ZBrushCentral

pre-sales questions on facial morphs?

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

My goal is to create facial morphs that I’d take into 3ds Max.

  1. Can I create morphs from low poly mesh while displaying it using level 3 sub-division?

So, can I edit the lo-poly mesh while seeing the hi-poly end-result?

Or, is there a better way to accomplish this that I haven’t thought of?

  1. Can I get these morphs/blendshapes into 3ds Max 2011 or 2012?

Thanks!

#2

Hi,

  1. It’s not possible to work on one level of subdivision while displaying another level. However, you could create and display a displacement map for the high res detail which would be a good guide while working at low res.

  2. There is a Blend Shapes plugin which currently only works with Maya. If you have Maya you could save out an FBX file which can be loaded into Max.
    Otherwise, until the plugin is updated, you would have to export each blend shape as an OBJ and import into Max.

I hope this helps,

#3

Marcus - are there any tutorials on using zbrush that would demonstrate using the ‘displacement map’?

Exporting to Maya is fine as long as all the blendshapes can be brought into 3ds at once (in a single FBX) rather than a lot of separate files.

Thanks!

#4

See here for a brief tutorial:
Displaying Displacement Maps in ZBrush

I understand that the Maya Blend Shapes > FBX method works fine as a single file. (See here : http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showpost.php?p=799479&postcount=15 )

HTH,

#5

Is the displacement map ‘live’, in that you can edit the model (like creating facial morphs) while viewing the high-res displacement map?

Of, is it just useful to viewing a snapshot of the model, where if you make more changes, you’d have to create another displacement map?

One other question. Does zBrush have a linear workflow (working in linear gamma)? This podcast outlines what I mean: http://www.fxguide.com/fxpodcasts/Compositing_in_Linear/

Thanks!

#6

No, the displacement map isn’t automatically updated. If you need to watch the high res detail you would be better off switching between low and high res subdivision levels.

On linear workflow, I’ve no idea what ZBrush does internally. Exported image files don’t have gamma baked in. ZBrush isn’t a compositing software so I’m not sure what particular workflow you had in mind?

If you have not already tried the trial version of ZBrush I suggest you do so. That way you’ll be best able to decide if ZBrush will satisfy your requirements:

http://www.pixologic.com/zbrush/trial/

HTH,