Hard edge - highpoly

diZzyWalnut

Hi,
I'm little bit lost in a highpoly modeling under ZBRUSH or MUDBOX.
I've started to learn for a Dominance war, but I think that I'm not ready for highpoly and I'd like to ask You for some tips ,suggestion ... help in generic way.

it's a just to see my first attempt ZBRUSH sculpt -

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<u>OK - here's my 2 questions :</u>

1 )
How do You make (or keep) the hard edges on the no-oragnic parts of model ? For example armor.
Do You go down to "low resolution" and You move the vertex by vertex ? Or some flat brush ?

Looks maybe stupide , but my second question is -
2)
What does mean "BLOCK IN" ?
Retouch - weld vertex under other soft as 3DS MAX ,MAYA ?

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Here's the model of VAHL and RAWKSTAR.
I take them as reference for my questions. I hope guys that You don't mind that I've posted Your work here.
Thank You






Thank You for any tips and suggestion .

Mongrelman

Smooth and pinch brush are you friend. Also using masks helps.

Try painting a mask over what you want to work on, inverting it, then inflating that a bit, smooth a little and pinch/smooth the edges.

Some good zbrush tips here (though not much on hard surfaces) http://www.pixologic.com/zbrush/education/zclassroom/class.php

Rick Stirling

I usually prepare my model in advance for the hard edges. In max, before exporting to Zbrush, I'd make a really tight bevel on all the edges that I wanted to keep ultra sharp, like belts. Another thing I've done in the past (it's quicker but potentially messier) is to grab groups of faces and extrude them or inset them a tiny amount.

In Silo, I use the Crease Edges function on the edges that I want to stay crisp.

The pinch brush is also your friend.

Mongrelman

Indeedy. A way I favour when wanting hard edges in zbrush is to model the base mesh in whatever, then weight the edges on the subdivision model until they are how I like. Then 'freeze' the subdivision and import that into zbrush. Then rebuild the lower subdivision levels in zbrush (make sure your mesh is all quads when you export from the other app).

Then when you skip up and down the levels, the creases are how they looked in the other app.

EarthQuake

Pinching is fail, you can get good results using smooth, flatten, and just sculpting with the different brush falloffs in mudbox. I know for a fact thats what vahl does and you should not use pinch, it will fuck up your geo and generally not give good hard edges(you want some nice soft bevels, not super hard piched edges)

diZzyWalnut

Rick, Lupus, Earth -
thanks a lot for Your tips. In a fact I've been searching for some tutos about highpoly modeling on the net and I didn't find anything "super duper".

There's one which will be surely very interesting , but the date of coming out is unknow for yet.


I hope that Mr.Rawkstar will show some his secrets of highpoly modeling.


EarthQuake -

I think You're right - I've done a test and it's true that the pinch brush destroy the mesh (in a mess). Don't like it.


Once more time thank Your for Your tips guys

demoncage

I agree w/ Rick; If the hard surface stuff is fairly mechanical, I'd leave that to poly modeling in Max or Maya. and unless you're going to add organic detail to those elements, I'd just leave that geo out of the import altogether unless you need it for reference. If you're going for organic hard surface stuff, then there's a couple ways you could do it in Zbrush. You can do the pinch edges which pulls surrounding edges towards the edge you're painting, and so subtracts geometry from the rest of the surface. Or you can use the standard brush to sculpt out those edges and then use a combo of the standard and smooth brush to get things all evened out. like anything in Zbrush, it's faster and more effective to do this at lower subdivision levels.

fritz

yeah. that's what i'm doing right now. i think it's also important to concept what you are going to model...with this in mind. if you are going to have some mech parts on an organic model...concept it so you can build the mech bits in parts. that way you can sculpt your organics in your sculpting app. its really nice to separate mech and organics. then you can just place the organics in, around, coming out of, etc your mech bits.

diZzyWalnut

FRITZ -
That's what I've always heard -

* mech (non organic) parts - trad. software as MAYA, MAX etc
* organic parts - sculpt. software as ZBRUSH,MUDBOX.

... this is also another reason why I've put my questions to get Your opininon about highpoly modeling of
a characters for a video games since a normal mapping is born and the ZBRUSH & MUDBOX exist.

I'm really surprised (+ positively +)
by the new way HIGHPOLY modeling of character by RAWKSTAR and VAHL and I'm seriously interesting about this.

Is it a new way of highpoly modeling for a game industry
( profite the time ) or just a way to get quickly a character for the DOMINANCE WAR ?

BE or NOT BE ? This is the question.

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Mr.CAKOVAN and You ,what's Your opinion ?

EarthQuake

You can model hard surfaces in mudbox, but if you dont even know how to model them well with traditional sub-d you're going to have lets of problems trying to sculpt that sort of thing, it is not something that is easily done so i would suggest learning how to do proper poly modeled stuff, and when you have a good grasp on that then i'de say experiment with the raw sculpting.

Sculpting hard egded surfaces is never going to be as accurate or precise as modeling it by hand, but often times can look quite good if done well. IT can also be very useful to quickly sculpt/block out a model that you can use as a reference or guide as to how to model parts with sub-d. Thats is soemthing that might be useful, because a lot of hte time to get really nicely done hard edged stuff you have to go with 5 million + polys......

Emil Mujanovic

[ QUOTE ]
Pinching is fail, you can get good results using smooth, flatten, and just sculpting with the different brush falloffs in mudbox.

[/ QUOTE ]
I second that! I barely use pinch, sometimes not at all. Flatten is awesome for getting some hard edge stuff once you get the hang of using it.

-caseyjones

diZzyWalnut

Earthquake, caseyjones -

thank You guys once more time for Your tips.
I would like get in highpoly modeling this year.

Mark Dygert

I think a common mistake people make is that they expect Zbrush and Mudbox to be replacements for quality high poly modeling, when they are meant to complement it, not replace.

In Mudbox:
- Making masks and freezing sections of the mesh can also help create hard edges.
- Using the "overly used" flatten tool with the advanced setting of Orient to Surface checked will also help to some degree.
- Adjusting the falloff for your brushes can also help create hard edges.

rooster

I wouldn't strike pinch off the list, but I'd say use it at the very end when you're sure you know where should be sharp and where not.. sculpting over pinched geom is indeed a pain in the arse and it has to be completely relaxed to be usable again destroying the shape

coldwolf

The most difficult thing I have with hard edges in sculpting packages is creating straight lines, as well as centering pieces (such as putting in a bolt).

So I just use modeling for it, but I can't help but think there's a faster solution.

MoP

Yeah, straight lines is something i can never do - is there nothing like the photoshop feature where you can hold down Shift and it'll lock to the nearest axis you were painting on for ZBrush or Mudbox?
All my attempts at really precise hard surfaces just end up a little too wobbly for my liking... I guess a good stencil might help that though.

demoncage

You can go into the stroke menu and increase the mouse average, but this kind of sucks because it affects navigation too. Another downer to trying to do the mechanical stuff in zbrush is the amount of density you end up with on the mesh, which isn't required as much for something organic like a head. My opinion, unless you're doing something gigeresque, better left to sub-d's.

Skella

MoP wrote: »

Yeah, straight lines is something i can never do - is there nothing like the photoshop feature where you can hold down Shift and it'll lock to the nearest axis you were painting on for ZBrush or Mudbox?
All my attempts at really precise hard surfaces just end up a little too wobbly for my liking... I guess a good stencil might help that though.

As far as I know, in 4r4, if you begin a stroke, then hold down shift, it will paint in straight lines, along 45 degree increments, (so up, down, left, right and all the diagonals) averaging in the direction of your stroke. It's based on the camera as well, so if you lock to a orthographic view, it's exactly straight.

Amsterdam Hilton Hotel

lol, not to be that guy, but zbrush was on 3.1 when mop posted that eight years ago.

EarthQuake

This thread makes me feel old.