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Perplexed still on low/high poly manipulation

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polycounter lvl 9
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Chase polycounter lvl 9
I just watched the new ZClassroom tutorial demonstrating more or less the Boolean feature using Dynamesh. He was able to get this shape extremely shortly using this operation where as modeling it in Max would've taken way too long for him let alone me.92261945.jpg

I've been told to avoid using Booleans as it simply destroys geo, and that I should be able to model the shape without relying on subtracting primitives. For me, this tutorial threw all that in a blender because modeling this prop in Max seems like a bloody nightmare where as ZBrush made it a 20 min operation.

Take for instance this gun prop I'm making
photo7581jpg.png
I can model this in Max easily, but why not just DynaBoolean the thing in ZBrush, decimate the high poly or throw it into Topogun and get the low poly that way?

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  • ZacD
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    ZacD ngon master
    Booleans in zbrush using dynamesh is fine, just avoid relying to heavily on booleans in max or maya.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Is that because ZBrush won't mess up the geo like Max and Maya?
  • Ace-Angel
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    Ace-Angel polycounter lvl 12
    Traditional apps like Max and Maya, have a very different pipeline when compared to apps like Zbrush, vs. apps like Solidworks, etc.

    Each one has a different workflow, the point is you need to learn each workflow, and make do with it at the end of the day.

    You're told to avoid bool operations in traditional apps because you want controllable topology right off the bat. It would be very silly to model something in Max, bool and retopo it when from the start you have the ability of creating an organized mesh.

    ZB on the other hand doesn't have this option, just like it doesn't have the option of selecting vertices and extruding manually or creating holes manually, so organized mesh isn't possible right off the bat, hence why you can model stuff with bools, because you have to.

    Look at it this way for an idea, the time it takes you model something cleanly in Max = time for ZB user to Model and retopo said model.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Makes sense. I'm already looking at the reference for my gun rail and how I'd do it in Max cause there are just a lot of elements in ZBrush that would make it difficult. Practice practice practice
  • WarrenM
    I've been playing with a work flow lately that consists of modeling shapes in Modo and using GoZ to send them over to ZBrush. Once there, I boolean them together and create complex shapes pretty easily.

    Ace has a point that you will have to retopo the ZBrush high poly model but if you build the high poly with an eye towards that process, it shouldn't be too bad.

    I'm finding the trade off worth it so far because I can get so much more detail out of the ZBrush booleans than I can out of traditional modeling techniques. That's a personal thing, obviously, but since I'm not that great at sub-d modeling to begin with it works for me!
  • cryrid
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    cryrid interpolator
    zbrush actually has tools to model vert by vert and delete faces. The main thing is that it is used to dealing with a massive level of polygons. It doesn't need to clean itself up and optimize the topology, it can apply sheer brute force to hammer out a shape.
  • nyx702
    perna wrote: »
    Max has Power Booleans, which is very good.

    The native 3dsmax Booleans you are referencing are called "ProBooleans" not Power. I think that is a 3rd Part plugin. Sorry to jump in here and correct you but I just didn't want to confuse the OP.

    But regarless, ProBooleans are awesome. People laugh at me when I say that I use Booleans but they are the dumb dumbs that dont know ProBooleans exist.
  • ZacD
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    ZacD ngon master
    At a certain point, people new to 3d tend to just boolean everything just because addition and subtraction via solid shapes makes sense. I'll just bolean some windows, boolean this door knob onto this door, combine these parts, etc... and they tend to not use tools that may provide better results quicker like bridging or beveling. These people also don't realize it might be a good idea to keep some meshes seperate.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Thanks for the comments guys. Like you said Perna I'm just having a difficult time modeling in general so I'm trying to find an easy out. Right now I'm stuck on this rail prop in Max. I thought it was going to be easy. Nope, not for me. This has taken me a few hours to model
    79004984.jpg
    I think it's look good so far. I just don't know what to do with the low poly on the right. This is the most complicated thing I've done up to this point. Any advice would be great :poly122:
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Perna, have you tried doing any hard surface in the latest z-brush? The video OP linked seems like it does a good job for boolean-heavy machined pieces, it could be faster than worrying about topo in 3ds max, assuming the end result will be part of a typical res normal map. Also the mask-painting/booleaning part of the radio video (Part 2, toward the end) looks pretty useful.

    Also, do you often use the boolean method you posted above to start those kinds of models?
    Do you do a lot of manual stitching and reflowing afterward and/or is that that just the raw result from proboolean?
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    That's just the raw result from proboolean. You'll have to do some edge clean up almost every time. In ZBrush it's done automatically........I believe.

    Perna, for the parts I've circled what did you do to get the smooth merge?

    11331218.jpg
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Also, wouldn't you need a lot more geo to have this extrusion keep it's shape?

    rkFLp.png

    Wouldn't that extra geo make the boolean and the resulting clean-up a lot harder/more-work?
    You also couldn't do this nondestructively or non-linearly, like if you realize later that you need to add that geo in to make the extrusion, so you would have to redo a lot of the work in that case, no?
  • Scruples
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    Scruples polycounter lvl 10
    We need something like a voxel cube that you can attach booleans to and continue manipulating the boolean objects after they are applied. Being able to drag a cylindrical hole across a mesh and watch it update with a proper chamfer would be a nice thing to see.

    edit: to answer computron on the destructivity question, proboolean is only partially destructive, you can still modify the operands and their modifier stacks.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Scruples wrote: »
    We need something like a voxel cube that you can attach booleans to and continue manipulating the boolean objects after they are applied. Being able to drag a cylindrical hole across a mesh and watch it update with a proper chamfer would be a nice thing to see.

    Groboto+Modo does something like that, but it maintains great topology and SDS endgeflow. The only problem is the topo is uniformly dense and that can make somethings a little difficult to hand model afterward.
    Scruples wrote: »
    edit: to answer computron on the destructivity question, proboolean is only partially destructive, you can still modify the operands and their modifier stacks.
    perna wrote: »
    Computron: About the protruding box shape, just add more segments to the base cylinder. Everything's parametric. This means you can tweak the settings and watch everything update in realtime until you have the perfect mesh. It's pure genius.

    Not sure what you mean about not being able to work non-destructively.

    How do you modify the parameters of the boolean members later?

    Like how do select and increase only the cylinders edge segements?
    I can't find the option in my proboolean:
    UQ58V.png

    EDIT: I have to extract the sub-objects, don't I?

    Facepalm! :poly127:

    perna wrote: »
    Computron: It's all a balancing act. Will Zbrush be faster? Then use Zbrush. Simple. Will Zbrush be faster because you don't have good subd modeling practices? Then practice your sub-d skills. For the majority of cases your overall procuction time will suffer, and quality will suffer a lot, from using ZBrush. It's just common sense. You can't select an edge and chamfer it unless you have a clean cage model. You can't change a chamfer width on a zbrush model. Heck, you can barely change anything at all. Once you've done something, you're stuck with it.

    I agree about that, it seemed to me like you where discounting zbrush wholesale for hard surface like a lot of people who tried using it before all the new tools in the later releases of version 4. I am curious if you have used it lately as a lot of websites have been posting tutorials and models made mostly with Zbrush in recent memory.
  • Scruples
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    Scruples polycounter lvl 10
    That is neat, first time I heard of this.
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4FoEYptQvA"]GroBoto Real-Time Real-Boolean Modeling.mov - YouTube[/ame]
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    I just meant have to make cuts and connects to make quads and triangles haha. As far as smooth merge goes, I just mean how you created the two shapes I circled in the pic. They flow evenly together
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Ok thanks for the explanation. I'm gonna try this out later and get back to ya with my results :D
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    So you put all the primitives together, then you instance them and make a proboolean on the instances?

    How come I have never heard of this!! :poly121:
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    How long have you been using this method? Do you have any more complex examples or shapes where you have used this (I assume this is a lot less usefull on organic flowing shapes)? Do you got any tips to minimize cleanup?
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Hell yeagh! I hopped into max and have been playing around with it since you mentioned it.

    Definitely post your tut when you get it up, hopefully with some really complex, somewhat more organic shapes.

    As an aside, how would you go about cleaning up the merging on this shape:

    hRmrN.png

    My guess is that a more realistic scenario would involve less segments on the big cylinder or more on the smaller one, but any tips in this case?

    Here is my attempt, although its got tris and its not really smooth:

    iEF67.png

    j1wM3.png
  • Scruples
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    Scruples polycounter lvl 10
    Reasons I lurk this forum, perna, renderhjs, (and matt to a lesser extent :P).
    I'll be watching for that tut.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    So, I was on the right track, it just 'needs more geo'. Man, I keep hoping there are a lot simpler ways, but SDS is mostly a lot of manual work and clean-up. Its why z-brush is so appealing for some of these things.

    Thanks man!

    Also, That last thing is pretty cool lookin', can you post the primitives and the wireframe? How much time did it take to clean?
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Yea, but "Needs more geo, but not strictly, just in the right places and with the right density" doesn't quite roll off the tongue as well. :poly124:

    But I understand, I was going for essentially the same thing with my attempt.
    It's hard to gauge how much geo is enough, I guess thats the type of thing you hone in on with experience.
  • cptSwing
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    cptSwing polycounter lvl 11
    this thread is a winner, ladies and gentlemen - seems I need to work through the awkwardness of max's booleans after all. very interesting stuff perna!
  • WarrenM
    Great info in this thread, damn. I'm learning the ZBrush/Modo/boolean workflow right now but I'm open to whatever. More options are good!

    And thanks for the Groboto mention. I'll take a look at that today, I've never heard of it before..
  • Deadly Nightshade
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    Deadly Nightshade polycounter lvl 10
    Anyone tried this?:
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtCD9-OsogA&feature=player_embedded"]fRay Boolean Master 1.0 - MEL Script Demo - YouTube[/ame]

    Real-time booleans in Maya
  • cryrid
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    cryrid interpolator
    A small thing to consider when using zbrush for this: keep all of your original shapes, pre-dynameshed (like how the tutorial has them). Then if you do need to go back and add more segments or adjust a bevel size, you're not screwed.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Yeah, just looking at that image I'm kinda lost haha. I see the shapes you used, just need to see the step by step to fully comprehend it
  • xXm0RpH3usXx
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    xXm0RpH3usXx polycounter lvl 13
    i dont want to post something too obvious, but just recently i found an interesting section of the pro booelans settings i would like to make everyone aware of.
    Under "advanced options" you can tick on "make quatliterals" which makes it possible to add some support edges easily.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    Yeah I just saw that last night. Makes it easier then doing it manually lol
  • EarthQuake
    Personally I take that attitude that as long as it provides a clean bake, and you're comfortable enough with the technique that you can make any changes requested of you in a reasonable amount of time, then go for it.

    I think for personal art this is a good policy, but for studio production it falls apart.

    Really it should be "that any artist can make any changes requested in a reasonable amount of time" because quite often someone else will work on an asset you made, either because you're working on something else, you've left the studio, someone else has left the studio and you're tweaking their art, etc etc etc.

    So if you're the only guy in the studio that is comfortable doing hard surface stuff in zbrush it really wouldn't fly. Unless you literally never have any revisions or never have more than one artist work on the same asset.

    Traditional sub-d methods can be viewed/edited in virtually every standard 3d app, and should be easy for any artist to pick up on even if you just send them an obj of your cage. Zbrush content is an entirely different story, and doing certain things like a quick tweak of some edges will be time consuming and difficult, whereas with traditional sub-d its only a matter of sliding some edge loops around.

    Another common situation:

    Lets say you have an asset, and that asset has 20 identical screws. Lets say you go to do your bake and find out the the edges are too hard on every one of those screws and it doesn't read in the bake.

    In your 3d app, you tweak the one source floater you have instanced around your mesh and rebake, takes only a couple of seconds.

    In zbrush you.....
  • nyx702
    I wish I could get an RSS feed for all your posts perna.
  • WarrenM
    perna
    I watched a zbrush hard-surface video recently that a bunch of polycounters were impressed by. It was taking ages to do what would be a 5-minute polygon job
    This is true but mainly because most guys who do that are married to doing everything in ZBrush. To be fair, building shapes in a modeling app and sending them over to ZBrush makes that process a LOT faster. Trying to shadowbox or clip the correct boolean sources is a waste of time, IMO.

    On another topic, I have a question about your process...

    You advocated booleans earlier in the thread, which I agree with. There's really no reason not to use them. You also said that by generating a high poly mesh you essentially get the low poly for free by removing edges, which I also agree with.

    However, do you find that still holds true if you combine both of those thoughts? The boolean'd meshes look nice but they don't seem to have any kind of nice polygon layout that would allow for quick creation of the low poly mesh. Or do they? Granted, I'm not all that experienced so that's why I'm curious...
  • WarrenM
    Ahh OK. Looking forward to it!
  • MrOneTwo
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    MrOneTwo polycounter lvl 12
    Damn I never thought hard surface modelling in Zbrush can be a thing in professional job. I always thought about it as of some interesting thingy... not usable in game art ;p

    I think people are just impressed that you can make stuff like that in Zbrush because Zbrush wasn't made for such things (which is really funny logic. Impresses because it does things it doesn't need to do). Sculpting app that can do hardsurface seems impressive but only as a concept. Also people think they can just make hard surface just like organic stuff. "Topology sucks ? Just divide it and it will look ok". When I started learning 3d I created heads in Zbrush. They needed 2 milion of polies to look more or less ok. Now by using topology right and knowing how to use geometry I can do the same thing with lots less polies.

    I really like technical aspect of subd modelling. I have still much to learn but it's a great subject and I really don't understand people who try to avoid it.
  • JonathanLambert
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    JonathanLambert polycounter lvl 6
    Wow, I'm really looking forward to this tutorial! I had completely written off using booleans years ago. This seems like it could really speed up the work flow when you have complex intersections.
  • Decency
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    Decency polycounter lvl 10
    Just want to say I really enjoyed reading this thread, especially the posts by the 3 Point guys. Sometimes you just need to learn the fundamentals, it's not easy or quick but it pays off.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    I haven't done much sub-d lately so I decided I would practice this workflow tonight:
    P0lPs.png

    Booleans are indeed awesome :D
    The damn cleanup still takes forever, I couldn't figure out how you boolean'ed in support loops as you mentioned, Perna, so definitely elaborate on that in your guide.
  • Internet Friend
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    Internet Friend polycounter lvl 9
    Computron wrote: »
    The damn cleanup still takes forever, I couldn't figure out how you boolean'ed in support loops as you mentioned, Perna, so definitely elaborate on that in your guide.

    Did you try using Intersection with Imprint checked? That just cuts edges into the operand above it.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Fun it is, but damn you are quick.
  • Chase
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    Chase polycounter lvl 9
    You post that tutorial Perna?
  • Hazardous
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    Hazardous polycounter lvl 12
    EarthQuake wrote: »

    Really it should be "that any artist can make any changes requested in a reasonable amount of time" because quite often someone else will work on an asset you made, either because you're working on something else, you've left the studio, someone else has left the studio and you're tweaking their art, etc etc etc.

    Sound advice.

    Also awesome info in here perna, looking forward to that tut!

    I gotta give this stuff more love, I need to find a girl to cover in hard surface bits that might motivate me...
  • EarthQuake
    Hazardous wrote: »
    I need to find a girl to cover in hard surface bits that might motivate me...

    Yes please.
  • warxsnake
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    warxsnake polycounter lvl 8
    Max has powerful mirroring and array tools, coupled with some plugins.

    As a result, the radio in the first post is pretty easy to do in a few minutes, just model and boolean one corner of the radio shape and then mirror the rest once you are done cleaning the instanced corner.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Yea, it's pretty clear now from just an interoperability and pipeline stand point that for the majority of hard-surface assets it is worth spending a little longer to have perfect topology and a nice non-destrucive/easily-changable stack.
  • warxsnake
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    warxsnake polycounter lvl 8
    Yeah, after complaining for the longest time about hard edge subD modeling (and the growing gap between subD and hard edge sculpting/dynamesh boolean) and now being a veteran at it, I kind of stopped complaining because usually with mechanical stuff you are rewarded with very instanced/mirrored items. Stuff that can be modeled in a modular fashion and then copied to complete the model. It's a balancing act I guess.

    And yeah, people who say avoid boolean are just plain ignorant. I admit, use it at your precaution (keep edges/vertex cleaner), so theres a cleanup process, but the benefits awarded with using proboolean are huge.
    I had to make 40 highres weapons for a AAA game, and boolean was and still is my most used tool.
  • sheckee
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    sheckee polycounter lvl 9
    Amazing stuff in here, I'd love to read more on the Boolean stuff if you would Perna.
    This is the exact reason I steered clear of Zbrush until I had a firm grasp of topology/subD modeling. A good modeler can use Zbrush and take their creations to their modeling package of choice and use them. It doesn't work the other way around.
    Although this is also partly the reason I avoid Zbrush a lot in favor of just subD Modelling things that would be more sensible and faster in a sculpting package. Swings and round abouts, I do love subD modelling though. It really is incredible fun :D
  • Envart
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    Envart polycounter lvl 6
    Some brilliant info here, going to have to get to grips with pro-booleans because it looks extremely useful. Being able to adjust the mesh density in a parametric fashion would have saved me many hours in the past. Very much looking forward to that tutorial!
  • FractaL
    I'm just gonna post in this thread so I can go back to it. Great read!
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    FractaL wrote: »
    I'm just gonna post in this thread so I can go back to it. Great read!

    I have Polycount set up on my RSS reader, so I get every new thread loaded in quickly glanceable chain and if I see a thread I like but I don't have something to post I set it up in my subs and check on those threads later with the sub box. super effecient and I never miss any cool art.
    iZ0J8r9mkyGCR.gif


    Now if only I could get the WAYWO and Lowpoly threads posts in my RSS reader the same way...



    I am learning to use modo and I am really missing the modifier stack and the 'edit poly, show-results, turbosmooth' features and haveing proboolean at the base of the stack as well.
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