****Zbrush And Mudbox Techniques ****
 

Hi all

Okay so with a nudge from CGIsoul...a Zbrush and Mudbox discussion/technique thread.....Enjoy and behave!!

Jay

Thanks Jay!

Looking at this page http://www.verold.com/ it looks like that we are going to have lots of fun retopologizing meshes in Zb. Just hope that is not another create zsphere technique for retopo. duh. :)

Yeah I saw that earlier today...very cool. I'm just downloading the new update with the fibres now!! Will post some stuff soon!!

Jay

Autodesk is very tight lip with Mudbox 2013..... can't find any news about it.
Didn't have the time to play with the fiber yet. Been busy, you know? :giggle:

Ok, I'm moving into this thread :D I'll be moving my stuff in shortly. Been doing some hard-surface tests in ZB, might be worth sharing.

I really like Mudbox more than Zbrush due to its straight forward approach.
I've been using zb for quite some years on and off and when I get back to it, I always need a quick refresh course. Though zb has tons of features I never use, there are also other very handy features. Arrgg.....

Hard surface is something I have never done before, but lately I have been giving it a thought and might give a try.

Hey Jay, perhaps a hard surface with retopo included sort of training - Maya and Zbrush process?? It doesn't have to be very complicated, something simple like a bad ass looking sword or armor plate?

I to prefer mudbox for texturing just seams to me to be more logical to use............dave

ok. Coincidentally I have a zbrush question today, so I'll drop it in here....


Mask by Cavity

Not something i've used loads...but have done a couple of times recently and found it really handy for helping to produce an overlay/multiply colour map to help accentuate the details in my normal maps.

But...Im sure some of you will have come across this before....on a couple of models ive had recently, and my current one...when i click 'mask by cavity'...it masks the entire model. Rather than that camo-like look it usually produces when it works how you'd expect. Ive tried playing with the intensity of the cavity - -100 all the way up to 100, and played around with the cavity curve....but I still cant get a mask that isnt either nothing masked at all...or everything masked entirely. Its not like my model doesnt have any cavities.
Are there any reasons people know of that stop zbrush producing good cavity masks on certain models?

Hey Ben

This got me a while ago because it looks like that....I think if you have small cavities they dont show up as well but if you add say poly paint and then inverse the mask and do say a different color you will see it. Also it could be how deep the cavities are....can you show your example?

J

Hiya. I can't really show it cause it's for the game project I'm helping on.... Under nda and that. I'm off to center parcs early in the morning but if I get a chance before I leave I'll pm you a shot.

3 possible reasons I am thinking of. One is that the process I have been using alot lately is to model my bases in Maya, sculpt in z, then export the sculpted level 1 to Maya for uv-ing and then importing the uvd mesh back to z. As the topology is always the same the detail transfers no problem onto the newly uv'd mesh.... But in the current case there were a couple of verts that somehow got adjusted so there are a couple of issues with how the detail transferred.

But also the model has some very thin areas.... You know how zbrush sometimes has
issues with very thin geometry, such as fingers, where if you sculpt on one side it pulls in the other side in the same direction....
Also.... The model has some parts which are just single sided geometry.... A few edges just extruded out from the model.... And I'm wondering if this could be causing an issue also.

I did try briefly polypainting over the ( seemingly total) mask, but nothing came out on the model.

I'll try post you a shot in the morning.

We really gotta get forum sections for Sculpting (e.g. zbrush and mudbox) and 2D (e.g. photoshop, drawing, painting)... what place does zbrush troubleshooting have in the WIP forum?

Anyway... just got an intuos 4 today!! So I'm looking forward to doing some in depth zbrush learning (haven't really touched z since the fall). Anyone want to share their express key and scroll wheel setup? Specifically, I'm trying to figure out how to zoom in using the scroll button thing. Or is that like using the scroll wheel on your mouse in maya (can't stand that).

Hehe, I've been using mine for almost 3 years and loving it every bits of it.
The way I work is like, You hold the Alt key and move the pen = pan
When you press Alt key, tap and leave your pen on the tablet, then release right away the Alt key = Zoom.
It sounds complicated, but it's not. It just a matter of getting used to it. I'm very used to it.

Lately I've been catching up with Mudbox again. Nice and easy to work with and excellent integration with Maya pipeline. However, when I was testing the blend shape in Maya imported from Mudbox (as fbx format), there were some weird stretching going on.

I've been trying to find an excuse to move completely to mudbox for quite sometime, but finding myself always back to zbrush as the sculpting is very very fluid in it comparing to mud. I really hope AD will bring great performance improvements and retopo tools in it.

So you don't bother with the tablet keys at all then?

Not at all. They actually slows you down.
Well, that's just the way i work with my i4. It really comes down to each person.

Stwert....well hopefully here is a good start for the zbrush section...people can post here with their work too.....of zbrush and mudbox

Jay