Soft-Edged Low Poly Objects in Z-Brush? (Non-Quad Appearance)

ChristheLancer97

Hi, still getting used to Zbrush,  but I was wondering if anybody has any idea how to apply smoothed normals for low poly objects in Zbrush that aren't intended for Catmull-Clark sudivision surface. I want to retain the low poly appearance with the subdivided details still on the mesh. I've tried to export my mesh with Smoothed Normals checked, but this is the results I get on Blender or any other 3D software:


As you can see, the Mask still has prints of the polygons, which I would like to turn off in Zbrush. For reference, this is what the Mask looked like before importing it into Zbrush and would ideally want it to look when exporting it or enabling that option in Zbrush even:


 If anybody knows how to turn this off in Zbrush so I can get a smoothed out, low poly look just like the image above, with the sculpted details on, I'd be eternally grateful!

Ghogiel

Zbrush is not really 3d and doesn't use normals like other 3d apps in it's realtime display. You can soften them in renders but thats about it.

That being said, if I understand correctly, you might just do the detail in texture and stick it on the low poly shape. You can't really subdivide and keep that low poly faceting without keeping the faceting as seen in the first pic. There are so many normals on the denser mesh that the shape will render more accurately, smooth shading has far less to do when the polys are so dense now the don't need to barely blend shading to any connected faces.

" I want to retain the low poly appearance with the subdivided details still on the mesh" if the last image is what you what it to look like, closest pure ZB high poly thing you might do is add creases to the hard edges then subd in ZB. It'll stil smooth around the circular loops though. Granted it's a little different result, but that's what you are trying to fake with the smooth/hard shading in blender, ZB just does it for real in actual geo.

ChristheLancer97

Yeah I may have to try out adding creases, hopefully that works. I just thought there was a quick way to eliminate the faceted look beforehand even, ah well. Thanks for your reply!

rollin

One important point here is that you seem to have subdivided without smoothing. So the polygon look comes from actual geometry and not from normals. At least that's what I would guess without having seen the wires

It's not completely clear to me what you want to do but I would split the mask and these tiny spikes into two subtools. Then subdivide only the mask and sculpt on it

ChristheLancer97

The mask and the crystals are two different subtools already. And that's what I was ultimately going for, I wanted it subdivided without applying catmull-clark smoothing (low poly version with soft edges like the 2nd picture) but it ended up projecting the low polygons facets onto the high as a result. I may have to test out applying a catmull-clark subdivided version of the mesh in ZB like you guys suggested and projecting the details onto the low poly through baking, it may possibly come with faulty baking results since it wont be the same geometry but I will test this anyway, thanks.