ProUV - UV plugin for zbrush
mod
Here you go!
http://speedy.rs/prouv/index.php
Discuss.
ProUV is a new ZBrush for Windows plugin, which brings heavy duty automatic UV unwrapping algorithm optimized for scuplting to all users of ZBrush.
Currently, the plugin is in "open beta" phase, which lasts until 14.June.2009, and in that time period is free and fully functional. This version is available for download on our downloads page. We welcome suggestions, bugreports and any other user feedback on our forums.
To illustrate benefits of this plugin, we provide a few head-to-head comparisons with ZBrush built-in automatic unwrappers AUV & GUV. More comparisons will be coming along during the "open beta" phase.
4x or more texture detail quality Improvement (click on the image to zoom-in)
Polypainting workflow Improvements (click on the image to zoom-in)
http://speedy.rs/prouv/index.php
Discuss.
ProUV is a new ZBrush for Windows plugin, which brings heavy duty automatic UV unwrapping algorithm optimized for scuplting to all users of ZBrush.
Currently, the plugin is in "open beta" phase, which lasts until 14.June.2009, and in that time period is free and fully functional. This version is available for download on our downloads page. We welcome suggestions, bugreports and any other user feedback on our forums.
To illustrate benefits of this plugin, we provide a few head-to-head comparisons with ZBrush built-in automatic unwrappers AUV & GUV. More comparisons will be coming along during the "open beta" phase.
4x or more texture detail quality Improvement (click on the image to zoom-in)
Polypainting workflow Improvements (click on the image to zoom-in)
Replies
hmm I am not a fan of these idiot UV tools that automate everything. Maybe nice for the lazy person and tech noob so that he can more focus on the artistic side - but even this has its limits (like non control- able seams) and its just a small improvement at first but at a whole not always the popper thing.
It might be nice for shadow map UV sets (those automated stuff) but for a real production ready (film or game) UVset you really need to push things yourself:
- Get the order of uvShells so that you the texture artist can read it
- stack elements that can be shared
- align shells so that pixel rotation effects don't appear
- smartly reuse uv space for low memory systems or engines
the other thought that comes to mind is that zBrush at its core is not the tool to render, fix or prepare your models. Its a specialized software (yet, not sure with zb4) that usually comes in between of your pipeline - not something that stands there till the end.
UV really seems to be a trend lately, now that unwrella, modo, XRayunwrap unrolled and now even this. Without a doubt there is a market for this but full automated stuff is not the artistic way - imo. it always needs some input control like that you can control the flow, layout or order.
renderhjs: Yes, but what this mainly means (as far as I can tell) is that you can now finally get some proper use out of sculpting freely from a base mesh that doesn't have UVs, polypaint and then have Zbrush give you a diffusemap from it with non-sucky UVs - which is a big step up! My point being that just being able to get some kind of good UVs for your hipoly to then bake onto your actual perfectly UVed lowpoly (using TexTools ofcourse
renderhjs: calling this an "idiot UV tool" is a mistake and the only reason why you say that must be because you don`t get it.
And personally I would love to be able to be a tech noob and focus on the artistic side. If I could make a perfectly functional game model just by sculpting and painting and then have tools compiling everything for me, working would be faster, way more fun and more creative.
EDIT: One thing though bitmap. The TEST text on the rhino in the pro UV mapping image doesn`t look the same as on the polypaint. I`m guessing this is not a distortion error and more of a "I lost my polypaint and had to redraw the text again" error.
It's better to do the uvs manually and taking care on seams.
Would be awesome if it could do this, but it doesn it gives you pretty bad chunks, tht are not usable for final products, thats where i agree to RenderHJS.
But however what it does, is giving you better uvs then the premade ones, which is great especially if you have polypainted stuff and want to transfer your polypaint to your lowpoly. It is a stupid waste of time to unwrap your highpoly if you want to transfer textures from the highpoly to the lowpoly. Polypaint gives you the ability to create textures that fit to your highpoly and therefore will work good with the later created Normal, AO or whatever Maps, having the ability to get cleaner results from rebaking it to the lowres UVs is a great thing as it will give you less of a headache then zBrushs normal UVs.
Neox: Exactly.
Yup guys, the point of UVs inside Z has never been to make anything final with them. It really just is to support painting good enough. (or more exactly : converting vertexcolor painting to a texture that can then be baked). This tool seems to give more pixel density than the default Z auto UVs techniques, so that's good!
And why does some think that it is completely unfeasible that some day in the future we could have the computer do all these boring stuff for us?
Or is it that you just LOVE uv mapping?
For game stuff you have to model with UVs already in mind, unwrap with the texture in mind, and texture with the platform in mind :P Only for film stuff can we hope for an automated workflow. When it comes to the assets actually moving in a game (not its highpoly source), no choice but being efficient and in control....
And in the end if all you did was painting on your high-poly then baking that information to your low-poly why would you ever want to have direct control over your texture files.
I`m not saying we have all the necessary tools yet, but tools like these are a step in that direction.
EDIT: Seems like I`m far far away in another galaxy here and I don`t want to de-rail this thread further.
Bitmap - Great tool! I`ll definately use it on the next thing I do
Over and out
However, I find it's really fast to unwrap your base mesh (even if it's from zspheres) in an external app, since usually base meshes are SUPER low poly by today's in-game standards, it literally takes 15-20 minutes for a good unwrap which you can then use later to bake out polypainting or ZApplink work later on... this way gives you well-hidden seams, and good density distribution, and really doesn't take very long at all and gives the best results later on.
I will continue to use this method since GUVs and AUVs give bad results, and this new plugin doesn't seem to save me much time or improve quality
darker areas = most likely areas that are less likely to be seen = best spot to put a UV seam?
and then set a stretch treshold, and be off with it.
i'm sure it could make a decent base UV .
then throw in a decent relax tool, and a tool that will break the shortest edges first.
ah well. dreams. need to improve my programming skills.
I think this is totally kickass work. I'm just trying it out now ....
THX
But even modern pelt mapping can be quite easy - just loop select the seams and then hit the pelt / relax button. Even in zBrush that would be more efficient and not really that much work to do.
So based on some replies here I assume its more a temporary solution that saves some time while you paint in zBrush.
so where do you place the seams for the... shoulders, arms, legs, upper body, head, etc? i mean making it AO based leaves A LOT of empty spaces, a non directional AO on a normal character will have some seams in the armpits or between the fingers, maybe on the mouth or around the ears, this can't work, at least i don't know how it should work, its too specialized and casedependent
I guess if someone has some ZScripting skillz, it might be possible to write out the vertex colour data per vertex, and then re-apply it in another app, but that would rely heavily on vertex order staying correct in the highpoly.
Ideally they'd add support for exporting other 3d formats which supported vertex colour.
Cheers!
ps. For more info the plug-in web site is here and the official release info is here.
Cheers! :cool: