3ds max <-> Zbrush 3.1 pipeline

Raider

So my last model i had so many headaches that i wanted to scrap it but kept going.

Basically, i created a all quad basic mesh, sculpted that up.. used the zbrush retopo tool which i found to be really clumsy and ended up with pretty bad topology as things tried to connect through the model instead of snapping to it. So i took what i'd done and fixed it up in max.

However by doing that my face counts didn't match so i couldn't then get the unwrapped + proper retopo'd model to link back to the high res.. So i couldn't use x-normal and i ended up having to use projection modifer... which was a nightmare on two counts.

1. I couldn't use my highest res pass as 3ds max would crash when i tried to it, so i lost a lot of my surface details.

2. Projection master is just a pain in the ass to use.

I've looked pretty much everywhere, got a few gnomon DVDs etc.. but none show the process of doing it. It really made the quality of my latest model suffer in my opinion. Any help would be hugely appreciated.

So basically...

quad base mesh -> hi-poly sculpt -> !!! retopo + unwrap bake normals / ao (THIS IS THE MAIN PROBLEM)!!! -> texture.

Bal

Don't understand what your problem is exactly... What do you mean by "face counts didn't match"? They don't have to, you can bake any model with any other model.

Yeah the retopo tools in Zbrush aren't ideal, what I do instead is export a mid-res version of your zbrush model into max (you just want the overall important shapes, details that will go in the normal map aren't important) and retopo in there (look up the max_retopo script on scriptspot, it's good).
Then unwrap it like you'd do any other model, load that and the high-res version in xNormal, and bake.

Raider

Then unwrap it like you'd do any other model, load that and the high-res version in xNormal, and bake.

My problem is the fact that I did the high res, retopo'd and uvw mapped in max, but how do you get the high res baked onto the low res when the high res has no uvw map or even close to the uvw map that the low poly has?

Japhir

You are baking the high poly geometry, using rays or a cage or whatever, there is no need for the highpoly to have UV"s at all! Just unwrap the lowpoly and put in in more or less the same position and bake!

CheeseOnToast

Also, if you want to do your baking in max, get the decimation master plugin for zbrush. You can seriously reduce your high-res model's poly count but preserve all the detail.