How often do you get to actually use Zbrush.

Fwap · Mar 2014

Directed to the people already in the industry, or having a deeper working knowledge of the industry pipelines than I do.

How often do you get to use Zbrush, or similar program, in your pipeline at work?
Over the last few years I've sunk a lot of time into Zbrush, and relying on baked maps to help push my diffuse and other maps, neglecting the workflow I would use if I didn't have Zbrush.

LMP · Mar 2014

Less than I would have liked... I never once got to use ZBrush in the first year and a half of work... I didn't even really get to model, I got to do light maps... I must have baked hundreds, considering I had to rebake each week for the newest version... and there were around 70 lightmaps... at least... then... I had nothing... literally no work at work for the next 4 months... then, finally, I got work... I got to actually model and texture some stuff and less than a month later, I got laid off.

Autocon · Mar 2014

Almost never.

Not once for Halo Reach, Uncharted 3 or The Last of Us (granted I came in on the end of Last of Us to fix bugs and set dress some stuff)

All the rocks I made in Uncharted 3 were hand modeled. None of them are unique 1 to 1 textures as we used tiling textures and blends to make a ton of rock models look different than relying on 3 or 4 rocks to build a level with unique textures.

Depends on the studio you work for and the job you do. My texture artist used it everyday to sculpt the tiling rock textures used on my models.

I'm still trying to find a workflow/way to use zbrush to create rocks that still use tiling textures but haven't had much luck yet.

aajohnny · Mar 2014

Depends on the assets but we use Zbrush often.

Justin Meisse · Mar 2014

My work computer doesn't even have a zeebles license installed! I use 3DCoat all the time for texture painting, it's the bee's pajamas

sargentcrunch · Mar 2014

Stirls · Mar 2014

Every day so far. That said, it's character art so it's a given. I've never been a fan of hardsurface in Maya, despite that being the best way to do it, so I usually sculpt all of my details and stuff in zBrush (making it my most used program).

Makkon · Mar 2014

I use it every day. And lately even for hard surface (much faster, though not as accurate or clean).

Will Faucher · Mar 2014

I use it almost every day as an environment artist/texture artist. I work in a pretty small studio, so I tend to branch out and touch a bit of everything, from modelling, to sculpting, to level design, to texturing. It all goes hand in hand, really.
Working for a bigger studio, however, would have you be more specialized in a specific task.

Bobby J Rice 3rd · Mar 2014

Every day

Avanthera · Mar 2014

Almost every day for me as well. It really depends on the studio like others have said. I interviewed some peeps in the past few weeks for an environment position and they were all surprised when we mentioned how much we used zbrush, some had never used it professionally and were 6-10 year veterans.

CrazyMatt · Mar 2014

Just about everyday.

Torch · Mar 2014

Never, ZBrush is the devil.

Milkshape 3D ftw

Jonas Ronnegard · Mar 2014

Depends on the work, but at the moment everyday.

Mask_Salesman · Mar 2014

Haa Milkshape that takes me back

Almost every week, but not everyday.

alexk · Mar 2014

To the environment artists who use Zbrush often at work. What assets are you using it for?

Bobby J Rice 3rd · Mar 2014

alexk wrote: »

To the environment artists who use Zbrush often at work. What assets are you using it for?

Tiling textures, organic level geo.

Shiniku · Mar 2014

It varies for me. Might have a month where I'm in there every day, might have months where I don't touch it.

Ged · Mar 2014

Shiniku wrote: »

It varies for me. Might have a month where I'm in there every day, might have months where I don't touch it.

same for me, cant help but feel zbrush should have an easier to remember user interface if so many people use it sporadically. Its always so confusing to come back to and be like " where was that thing...whats it called again...do I hold shift or ctrl... ) haha

Fwap · Mar 2014

I was actually half expecting the resulting answers to be more indicative of Zbrush being more of a luxury.
Its a sigh of relief that it appears to be the opposite, well in majority of the cases here.
Was getting worried i'd spend all this time trying to be a l33t sculpter just to have Crazybump thrown into my workflow instead.

Speaking of crazy bump, for those who use zbrush on a daily basis,
Do you still generate a lot of your normals from a diffuse via knald/crazbump/ndo2 ?
or is that just reserved for smaller assets?

Jonas Ronnegard · Mar 2014

As an environment artist I use it for Textures, any prop that has any kind of wear and tear, organic props etc.

Still use ndo, crazybump for small detail surface normals.