ZBrushCentral

Displacement maps and blendshapes

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Hey guys, first post, so don’t kill me if this has been asked a million times!

My friend showed me how to use Zbrush the other day, and I got all excited and did a little sculpture of a character i’ve been meaning to model in Maya. It’s not finished but I really like how it’s looking so far.

http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/8703/oldladyfront.jpg http://img532.imageshack.us/img532/8533/ladyzbrush.jpg

the problem is, of course, the model is completely unusable for animation purposes. What I’m thinking of doing is using it as a reference to try and remodel it with curves in Maya.
Does anyone have a better suggestion?

Also, I know that once I have a model in maya, i can take it into zbrush, reshape it, and then use that a displacement map in maya. But I was wondering how that works for animation purposes on the face when I’m intending to use blendshapes? Do the two not clash?

I imagine zbrush is very useful for games, or for things that don’t need to be animated very carefully. I wonder how useable it is for the character animator?

#2

i got the same

#3

It’s VERY useful. You’ll likely have to use some of the ZB plugs and tools to Optimize the mesh a bit and retopologize some of the edges. Do yourself a favor and do a searches on the forum on “retopology” and “Decimation Master.” Also, there is a list of films in which ZB has been used to one extent or another to create characters for animation.

#4

Oh thanks a lot. That’s very useful, I didn’t know the option even existed! I’m gonna have a look. Are there any links you can direct me to?