ZBrushCentral

Questions & Troubleshooting for ZBrush 4R8

ZBrush Usage Questions
#301

Not sure if anyone else has this problem.
I made a custom ui for my 4k monitor in z4r8 from scratch. Everything works fine until using surface noise,
when switching to the procedural Noise plugin the ui resolution collapses. ie. everything shrinks smaller.
Exiting the plugin does not cure the resolution problem but a complete reboot does.
This happens in z4r8 and z4r8p1.
Not a major hassle but a bit annoying.

Windows 10
Intel 6700k
32gb ddr 4 ram

Make sure that the Windows 10 high resolution DPI scaling is not running for ZBrush. Right-click on ZBrush 4R8, choose Properties and then go to the Compatibility tab. Make sure that the check box is ticked for “Override high DPI scaling behavior” and make sure it’s set to Application.

If that doesn’t fix the issue, you’ll need to submit a Support ticket.

#302

In 4r7 I had a lot of brushes I had downloaded from other sources. I put them in the Zstartup brushes folder so they would be there when I opened Zbrush. It worked fine and I assumed it would be the same for 4r8. I have all of them in the folder but when I open Zbrush none of them are there. Am I missing something?

How many is a lot?

The ZStartup folders should never contain more than 25 items each. More than that will nearly always result in odd UI issues because it just wasn’t designed for a ton of startup items. The ZStartup folders are meant for items that you use all the time. For everything else, use the regular ZFolders in your main ZBrush 4R8 directory and navigate to those items using LightBox when you actually need them. You’ll reduce UI clutter, save system memory, get a faster ZBrush startup and will avoid having issues with the UI itself.

#303

Is it just me or does the resulting dynamesh from ZSpheres still need to be turned into a PM3D?

No, it’s a polymesh object as soon as you skin it. Are you selecting the newly generated skin mesh in your Tool palette? The ZSpheres are still going to be selected if not. Also, Tool >> DynaMesh >> DynaMesh is going to be active because the generated skin is a DynaMesh. If you want to do things not compatible with DynaMesh, you must turn that off first.

I’m totally confused…
Too many things arent working and I dont know where it starts… or ends.

#304

The “Rigging” tool is missing from my tools. I rely on this tool for doing re-topology. I was curious if its been moved before reinstalling.

Very best regards
-cgreen

It’s still there. But you have to have a ZSphere selected, just as with previous versions.

#305

Heres another couple (heh) of questions:

When ZBrush is doing something that requires a progress bar, is it changing monitor resolution on anyone?
Like the whole window expands and goes blurry then when its done goes back to normal (usually)?

Is anyone else finding that Live Booleans make weird edges, but that ZRemesher (rather than other methods such as Dynamesh even at full resolution) with Keep Groups turned on does a fantastic job of fixing them?
I find this confusing, but since it works I’m thrilled! ZRemesh seems to have improved dramatically some how and I dont know exactly how.

Has anyone else found that all of the sliders now move to diferent numbers than they did before, and if so would this have anything to do with button size?

Is anyone haveing issues with the change, or rather loss of MatCaps?
I’m finding that on files made prior to 4R8 my matcaps are trashed and that I cant fix them.

Is anyone else haveing a new issue with the task bar getting stuck behind ZBrush rather than the equally annoying problem of it being stuck behind it? And if this is an actual problem, are you also finding it impossible to minimise ZBrush until you use Alt Tab to get to another window?

Most of this I suspect is just me being confused, but I dont honestly know.
This update happened at the same time as Windows Creators addition forced itself on my computer. It didn’t go well.
I got home to it being blue screened and one of my videocards, a hard drive and my wacom tablet not working. I fixed the HD, and the Wacom Tablet, but I think my Nvidia card is toast.
In the long run, I cant tell which problems are windows, and which are me not understanding new stuff in ZBrush.

#306

@MeaLeaYing

Something Marcus mentioned recently is perhaps worth pointing out here. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the screenshots I’ve seen you post are typically 1600 x 900? If that’s indicative of your screen resolution, it is below the “highly recommended” specs for Zbrush. In that scenario, display/UI related issues are to be expected, even if everything is working correctly in zbrush.

#307

Spyndel, that’s correct, 1600x900. It’s never been a problem though, and my UI is now so small due to font (button) size and loss of buttons (Scroll, Zoom, Actual, and AAhalf for example (I need to put those back actually, I used them all the time)) that it has far more space than it did before. It’s actually smaller than it was in 4R7 by a lot in some places.
Actually I need to expand things slightly because its hurting my eyes. Not even the top where there’s all sorts of stuff I never use but cant get rid of is too full.

The taskbar thing is a known Windows 10 problem, and its back. Only weird.
The resolution thing though makes no sense, I have more room than I did before because of the button size thing (thanks to the people with insane monitors for that one).

Does resolution actually affect tool slider resolution? Im guessing that if thats the case then they are a type of button.
The EdgeLoop Displacement slider is a good example, it used to scroll to 0.037 with the mouse with little problem (it was sensitive, but doable), now you need to use great precision to get it to 0.03546 . This is a weird change, but one that slams workflow to a halt so you can type stuff in by hand. 0.037 is disturbingly precise in an environment that has no measurement system to speak of, its a tiny fraction of a human hair, but 0.03546 is five friggin decimal places! I cant measure an inch or a foot, but I can split the atom! hehehe!!!
I bet this gives people with 4K displays a fit.
Can you even see a pixel at that resolution?

The other stuff I know isn’t my monitor, my problems with ZSpheres I guess might be me not understanding the changes and the documentation.

What ever it is that changed with ZRemesher its a hundred times better than it was in 4R7, I friggin love it, and its almost completely replaced Dynamesh for me. Im wondering if anyone else has noticed this.

Anyway,
I have space left over:RoomLeftOver.jpg

Attachments

RoomLeftOver.jpg

#308

What is your display?

#309

Make sure that the Windows 10 high resolution DPI scaling is not running for ZBrush. Right-click on ZBrush 4R8, choose Properties and then go to the Compatibility tab. Make sure that the check box is ticked for “Override high DPI scaling behavior” and make sure it’s set to Application.

Ah, I see. thank you for your reply. This has appeared to of fixed the surface noise UI issue. All I had to do after your instructions was to scale my UI fonts in the Preferences tab.

Cheers, Neil

#310

@MeaLeaYing

It sounds reasonable to assume that decreasing the size of a slider on the interface would affect how granular the result is when dragging on it, because you’re covering a much greater numerical range for the same amount of physical drag as you would at a larger size-- but I don’t know for sure. It seems like something easily testable if you really wanted to know.

#311

@Spyndel
You are right, I can test that.
I was just speculating as about all I do lately is test stuff trying to fix things. Not just in ZBrush, but my computer in general.

#312

Welcome to the digital age. I just spent a week troubleshooting and replacing all our networking gear, cable by cable, after a lightning strike.

#313

@Spyndel
Thats horrible.
The only consolation I can offer for that is at least Microsoft doesn’t know how to make lightning.

Testing it went poorly, I’m just going to live with it, its happened before and I suppose it will happen again.

#314

Hey, guys! This is my first time in the forum, and I’d like to know if some of you have experienced trouble exporting to fbx. I was trying to export a model and ZBrush just crashed. Like it went nuts and never finished the export, and when I clicked it showed a window saying the program had crashed blah blah…
Could you guys help me out? I found absolutely no answers on google, thanks!

Please submit a Support ticket at https://support.pixologic.com.

Thanks!

#315

I have problems with my Wacom tablet. I can’t touch the top menu bar with my pen (the whole interface will shoot downwards to the bottom of my screen, sometimes it will disappear and I have to force quit…) nor do a save action with the pen. Plus, quiting zBrush etc via the menu cannot be done by pen. I will have to use my mouse to do all of that. For the rest the pen works reasonably well. Although sometimes it is funky and when I press tabs , panels and buttons, it will open the one below. Upon re-starting zBrush (also pretty annoying), it will work normally again. Apart from the above-described issues.

It uninstalled and re-installed the driver software at least 3 times. And tried all sorts of different options to see if I could resolve the problem.

Can anyone give me a suggestion how I can solve this?

#316

@liseng:
I have an Intuos4 also, and had serious problems with it as well. Mine were diferent than yours, but Im running Windows.
I have it working fine now by uninstaling all the current Wacom stuff and installing an older driver. I dont know what version to suggest for a Mac, but try dropping back one at a time till it works.
Do uninstall first, that made a big difference for me for whatever reason.

#317

Hello [MealeaYing
Thank you! I tried the older versions and regretfully, it didn’t seem to do much. I will just have to work in zBrush a bit handicapped I guess.

](http://www.zbrushcentral.com/member.php?229759-MealeaYing)
#318

Hi guys, usually the new gizmo allows you to temporarily unlock it by alt clicking on controls like mesh-to-axis, however when there’s another subtool below the gizmo controls (and you have Auto Select Subtool enabled) you end up switching subtools. I do it a lot. It’s behaving as if the gizmo control interface doesn’t exist or is behind the 3d object though it’s drawn on top of it. This doesn’t happen if you drag, only when you click, as though the event handling clicks has the object select check before the gizmo click check (or is anding instead of oring)

Subtool picking also unexpectedly happens when I’m trying to alt click verts on my object and they’re partially hidden behind a subtool but clearly visible in XRay mode. It’s super awkward as I have to go into solo mode just to move my pivot, or manually click the pivot lock first and then again after. With the transpose line I became very used to doing this as you just dragged out a line with left click. The new alt click functionality basically just has a few overlaps with alt click subtool selection that need a little reordering. I guess what feels intuitive to me is, as we’re using the gizmo as an interface element, operations related to it should always overrule the alt-click to select a subtool.

One workaround is to just drag every time you want to click on home/reset rotation etc, but it’s just too odd to really stick as a habit for me. For now I’ll turn off direct subtool selection and hit n (pick through the wee subtools) but I sure would like to keep it on if possible!

Gizmo-Alt-Click-Issues.png

Thanks!

#319

Just a small niggle from me. When selecting a subtool in the subtool palette, I have to double-click on it. I don’t remember doing that in 4r7, as far as I remember a single click was all it took. I’m wondering if there is a way to change it.

#320

@dillster

Just one click (mouse) or one tap (pen) switches subtools for me. There is a very slight delay when it switches but otherwise normal. Does it do it with both pen and mouse? Maybe a driver problem.