Zbrush - painting workflow
polycounter lvl 4
Hi guys,
I am looking for advice on texturing high poly zbrush sculpt.
So far I was doing LP characters for game engine so it my process was:
Zbrush HP sculpt > Retop as few chunks in 3ds MAX > bake the maps for the LP > paint the LP textures in PS.
Right now I was asked to do marketing render: posed HP sculpt, specific angle, lights etc.
I am looking for the best way of dealing with:
1. Zbrush HP sculpt does not have the UVs
automatic unwrap is crappy or I don't know how to use it - manual unwrap in Max? Sounds tedious as I have over 50 subtools
and if I should manually unwrap the subtools then
2. I would have to retopologize the subtools as well as the mesh flow is sometimes messed up due to cartoonish character and pose (and my skills probably)
and if I am right with the two above then:
3. it leaves me with 50 seperate elements with seperate textures. 50 seperate files to work with in PS.
So to sum up: is it all just the way it is or am I missing something? Any advice will be greatly appreciated.
Forgot to add:
One workflow I found is to do everything inside Zbrush with polypainting. That allows me to avoid unwrapping and retopologizing. The problem with this way of doing things is that I cannot go out to paint stuff in PS and the style I am going for is bit cartoony / handpainted.
I am looking for advice on texturing high poly zbrush sculpt.
So far I was doing LP characters for game engine so it my process was:
Zbrush HP sculpt > Retop as few chunks in 3ds MAX > bake the maps for the LP > paint the LP textures in PS.
Right now I was asked to do marketing render: posed HP sculpt, specific angle, lights etc.
I am looking for the best way of dealing with:
1. Zbrush HP sculpt does not have the UVs
automatic unwrap is crappy or I don't know how to use it - manual unwrap in Max? Sounds tedious as I have over 50 subtools
and if I should manually unwrap the subtools then
2. I would have to retopologize the subtools as well as the mesh flow is sometimes messed up due to cartoonish character and pose (and my skills probably)
and if I am right with the two above then:
3. it leaves me with 50 seperate elements with seperate textures. 50 seperate files to work with in PS.
So to sum up: is it all just the way it is or am I missing something? Any advice will be greatly appreciated.
Forgot to add:
One workflow I found is to do everything inside Zbrush with polypainting. That allows me to avoid unwrapping and retopologizing. The problem with this way of doing things is that I cannot go out to paint stuff in PS and the style I am going for is bit cartoony / handpainted.
Replies
There is also the spotlight tool for texturing inside of Zbrush, and zapplink to send a view to photoshop.
Here's a zapplink tutorial
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?30015-ZappLink-head-texturing-tutorial.
Not sure if any of this helps, but thought I should throw out some options for you.
Using AO to control UV creation is new to me - I will look into it.
also this Zaplink tutorial looks promising, I just need to wrap my head around this method.
Cheers,
AQ
http://pixologic.com/zclassroom/homeroom/lesson/spotlight/