert to Grayscale or shortcut CTL G
Thanks Nancyan converting it to graymode now shows it in the startup alpha palette.
The last issue I am having with this is that it simply names the alpha as “image” when I gave it a distinct name on the .psd which is “concrete01”. Is is possible to modify the name image and replace it?
Please see the image in this link below
http://i722.photobucket.com/albums/ww229/StephanieeChrislol/custom_alpha.png
I really can’t explain why the name has changed to “image”, but I’m sure if you go into the folder it resides in you can just rename the file. You might have to close and reopen Zbrush to see the changes.
Hope that helps and glad you got you alphas where you want them 
