sBend Deform is distorting my model. Need help learning how to control it please!

[bladerender]

Hi ZBC, struggling new zbrush user here. I have modelled an alligator leather strap and I’m trying to curve it in a nice, natural way but I’m getting weird distortions when using the sBend Deformation. It sort of skews the strap rather than just curving it evenly. The top padded part (where the springbar goes) is getting squashed flat, which looks a bit silly. Could somebody please point me in the right direction of how to curve the strap in a more controlled way? There are several different subtools (stitching upper and lower, back leather and top leather) so those all need to maintain their position to each other - any deformations I make need to equally affect the other subtools. I have attached images of before and after the sBend deform to illustrate my daft and probably easily-solvable noob problem! Many thanks in advance.

Attachments

[Spyndel]

I have modelled an alligator leather strap and I’m trying to curve it in a nice, natural way but I’m getting weird distortions when using the sBend Deformation. It sort of skews the strap rather than just curving it evenly.

The deformations in the tool>Deformation palette require centered geometry. If your mesh has been moved off center to some degree in the Zbrush world space, or is significantly asymmetrical along the bending axis, it will not deform evenly.

Could somebody please point me in the right direction of how to curve the strap in a more controlled way?

With the new R8 Gizmo, there are several new deformers that are caged based, allowing you to specify the resolution of the cage, and drag the control points to deform.

http://docs.pixologic.com/user-guide/3d-modeling/modeling-basics/gizmo-3d/deformers/

There are several different subtools (stitching upper and lower, back leather and top leather) so those all need to maintain their position to each other - any deformations I make need to equally affect the other subtools.

The Gizmo can be used to move and scale multiple subtools at once, but it wont work with more advanced deformations like bend. You’ll have to either merge the subtools to apply the defomration at once to all of them, or make use of Transpose master if they have levels of subdivision:

http://docs.pixologic.com/user-guide/zbrush-plugins/transpose-master/

[bladerender]

Hi Scott, thanks very much for your reply. How would I use these two functions together? I’ve actually never used either but I had a read of the documentation just now. Would it involve making a combined mesh in transpose master and then deforming it using the Gizmo and somehow copying that deformation back to the original subtools? Your further guidance would be greatly appreciated.

[Spyndel]

If you need a deformation to affect multiple meshes in exactly the same way, they need to be part of the same subtool. This would mean merging those subtools into a single tool using a subtool> merge operation, performing the deformation, then splitting them back up again if you need them to be separate. OR you could use Transpose Master, which automates this process. TM is most useful when there are multiple levels of subdivision involved, but it could still be used in this situation.

Refer to the documentation on Transpose master for how to use it. It basically creates a unified version of all visible subtools at their lowest subd level, which you then pose or deform, and it transfers the changes back to the unmerged tool.

In the future, consider keeping all meshes that might need to be affected at once as a single subtool, and simply assigning them to different polygroups to be able to work on them individually or concurrently as desired.

[bladerender]

Thank you very much for the explanation. Is there an automated way of converting the subtools into separate polygroups of a single subtool? If I could do this, I guess I would be able to split them to separate subtools again.

[Spyndel]

Polygroup assignment, isolation, and manipulation is generally accomplished with a combination of the visibility shortcuts:

http://docs.pixologic.com/user-guide/3d-modeling/modeling-basics/mesh-visibility/

Polygroup assignment operations:

http://docs.pixologic.com/reference-guide/tool/polymesh/polygroups/

and masking shortcuts:

http://docs.pixologic.com/user-guide/3d-modeling/modeling-basics/masking/

To get the most out of zbrush, you’ll want to commit the visibility and masking shortcuts to muscle memory, and familiarize yourself with the various methods for creating polygroups. The fastest way to convert multiple, non-contiguous meshes in the same subtool to separate polygroups is often the “auto groups” feature, but sometimes you will simply need to hide geometry and group the visible polygons with Ctrl-w.

[bladerender]

Thanks! I will familiarise myself with these commands

[bladerender]

I worked out an easy way to solve my problem! I just needed to play around with the other deformers in the deformation panel. A combination of sBend in the X axis and Size in the Z and Y axes made the shape I was after. Each time I made a deformation, I just clicked the repeat to other button so the other subtools followed along. Eventually it worked out!