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Z3 thoughts/suggestions...(Subtools & Layers, Transpose...)

ZBrush Usage Questions
#1

Originally posted this to talk about possible subtools & layers enhancements or workarounds, but changed the title to reflect additional suggestions for Z3 enhancements as I “discover” them through use of the program…

SUBTOOLS & LAYERS…

Subtools remind me of photoshop layers (and I realize ZB3 has a layers feature in addition to subtools).

However, it seems to me that ZB3 (whether in subtools or layers) is lacking some features that would help workflow. Perhaps a plugin would help…

Some ideas for subtools or layers enhancement…

select multiple - First, we need a select multiple option to be able to select multiple subtools at once (and then assign different attributes if necessary)

link - be able to link subtools to sculpt or transpose multiple subtools at once (at least transpose). Link selected, link visible, link all…

merge - be able to merge subtools (or layers) together so they are treated as a single object. Merge selected, merge visible, merge all…

group - be able to group multiple subtools (like under a folder in PS) together so that they can be made visible/not visible or transposed or sculpted together as a group. Group selected, group visible…

opacity - change the opacity of subtools, so that they can be something other than just visible or not visible. This way you can keep track of the “form” of something even if it’s obstructing whatever it is you’re working on…with the opacity set to something like 10%, you can see it, but it doesn’t obstruct your view. (This would be like the “display->See-Through” option in Max.)

color - It’d be great to be able to color code different groups, so that when you’re working on something that has dozens of subtools, you can tell which subtool belongs to which group (if we can make groups) by the color you assign to it

MASKS/TRANSPOSE

save mask for transpose - would be cool to be able to make a mask selection for transposing which you can then go back to for further changes. For example, if I take the time to carefully mask an arm, elbow, or neck, it’d be great to be able to go back to that particular mask again if you want to change the angle of the elbow, etc… I guess this would be taken care of with Z3 “rigging”, which I haven’t looked into… still, saving masks could be useful.

#2

select multiple - First, we need a select multiple option to be able to select multiple subtools at once (and then assign different attributes if necessary)

I think the issue with that atm is polycount.

You see every subtool can be 4 million polys (if your pc can handle displaying 4 mil polys easily that is) if only one can be selected at a time it can display 50 subtools with each 4 mil polys since it doesnt have to prepare for the fact that you can sculpt on all of em at the same time.

#3

Hmmm… there may be a workaround somewhere… even if it means being able to copy or duplicate an “action” and then apply it to another subtool.

For example, if for some reason you can’t transpose multiple subtools at the same time (due to polycount issues or something), then at least being able to transform one object (such as a main body part of a figure), and somehow being able copy that exact transform, and then apply it to another subtool, such as a piece of clothing, armor, prop, or whatever, would be a big help.

I’m not sure of the technical details, but it seems like there is probably a workaround, even if it’s not conventional.

#4

They are some really great ideas you have there. Hopefully someone will take up the cause and get scripting. I would myself only what I know about scripting could be written on the back of a postage stamp. In capital letters. With a wet crayon. A blunt one at that.

#5

Marcus is working on a script to automate the work around for merging tools:

I see now that making two 7+mil tools active at a time would be a good way to crash my program, but as long as I could painlessly merge and split tools at my discretion, it should be fine.

#6

I wrote this elsewhere, but…

I thought about this, but wouldn’t a possible solution be that somewhere behind-the-scenes, the process converts whatever tools you want to unify to there lowest subdivision level first, then transpose, then revert back to whatever subdivision level you were at…

Almost no one starts with a multi-million poly object and I think most people always keep a low initial subdivision level…

So somewhere in there the mechanics of this seems like it’d be possible. Just because you want to unify/merge/select multiple subtools in order to transpose them together doesn’t mean you have to do so at the highest subdivision level…have the program do it at the lowest.

#7

i agree with all the suggestions but i think the ability to group subtools instead of merging them would be better. merging the tools on the highest subd level is most of the time not even an option because you would pretty much never be able to alter those tools again unless it was in the most detailed of ways. But if you could group them so that transpose could read them both as one but they could still have different levels of division, that would be great. Because appending subtools that have subtools attached to them, and then trying to move them into position, is such a hastle.

If you could combine the subtools at a low sub division level then polygroup them sepatatly before you bring it into a seperate scene, then when you get it in the scene Grp split them back to their original subtools, then that might work. (if that makes any sence) but i dont think thats possible since in order to combine subtools their can be so subdivision history :cry: .

#8

See me.

#9

Definitely a big step in the right direction. :slight_smile: Awesome. I saw that earlier, but thanks for the heads up!

#10

There are some nice ideas here, some of which are possible with zscripting, some not. As has been said, the main problem with treating subtools together is the polycount limit but it wouldn’t be impossible to check for this before certain operations. The GrpSplit button provides a way of getting subtools back again but has some problems. I’m holding off on releasing anything just now in the hope that some issues will soon be resolved in an update…

Incidentally, you can select a subtool by Shift+Ctrl+clicking on it and various polycount info is given in the large Tool thumbnail.

#11

thanks for the plugin aminuts!
one more little thing i noticed when i was doing some sculpting. when i have x symmetry on and am at a high poly count (3mil), i sculpt something on the model but the sculpt information seems not to be transfering over to the other side of the model. it retains a little of the information but most seems to be lost for some reason. is anyone else having this problem? or is is just me. Also Resym doesnt seem to fix it, but make the unmasked side blow up. its bizarre.

#12

One thing about subtools that I find odd is that if you save your ZTool with a subtool selected, it renames that subtool to whatever you named the file when you saved it. For example, say you have a subtool named “shirt”, and you save the file as “Stage4_Wrinkle_Pass” it changes ‘shirt’ to ‘Stage4_Wrinkle_Pass’. Not gamebreaking by any means, but odd nonetheless :wink:

#13

Hmmm…is it possible you have your brush wrapmode set to something above “0” and you’re using the freehand stroke? If so, that’s buggy…or possibly your issue is somehow related.

Maybe it’s not related at all, but try sculpting your model with the “dots” stroke instead, and see if you get different results.

#14

Yeah, I’m sure that made sense to someone at some point, for some good reason (I hope), but I find it a little odd also.

#15

i tried changing my stroke to dots and making sure wrap is at 0 and i still get the same problem. aparantly its not just me as i saw other forums with posts of similar problems.

#16

I personally feel the transpose function should be appended to Z2’s current functionality and not used to replace what I was so used to. I will deal if it stays this way but the workflow changes are ruff. People complain about the learning curve as it is. To have a change like that is even worse for them. I will survive. I am a ZJunkie. But others…?