Hand painting textures completely in photoshop vs scuplting in zbrush first.

dosit · Nov 2016

What is usually the better way to make hand paited textures for stone or wood for example. Paint it all in photoshop or scuplt it in zbrush and then finish it off in photoshop.
Thanks

AtticusMars · Nov 2016

If you are not confident with painting my advice is pretty much always to sculpt, bake, and paintover simply because the majority of the rendering is already done for you and you don't really need to worry about it.

If you are already good at painting there isn't really much of a better way. I am generally of the opinion that doing sculpts and bakes will give you more reliable and consistent results because you'll be following a consistent process that starts with accurate lighting.

That being said, if you start without a bake you may get more interesting results because you won't be able to fall back on your bake. Inevitably the process affects the outcome, starting with generated maps will change how your final result looks in some way, that's not necessarily good or bad.

It just depends on how you want to work and how you're after.

jfitch · Nov 2016

There really isn't a better or worse way to do hand painted textures, it's really preference. Some artists can work faster from a sculpted base, some work faster just starting on simple geometry. Try both and see what you like.

I'd also recommend finding artists whose work you like, and seeing how they create their textures. For instance Fanny Verne seems to usually do sculpts and then paint. Tyson Murphy and Kelvin tan seem to just straight up paint. Lots of Riot Artists seem to do sculpts first, same with Marc Brunet though he also does a lot of 2d painting. Research some of that, see what you like and don't like about their work, and incorporate it into your own! Good luck.

rohMizuno · Nov 2016

I would recommend sculpting, baking and painting. One because zbrush is fun. Two because for what I have been noticing the "fully" hand painted style popularity is shifting to the PBR hand painted style, where you have your Albedo with that brush stroke look and maybe even some light information in to it but you also have a normal map and real lights to help it work better in a 3D envrioment.
So working that way you not only training 2 skill sets at the same time (zbrush and Photoshop(or even 3d coat)), but you are also doing what is popular.
You would be surprise with the amount of clients who ask for a PBR hand painted style and them send you hundreds of overwatch print screens as references.
Hope that helps!

Hand painting textures completely in photoshop vs scuplting in zbrush first.

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