Zbrush-pinching effect on edges,need help

Pangahas

Hi so I'm playing around with Zbrush,I have this model imported.Before exporting it,In max I placed support edges for it and have it all quads and relatively evenly distributed.So I have this nice hard edges but When sculpting on those areas I have these pinching effect.Any solution to prevent those from happening while sculpting?

Ghostscape

The problem is your support edges, they're adding uneven poly density in those areas.

Instead of using support edges, instead maintain an evenly quaded base mesh, and in zbrush use subdivide with the Smooth button unchecked (next to the subdivide button) to get a denser mesh before using subdivide with smoothing to get softer edges.

Pangahas

Thanks gonna try it out..

CheeseOnToast

Ghostscape's method is fine if your mesh is all planar, flat surfaces. If there's any curved surfaces they will remain faceted when you subdivide with smooth switched off.

An alternative is to use the Zbrush "crease edge" function in the tool>geometry panel. You can either use it with a global tolerance (the "Ctolerance" slider) which will only crease edges with an angle equal or lower than the value specified. You can also hide parts of your mesh then apply crease, which will add a creased edge to the visible parts of the model. It can be a bit time-consuming to do this though. There's ways to speed up that process using polygroups and UVs defined in your main modelling app. There's plenty of further info on the subject if you look for it.

Note that your edges will remain razor sharp with crease edge if you leave the CreaseLvl slider at 15. If you want the edges to get a little softer, change this to something like 3. This means that Zbrush will only apply the crease for the first 3 subdivisions, after that it'll smooth it like any other part of the mesh.

Boyso

The way I do it it set the weight/crease in Max on my low before exporting, just hit Crease when you import it in Zbrush, smooth it like 2 levels, smooth your edges, and go on

Gestalt

Dynamesh project to get an even poly distribution and then build your low poly off of a decimated version of that in you modeling app, or if you are trying to maintain very specific dimensions, make a low poly specifically with sculpting in mind (even quad distribution), bring it into zbrush to subdivide with smooth off, sculpt on that, and make a separate optimized low-poly to bake to for actual use (you could probably just remove edges on the low-poly used for sculpting). Either way don't worry about having an optimized, perfectly modeled mesh until the end; worry about getting a clean sculpt first.

nordahl154

You could just sculpt it out with a strong small brush like ClayBuildup, TrimDynamic, MalletFast, or any others like that really. Or be more careful of your sculpting next time.

Seems like you're using the default brush for rock or metal damage. I strongly suggest you use either/all of those 3 (though those are just my preference) for stuff like that. You could even use them (though not TrimDynamic) on spray mode! Remember to always experiment with different brushes, and use a wide array of brush sizes and intensities.

Pangahas

I ended up using TrimDynamic and I'm fairly getting the hang of things sculpting..so yeah more practice I guess.Thanks guys.