ZBrushCentral

Mesh extract without slight enlargement?

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Is it possible to do a mesh extract, without it creating a slightly bigger version of what you extracted?

I want to cut a nice big hole in my mesh, and mesh extract works PERFECT for that. Only problem is, the extracted texture is slightly bigger and messes up parts of my model. Well, more like thicker. I don’t understand why the thickness is placed on the outside, instead of hidden on the inside…

So is there any way to extract a mesh without that enlargement? Or cut a hole in the mesh another way? (Scaling the model down a bit doesn’t work, because it’s an added thickness on the outside of the mesh.)

#2

Set Tool>SubTool>Thick to 0. This will give you an extraction that adds no depth.

With the Mac version, you can actually use a negative Thickness value, which means it will extract into the mesh rather than out from it. That will be possible for PC users with ZBrush 4.

If you wish to cut a hole through the mesh where the hole has walls, then extraction won’t work. You’d need to use retopology for that. See here: http://www.pixologic.com/docs/index.php/Topology:_Mesh_Editing

#3

Ah thanks.
And yeah, mesh extract works for me because I’m creating a rubber suit, so it gives me a nice hallowed out inside like a real suit. Sucks I can’t do -thick on the PC. Looking forward to ZBrush 4 though, should be awesome :stuck_out_tongue:

#4

try this. store a morph target, do your mask, invert mask, inflate in negative, go to morph palette and do a create difference, it should make a new tool that you will need to append, also you may have to Display: Flip the normals.

#5

Tried, but it only seems to make a mesh of the piece I deflated, instead of the suit.

The mesh extract with 0 thickness worked though. Although I don’t have an inside layer to texture without that thickness. I think i’ll just mesh extract with 0.0001 thick, wont effect my model in any noticeable way then.

Thanks for the help guys.