Hi Guys,
here are some images from a project I did here at work. I see alot of characters created using Zbrush, but I think that Zbrush can also serve as a good companion to terrain generation programs like Vue Infinite - especially for specific areas where those programs lack control over sculpting details like cliffs, caves etc.
Terrain in Vue Infinite - Wireframe
[attach=46827]up04.jpg[/attach]
Here are some more shots of the environment and the terrain edited with Zbrush after returning it to Vue Infinite and rendering
Military Base - OpenGL
[attach=46830]up05.jpg[/attach]
Binoculars zoom from the military base.
[attach=46828]terroristbase4.jpg[/attach]
Coastal area a few miles from the military base
[attach=46829]mainbeach11.jpg[/attach]
This is a frame from the animation of the landscape - overlooking the military base.
Link to Video clip
http://www.sowl.com/flash/militarybase.html
[attach=46832]closeF1_000033.jpg[/attach]
That’s interesting. I recently did a project where I had to make a martian landscape. I tried it in Vue, but ended up using only Zbrush for the modeling and texturing. Transporting landscapes between Zbrush and Vue might be useful. Can you show a picture of the rendered military base?
Ah, updated thread. Nice shot of the base, looks quite real. Did you render in Vue? That clip’s got a C&C feel to it! 
Hi Plakkie,
thanks.
Hehehe, I happen to be a great fan of the C&C RTS series and Cryteks Far Cry.
Yes, I rendered the whole scene entirely in Vue Infinite.
I did some of the textures for the overhanging cave and cliffs in Zbrush and tweaked in Photoshop.
here is a render from the top of the base showing some more definition
I do not use Vue, but I’m curious as to how Zbrush was used in this scene. Did you import an actual hi-res obj. from Zbrush, or did you use a low res obj. and a displacement/gray scale map to create the terrain and details?
Hi sirquadalot,
the entire lanscape is a procedural terrain created in Vue - 12 million polygons - what Vue lacks is the ability to sculpt the terrain like the way a miner would dig into the sides of a mountain or cave - so you can’t really create caves and cliffs, by using the built in terrain editor - a problem that was inherent in Bryce as well.
There is a work around whereby you can sculpt the terrain and rotate it and place it on top of another terrain to give the impression of an overhanging cliff or cave.
For my purpose, I needed full control of sculpting the cave and having the ability to define how the base looked - so after creating the overall landscape, I exported a standard terrain from Vue Infinite as an OBJ file.
I imported into Zbrush and started sculpting by pushing and pulling, smoothing, creasing - you name it, all those tools that are missing in Vue.
I then painted using projection master - after I did the usual flipping of the texture and exported the edited terrain back into Vue - the materials come in pretty well as MTL files - and I then placed the terrain in the place it appears in the landscape.
Hope that helps
These look really good, allot of stuff rendered in Vue looks very computer grafiky, very reapeated, Never thought of using zbrush to break things up a bit, would love to se move of your workflow on this.
thanks Harmonic
yeah, Zbrush is like a swiss knife - if you look around long enough, you can find a new use for it.
I will post some more examples when I get some free time.
Thanks Solomon, Have you seen the new version of Terragen thats out? It’s pretty slick. I’m just starting to get into it.
here is a render showing some more detail. Rendered with a spectral environment.
Man, that DEFINATELY has a C&C feel to it. I’m playing around with Vue6 since 2 days and can see it can give nice results. But for my little computer takes SUCH a long time to render out a nice picture, let alone a whole animation.
Thanks for your work description. I agree, Zbrush is like a Swiss army knife. (and you don’t even have to clean it :D) Can you somehow show what part of the pictures is the Zbrushed object and which is the procedural Vue part? They blend so well…
Hi Plakkie, thanks
k, here is a series of renders showing the build up of the base - starting with the procedural terrain and the addition of the edited terrains.
Procedural Terrain - showing placement of base objects.
Hope that helps, and you can see the difference between the procedural terrain, which covers most of the landscape, at 19,000 X 19,000 pixels. The edited terrains are much smaller and make up just a small fraction of the landscape.
and here is the terrain as a ztool inside of Zbrush.
here is an updated render
Very informative Solomon! How did you texture the edited landscape mesh? Did you use part the texture of the procedural landscape or did you do it in Zbrush? (guess you had to paint the road…)
thanks
yeah I textured the edited landscape using the same texture for the procedural terrain, as the foundation and laid down the road in photoshop with Zapplink.
no man, I haven’t had a chance to try it out, but I have heard some good things about it, especially it’s volumetric clouds. Have you tried it with zbrush?
I think we will begin to see more Zbrush and Vue Infnite use for landscapes and evironments - in “Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest”, the guys at ILM took that to another level with mixing Zbrush and Vue Infinite in their work flow