ZBrushCentral

Saving a subtool

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Ok, Im getting pretty comfortable after a few months of using this every day, sceneMGR has been a great help. Mostly have been a 3DS Max user but for my current project, zbrush has proven to be wonderful… so glad I went to the trouble to get it and learn it.

My question is, if I have a tool that has multiple complicated subtools and I want to save just one of the subtools as a .ztl, what is the best workaround for this. I’ve been exporting as an OBJ and then reimporting it, but that seems silly, or you can duplicate the tool and delete all the other subtools but that seems silly.

Thanks

Morgus

#2

You can use Tool>SubTool>Copy and Paste.

Select the subtool you want to copy, press Tool>SubTool>Copy. Then select one of the 3D primitives in the Tool palette and press Tool>SubTool>Paste. This will create a new subtool so just select the top subtool (the primitive you selected) and press Tool>SubTool>Delete. This will leave you with just the one subtool which you can save as a ZTL.

#3

Like Marcus said…

… but I usually just click “Clone” and save that. :wink:

#4

thanks guys…

#5

Doh! Yes, that’s the quickest way. :slight_smile:

#6

Heheh… I always forget about copy/paste… I don’t think I’ve ever used it.

#7

Ok, so am I missing something… I get the copy paste delete primitive – that works but clone makes a duplicate of the tool so you get all of the subtools, there are hundreds in my “scene”, and you delete all but the subtool you want to save… Ive done that …

Is there some clone method other than that that I am missing?

#8

Are you selecting the cloned tool in the tool palette? It won’t be automatically selected but you’ll be able to tell which it is because it won’t have a little number in the thumbnail (which shows it doesn’t have any subtools).

clone.jpg

#9

What is the difference between clone tool and copy paste tool? it seems the same to me.

#10

Clone simply copies the selected subtool only to the Tool palette. Copy Tool copies the whole ZTool (including all subtools) and can be pasted into a new project if desired.

#11

Thanks, it is confusing the contextual help for clone as it says “it creates a copy of this tool” instead subtool.

#12

I don’t know why, but if I hit clone I get a copy of the tool with all of the subtools, unlike what you have shown…

Anyway I’ve since stumbled onto another way, if you hit “Make Polymesh3D” like you would to change a primitive, it makes a copy of the selected subtool and puts it alone as a tool.

#13

Make polymesh also will get rid of layers, polypaint, uvs etc. Not necessarily what you want always.