ZBrush vs Substance Painter for Normals

OCalderabnk

I'm using the workflow of doing a low poly in Maya then coverting to high poly in ZBrush to do detail, then baking maps to a low poly version, then I am taking to substance painter for textures and final details.

I am wondering why ZBrush is needed. I find that I am editing normals and designing in Substance Painter and the normals created from the ZBrush just feel pointless?

Can anyone explain why people dont just make a low poly version in Maya then exporting to Substance painter and paint the normals and textures on there, why does ZBrush need to be included in the process when your only designing the normals for games?

Thanks for any responses.

rollin

Normals is a broad topic. it reaches from the overall big shapes to very fine details. And there is a area where it is indeed a matter of taste if you do the them in the sculpting app of your choice or in the texture app of your choice. E.g. stitches on fabric

But you can't efficiently create normals in e.g. substance painter that mimic the normal difference between a lowpoly and highpoly model. 
And before we add any details this is usually the main reason for creating a normal map in the first place.

So if you feel you don't need zbrush you're doing something wrong or your workflow might really doesn't need a sculpting app in between. Show some pics if you don't mind! 

OCalderabnk

@rollin Thanks for replying, Im just still trying to learn the best path to create assets to the best quality so any advice would be amazing.

Here are some images of an example WIP of a prop in an environment I am creating, so is it okay to not use ZBrush and use just Substance on the smaller assets while bigger more complex ones should be done within ZBrush? I just assumed the best process is Maya - ZBrush - Substance but after taking it to texture in substance I found that all the ZBrush normals I created could have been done in Substance or were faded out from Substance adjustments.

Low Poly Prop Zbrush


High Poly Prop ZBrush


Substance Painter Prop


Any advice for the best practice to create props would be amazing!

Thanks

musashidan

Ultimately, the output is to a normal map so Substance Painter has deprecated a lot of the work I once would have done using floaters and Zbrush sculpting. It really is a matter of a 'per-aseet' basis. The Zbrush sculpting pass can be entirely skipped to great benefit if the same work can be done in SP. Adding your normal details in SP post-bake is fully non-destructive, extremely flexible, and has a LOT of power. The tools vae gotten a lot better too so you can even create brushes that mimic the ZB brushes and build up your details in true layers. Add to this procedural tiling maps and it becomes obvious that this non-destructive approach in SP is the way to go in a lot of cases. I say a lot because there are definitely still cases where I will use ZB, but they are becoming less and less for me. This is a decision that you have to decide upon on this 'per-asset' approach. Also, another advantage is that the detail added in SP is wysiwyg and you have full control of it without having to do any costly rebakes.

Here's is an image from an asset I recently finished with 100% detailing being done in SP. I even decided to hand paint the wood damage, which is something I would have traditionally done in ZB.

rollin

@OCalderabnk   The difference between high and lowpoly in this case is indeed so minimal that you could skip all detailing in zbrush entirely. 

OCalderabnk

@musashidan @rollin Thanks for both your responses, really useful to know for the future!

gnoop

    SPainter is  getting better than before every new release but still lacks in area of simple art techniques  people use for years elsewhere. Like projecting a photo of something to be precisely matching your model.  Because you couldn't set a center of scaling, neither you have convenient enough mesh deform or something.  The scaling is  always around the center of the image.     It's monstrously inconvenient  in SP comparing with what Mari + Photoshop smart object + saved projections in Mari provide   and imo main reason why people for realistic photo based texturing  still prefer Mari .    

  Another omission is what's called "roll" brush in Zbrush.  It's when you could make a long, long brush dab of a crack  or tire track  and roll it along your stroke with proper deformation.   You could even adjust a curve of your stroke first.

It's why I love 3d coat btw  where its all there . Well, almost.

  In general SP still feels a bit robotic and mechanical resulting in pretty distinguishable SPainter  "style" , at least  in works of many people .   And it does feel like that  in all Algorithmic products too imo.

  It very much lacks that almost physical sense of  surface beneath your fingerprints you are getting in ZB with many of its brushes.    It's why I guess many still prefer ZB and Mari.