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Subtools using one Map?

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

So here is an issue I need help with. I have recently created a suit of armor with each piece being a subtool. I’ve gone ahead and polypainted each piece separately. Now I want to bring the model into Maya and apply maps and shaders.

Is there a way to combine all the subtools into one object while preserving the polypainting and high sculpt detail. I was thinking there is a way I can do this, so I can do a quick AUV tile to the whole armor and just import to maya as one .OBJ file with one color,normal,spec map. I’m using the mac version and I tried merge visable at sub-d level 7 but I got a ram error because the polycount is way too high.

#2

you’re not going to be able to do that…unless your machine can handle the polycount of all the tools combined…and it will probably crash during the AUVtiles even if you could get it all together.

So basically, no, you can’t do what you want to do…at least not in any way I can think of.

#3

What you could try is this:

  1. Make sure each SubTool is a single polygroup, then Merge Visible at the lowest subdiv level with the ‘Weld’ option turned off (so that the vertex number is not changed).
  2. Assign UV mapping to the single low res mesh.
  3. Group Split the UV mapped mesh and export each new SubTool as an OBJ.
  4. For each of your original SubTools:
    (i) Import the relevant OBJ exported at (3) above and generate Normal/Displacement maps.
    (ii) Switch to the highest subdivision level to generate a texture map from the polypainting.
  5. Combine the various maps into a single map in Photoshop before applying to the low res mesh in Maya.

You might consider UV mapping in Maya so that you are better able to see what’s what for combining the maps.

HTH,