ZBrushCentral

Shadowbox basic operation

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Hi there,

This is driving me mad. I must be incredibly thick or have the wrong mindset.

I’m trying to draw an alpha in shadowbox to create a mesh. No key combination I use seems to draw the alpha. The alpha is loaded and chosen in the alpha palette. I must be using the wrong brush, or there is a setting not turned on.

I would be grateful if somebody would please bear with an idiot and tell me the correct procedure for using an alpha in shadowbox.

  1. Does Masking by Alpha have to be checked? (However, this seems to draw the alpha on the back plane of the shadowbox, but not create a mesh.)
  2. Which brush has to be selected, or doesn’t this matter?
  3. Which key combination has to be used (I seem to have tried them all.)
  4. What other settings have to be changed?

Sorry, this may seem like a simple matter to you experienced people, but it’s defeating me. I’m beginning to doubt my sanity.

Can’t get this to work using 4R6 on Mac OSX Leopard, or 4R7 on Mac OSX Yosemite.

Any help very gratefully received, and thank you for your indulgence.

My alpha is the usual 16-bit PSD file.

TL

#2

Once you have your Shadowbox on the canvas…

  1. While holding down Ctrl, select your alpha and then the DragRect stroke.

  2. While still holding down Ctrl, on a blank part of the canvas (not over the Shadowbox), draw out the alpha (click + drag).

  3. While still holding down Ctrl, press the Spacebar to move the alpha over the Shadowbox where you want it. Still holding down Ctrl, resize if you have to. If you still have to move it, press Spacebar again. When satisfied, let go of Ctrl.

#3

You could just click Make 3D in the Alpaha palette :wink: and avoid Shadowbox for that part perhaps?

#4

Thanks zber2 and Doug. That works great zber2, and I will try the other trick Doug.

Sometimes, I feel such a fool. I’ve been using Cinema for some years now, but didn’t really get into ZBrush much. Just investigating its power now.

Once again, thanks to both of you for your help.

All the best – TL

#5

Make 3D is old. That pretty well went by the wayside when Shadowbox came out. First of all you are not going to get the results you expect. It’s hard on resources and takes a long time to compute if you start turning up the MRes slider. You will get much better and quicker results using Shadowbox. There is no comparison at all really.

…

Also, as an alternative to using alphas, you can use textures to get even crisper results in Shadowbox. See my post here for a step by step how to.

#6

zber2 – Yes, I’ve tried the Make 3D. You are right, it doesn’t give as satisfactory a result as ShadowBox.

Like your described Texture method. I’ll give that a go. I’m specially interested in its use for text, coming from a typographical background.

All the best, and thanks for sharing your knowledge – TL