Zbrush prop wip... *updated* still noobing it

IronHawk

This is just a silo viewport grab to test out exporting. Modeling in Silo and detailing in Zbrush.

Posting a bit to early even for a wip but I wanted to get some feedback before I continue on tonight. I don't think I'm getting everything I can out of my sub d levels.

Current poly count is 500,000 on this piece. I am using mostly standard alpha's for now and just working on banging this thing up. I will hit corners and edges tonight since that is where most of the damage would occur.

Can someone give me some tips on getting some tighter sharper edges? It usually looks good till I hit the projection master then it blobs out. Should I push the depth harder? The deep single pit marks look how I want but I lost all the detail on my cracks.

How do you guys go about getting decent looking gouges? I usually end up with a line of separate pits and not a good long deep cut even when I press with the pen harder.

I'll crop and resize this image tonight so the thread reads easier.

Thanks in advance.

Iron

twebb

Do you have mouse-averaging turned on? It would help with consistency of lines if you haven't used it.
Also have you used to pinch tool (maybe the wrong term, its pinch in silo, might be deflate in zbrush?) which will just basically shrink the polies to increase the density. If you draw a hard line and then pinch the line it will make it more crisp. The tool will sacrifice density in another area to make the affected area denser, however, so must be used with discretion.

I haven't used zbrush in a while, switched to silo 2. Sorry if my info is hard to understand or not precisely accurate, its been a while.

Quickel

If you're concerned with creating a normal map, I'd create this type of stuff in Photoshop and use Crazybump or the NVIDIA filter (pref. Crazybump) to create the normal map.

IronHawk

Thanks guys.
@ twebb - I'll look at pinching the lines. Makes total sense and I think I read that here once before but forgot it.

Figured out the dots issue. I was using the freehand stroke. Something I thought was for painting regular lines. How wrong I was. Reading through the manual prepping for my evening 3d session.

@Quickel - I will be using crazy bump for the fine details then combine the normal maps in PS.

IronHawk

updated image at top. Going to do a better render once I can get this thing polycrunched without crashing. My poor computer is choking.


Freehand brush is fine. I simply didn't adjust the spacing.
Also getting the hang of working for a bit hit G save check the model. I had troubles with some odd vert jutting out when sculpting on the corners.

Going to try and build the low poly and do the AO / Normals tonight.

additional crts or warnings before I continue welcome.

- Iron

CheeseOnToast

As Twebb said, upping the mouse average number will also help avoid blobby lines. It'll add a little lag to your strokes though. It's found (oddly enough) in the "stroke" palette.