ZBrushCentral

Best way to create tentacles

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Hi,

I’m creating a squid like creature, but I can’t figure out how to make free flowing tentacles. Zspheres seem like the logical solution, but I don’t know how to add them to the sculpt without seemingly deleting the sculpt. What’s the solution here?

Thanks

Attachments

Squid.jpg

#2

First of all I love tentacles, yes I’m weird.

ZSpheres are a great way to go, but there are others such as Fibermesh, Curve Tubes and so on.

I would start with ZSpheres personally.


  1. With your mesh loaded open the SubTool Palate.
  2. Hit the Append Button and select ZSphere.
  3. Hold down Alt and Click once on the ZSphere on the Canvas, or click on its icon in the SubTool palate.
  4. Turn on Symmetry if you want and start adding ZSpheres.
  5. Hit A to see how things look, hit A again to go back to editing your ZSpheres.
  6. When you are done open the Adaptive Skin Palette and hit Make Adaptive Skin, this will create a new tool that you need to append (This is stupid, I don’t know why it works like this).
  7. Back in the Subtool Pallet hit Append again and select Skin_ZSphere.

The reason I say its stupid (Other than being utterly sick of this problem and all its extra steps) is because all you SHOULD have to do is hit A for preview and then if you like the preview start working. However the Preview isn’t a PolyMesh3D object and hitting the Make PolyMesh3D Button will delete all your subtools with no way to undo. Ergo: stupid.

#3

Thanks man, it worked great, I do see what you mean about stupid though, you should write to Pixologic and point it out.

I’ve gotten this far now, what’s the next step? I clicked on Make Adaptive Skin and Append, but after that I’m stuck. Make PolyMesh3D doesn’t work as you wrote. How do I convert it to DynaMesh so I can work on fine detail?

Attachments

SquidT.jpg

#4

DON’T use Make PolyMesh3D on a subtool, thats when the stupid thing happens.

You need to append the SKIN you made with the Adaptive Skin Pallette…
After that you can hide or delete the ZSpheres as they will be visual clutter.
I recommend hiding them (use the Eye Icon next to it in the SubTool Palette to do this).

#5

What may work well(usually does, because you’ve had more practice) keep your base mesh as a reference and start with a fresh new ZSphere armature getting the major proportions and ZSpheres for nice grouping when converted to a skin and add the tentacles as needed rather than appending things afterwards. My $0.02