Tutorial: Warrior Image

From ZBrush Info

by By J.S. Rolhion

Contents 1 Creating Armor with ZSpheres 1.1 In Conclusion 2 Sculpting the Armor 2.1 In Conclusion 3 Fine Details with Projection Master 3.1 In Conclusion 4 More Armor: Upper Arm 4.1 In Conclusion 5 The Warrior's Head 5.1 In Conclusion 6 Combining Everything Into a Scene 6.1 In Conclusion

Creating Armor with ZSpheres

In this section, we’ll use ZSpheres to create a base mesh that will be refined in the following sections.

• If this is not a fresh ZBrush session, initialize ZBrush (Preferences:Init ZBrush).
• Select the ZSphere tool.
• Holding down the Shift key, draw the ZSphere on the canvas.

By holding down the Shift key, you constrain ZBrush to draw the object “squarely” on the canvas. It will be oriented so that X is perfectly horizontal, Y is vertical, and Z is directly facing the camera.

• Press Transform:Edit Object.

This allows you to sculpt the most recently drawn object in this case, the ZSphere.

• Press S and change the Draw Size to 1.

This step is very important when working with ZSpheres. Larger draw sizes can cause you to affect more than one ZSphere at a time, which is usually undesirable.

• Also in the Transform palette, click on X Symmetry.

Now all edits made to one side of the model will be duplicated on the other side.

The small circles indicate the future positions of ZSpheres. They turn green when the positioning is ideal, but that is not always important. Don’t worry about it for the purposes of this tutorial. Also, the red line is drawn from your pointer’s position to the center of the ZSphere that would be affected by clicking at the pointer’s current location.

• Click and drag to add two new ZSpheres as shown:

The red ZSphere is the one that you actually draw, while symmetry also draws an identical ZSphere on the other side. White lines show the parent/child relationships for the currently-selected (red) ZSphere.

• Rotate the object by clicking and dragging on a blank part of the canvas.

• Switch to Edit:Move mode.

The keyboard shortcut for this is W.

• Click and drag on the new ZSphere to move it slightly away from its parent.

• Activate the mesh preview by pressing A.

• Change Tool:Adaptive Skin:Density to 4.

This greatly increases the number of polygons in the preview mesh. It also increases the number of subdivision levels that a skin created from this model would have. Density of 4 means that the skin would have 4 subdivision levels.

• If the preview looks like the image above, your ZSpheres are positioned correctly. If not, adjust them as needed by pressing A, moving ZSpheres, and then reactivating the preview until the mesh looks correct.

• Press A to return to the ZSphere view.
• Activate Edit:Draw mode by clicking on the Draw Pointer button or pressing Q.

You must be in Draw mode to add ZSpheres to the model.

• Create a new ZSphere for the armor’s torso.

To draw a single ZSphere, move your pointer so that the two red circles overlap. When they become one circle, this indicates that a single ZSphere will be created, exactly centered along the model’s axis. For this ZSphere, try to get the circle to turn green before you click and drag.

• Create another small ZSphere for the neck.

• Move the ZSphere slightly forward of center.

You can try different moves and then see the result by pressing A to activate the preview. To help get the proper positioning, don’t hesitate to rotate your model. You will often find that it is beneficial to work from one of the “planar” views. Rotate the object so that it is close to the planar orientation, then hold down the Shift key to snap it into position.

• Move the neck ZSphere into the main structure. You’ll know that its position is correct when it becomes semi-transparent.

When a ZSphere is inset into its parent, its effect on the mesh changes. Instead of adding to the mesh’s mass, it creates an indentation.

• Activate the preview, then set the density to 3.

While ZSphere meshes can be created with any density up to 8, lower numbers of polygons are usually better, as they allow broader-scale control over your mesh. Your preview should be close to this:

• When satisfied, deactivate the preview and then return to Edit:Draw mode so that more ZSpheres can be added.

• Draw arm ZSpheres from the base of the shoulders.

• Like with the neck, press W to switch to Move mode and then inset these new ZSpheres into their parents.

• Return to Draw mode. Click on the first linking sphere connecting the chest ZSphere to the shoulder.

Clicking on a linking sphere while in Edit:Draw mode converts it into a ZSphere. By adding a new ZSphere so close to its parent and child, we force a crease to appear in the mesh as shown:

• With the preview active, change to Move mode.
• Increase your Draw Size to about 100. The cursor should be slightly larger than the waist ZSphere.
  

While the preview mesh can be sculpted, it is important not to do so until you are sure that you will not be adding additional ZSpheres or otherwise changing the structure of the ZSphere figure. If you were to make a change to the ZSphere structure that caused the number of vertices in the preview to change, your sculpting would be lost.

• Click on the bottom of the mesh and drag to move the center polygons up inside of the figure.

There are other ways that you could achieve this same result, such as by adding another inset ZSphere. We’re using this technique instead to show that you can sculpt the preview mesh, even without skinning the model.

• Rotate to a side view and refine the shape further.

• Now increase the mesh density to a value of 5.

Now that the basic shape of the mesh is finished, it’s ok to add more polygons to it. This will allow finer detail to be created in the next section.

• Press Tool:Save As and save your model as ArmorPart1.ztl

In Conclusion

ZSpheres provide a very fast and easy way to create a wide variety of shapes. All you need to do is block out the shape that you want by creating a skeleton of linked ZSpheres, and ZBrush will then create a nicely-organized mesh around the structure. You can preview this mesh at any time, and even sculpt the preview on a polygonal level. For more information on ZSphere modeling, including the use of Attractors (magnet ZSpheres), be sure to review the ZScript documentation and tutorials included with ZBrush.

In the next section, we will add details to the armor using the mesh-level editing tools that are at our disposal.

Sculpting the Armor

In this section, we will explore ZBrush 2’s new editing tools to further refine the shape of our mesh.

The Transform Brushes provide a really powerful way to obtain precise results when adding details to a mesh figure. You’ll find them in the Transform palette.

• Std is the Standard brush. It moves points away from the surface along a single direction. This direction is determined by the surface normal at the center of the brush’s area of influence.
• StdDot is similar to the Std brush, except that it only draws a single “bump.” This bump can be dragged across the surface until you are satisfied with its position.
• Inflat has an effect that can be very similar to Std, or very different depending on where you use it. Every point within the brush’s area of effect is moved according to its own normal. On mostly flat areas, this effect is indistinguishable from Std, but in places where the polygons have very different orientations this brush has the effect of infating the edited area.
• InflatDot allows precise placement of an inflated bulge by allowing you to drag the inflated area around before releasing the mouse.
• Layer raises the polygons in a single hard-edged layer. The effect is similar to the Single Layer tool when painting in 2.5D, but works on a fully 3D polygonal level.
• Pinch pulls nearby polygons toward the center of the edited area. This is very useful for creating creases or sharpening edges.
• Nudge pushes vertices along the object’s surface. This is useful for refining edge loops and the overall “flow” of polygons.
• Smooth is used to soften edits that have been made to the surface of a model by averaging the points within its area of influence. Taken to an extreme, it can erase edits that have been made to portions of a mesh.

Many brushes can also be reversed by holding down the Alt key. For example, Std normally adds depth to a surface but by holding down Alt it can cut into the surface instead.

Each brush has its own Z Intensity settings.

Last of all, the Shift key by default activates the Smooth brush. You can change this by holding Shift while activating any of the other editing brushes. Shift will then activate that brush instead.

Let’s start putting this into practice.

• If you are starting a new session, press Tool:Load Tool and select ArmorPart1.ztl. Draw it on the canvas and press T to enter Edit Mode.

Make sure that Edit:Draw is active, like in the illustration above. Also make sure that X Symmetry is still active.

• Set your Draw Size to 39, and Z Intensity to 25.
• Paint additional detail onto the model to build up the neck and chest.

While working, you can change your Draw Size and Z Intensity. Be sure to add details to every side of the mesh. You may also at times want to hold down the Alt key to chisel into the mesh rather than building up detail.

These tools are very intuitive, since they are much like traditional sculpture. They are extremely useful for organic shapes. Of course, armor is usually very sharp along edges and intersections. ZBrush can accommodate this need, as well.

• Activate the Pinch brush.

• Choose a Z Intensity of 40 and a Draw Size of 25.
• Draw on the areas where you wish to make harder edges.

As you can see, this brush directly sharpens area where we originally had an organic look that was not realistic enough for this armor.

You should experiment with different Z Intensity and Draw Size settings to really get a feel for this brush, or to achieve different results. Feel free as you work to alternate between Std and Pinch.

• Press Tool:Adaptive Skin:Make Adaptive Skin.

This creates a new object in the Tool palette, which starts with “Skin” for the object name. This new mesh is no longer tied to the ZSpheres that were used to generate it, and is a discreet polymesh object.

You could actually continue to work with the model while it’s connected to the ZSpheres. While this is useful if you plan to animate the finished figure in ZBrush, it’s not necessary for a project such as this still scene.

• Save the model as ArmorPart2a.ztl.

It’s always wise to save your work in case you wish to return to the ZSphere model later for some reason.

• Press T to exit Edit Mode, then Ctrl+N to clear the canvas.

We do this because the ZSphere version of the model is still on the canvas. ZBrush is programmed to work this way, since it allows you to change the model and create additional skins if you wish. For our purposes, though, we want to switch to the skin object instead of the ZSphere model, so we need to remove the ZSphere figure from the canvas. Place your pointer over the thumbnail for the skin object. A popup will appear with information about the mesh, including the number of polygons, points, groups, etc. This information can be very useful.

When creating a skin using the Make Adaptive Skin button, ZBrush also keeps the mesh’s subdivision levels. This means that you could actually make broad-scale changes to your mesh by going to a lower subdivision level and moving a few points, then return to the higher level without losing the detail that has been sculpted so far. We’ll make use of this feature later.

• Select the skin object and draw it on the canvas.
• Press T to enter Edit Mode.

• In Tool palette, click on Geometry to open the Geometry menu.
• Press Divide.

Dividing the mesh quadruples the number of polygons. More polygons make it possible for finer details to be added to the mesh. The number of times that you can divide the mesh is ultimately dependent on the amount of RAM that your system has and the processor speed.

Dividing also adds a new subdivision level in the top section of the Geometry menu. You can then use the Lower Res button to temporarily decrease the number of polygons and Higher Res to increase it again.

• Select the Intensity Metal material.

While the Fast Shader material allows slightly faster mesh interaction (especially at really high polygon counts), it is also beneficial to be able to see what the figure will look like with a metallic material.

You can create your own material by changing the modifiers, but for this tutorial the standard Intensity Metal is perfect.

• Select Transform:InflatDot
• Set the Draw Size to 10.
• Click on the surface of your model. Drag the raised dot to where you want it, then release the mouse.

Feel free to put these dots anywhere you like to add visual interest to the armor.

As you can see, this is a very fast and easy way to create detail!

• Use varying Z Intensity settings to modify achieve different effects.

When you’re done, the armor should look something like the image below (depending on how much detail you’ve chosen to add).

• Save the tool as ArmorPart2b.ztl

In Conclusion

In this section we’ve created a skin from our ZSphere model and experimented with several of the sculpting brushes to refine the look of our armor. These techniques allow us to sculpt the figure in a very intuitive way, working with the model as if it’s made of clay.

In the next section, we’ll add more details in a different way: using Projection Master.

Fine Details with Projection Master

In this section we’ll finish the armor chest plate by using Projection Master to paint detail onto the model. We’ll also cover the subjects of texturing, lighting and rendering.

In part 2 we saw how to create the base mesh for the armor through modelling. But what about when you wish to add detail that cannot be achieved through the editing brushes?

ZBrush offers an innovative solution called Projection Master. Using this utility, you can literally paint details onto the model, using any or all of ZBrush’s 2.5D painting tools.

UV mapping will also be assigned to the model, which can be used for texturing or for export to other applications.

• If it is not already active on the screen, load ArmorPart2b.ztl and draw it on the screen. Enter Edit Mode by pressing the T key.
• Hold down the Shift key and rotate the model so that it is exactly facing you.
• Ensure that the model is at least subdivision level 7. If you don’t have enough subdivision levels, add another by Dividing the mesh.

Projection Master will project anything you paint directly onto the mesh below. Because of this, it is important to position your model so that the area that you will be working on is facing the camera as directly as possible.

• Click the Projection Master icon on the top shelf.

The following popup menu will open:

You are presented with a panel showing the various Projection Master options. The top section is for painting textures while the bottom section is for projecting displacements. As you click on the check boxes, the preview to the right will update to show the effect that your selection will have.

• Activate the options shown above (Colors, Material, Fade, Deformation and Normalized).
• Click Drop Now.

ZBrush will snapshot the model to the canvas. This prevents the model from being rotated until you use Projection Master to pick it up again, but it also enables all of ZBrush’s other tools. This opens up possibilities beyond what can be achieved with the Transform palette alone.

Since a texture has not yet been created for this model, Projection Master will prompt you with a warning window.

• Click the “Create a texture and continue” option.

This instructs ZBrush to create a texture at the default size of 1024x1024.

If you wanted to work with a different size, you would cancel projection instead and create a texture. First, you would need to set the desired width and height in the Texture palette. Next, click New. Finally, open Tool:Texture and select the UV mapping that you would like to use (unless you’re working with an imported model that already has mapping applied).

Since the model cannot be rotated while you are working on it, a full mesh texturing needs to be done in parts, over the course of several drop and pick cycles. You will usually find that it works best to paint the entire model with one step before moving on to the next. For example, paint a base texture across the entire model (using several drops and picks). Next paint the next level of detail onto the entire model. Then proceed to the next level of detail, etc. This makes it easy to keep your work consistent across the entire model.

• Choose the Single Layer brush.
• Choose alpha 08.
• Choose the Spray stroke.

• Set Zsub with a Z Intensity between 5 and 10, and a Draw Size between 10 and 15.

• Begin texturing by painting details like you see on the example below.

Feel free to experiment with different alphas, Z Intensity settings, and Draw Sizes to create naturalistic results.

• Choose the Simple Brush
• Select alpha 52
• Choose the DragRect stroke.

• Activate Zadd and set the Z Intensity to 25

• Click and drag on the mesh to create a large sunburst.

Remember that after drawing the stroke, you can use the gyro to move and scale it for the best positioning. Note that for this tutorial, we are using the alphas that have been included with ZBrush. If you wish, you can modify them using the Focal Shift slider and Alpha Adjust curve. You can also create or import your own to create custom brushes and personalize the armor.

As you can see, you can obtain a very high level of detail using the various brushes, alphas, and stroke types. Feel free to add as many details as you wish.

• Click the Projection Master button again.

The Projection Master panel will open once more. It will be exactly like you last saw it, except that Drop Now has changed to Pickup Now.

At this point, you can change your settings if you find that your creativity took you in a direction that you hadn’t anticipated. In our example, we did not paint any colors or materials onto the model.

• Deselect Colors and Material.

Of course, your own experimenting might have led you to use color and/or material. If that’s the case, then you should modify the settings appropriately.

• Press Pickup Now.

At this point, ZBrush will return the model to Edit Mode, ready for you to rotate it to a new position or do anything else that you like. In the process, all of the details that you have painted while it was dropped will be transferred onto the model. In the case of depth details, they will be incorporated directly into the mesh geometry. The quality of this projection displacement will depend upon the number of polygons that your model has. More polygons mean the ability to paint finer levels of detail.

• Rotate the model to take a look at your work.

As you can see, all painted depth has literally become a part of the mesh.

• Repeat the Projection Master steps from several different angles to add details to the entire mesh.

Feel free to use different colors and alphas to get a variety of rust effects and produce a truly aged, beaten look. Various Z Intensity and Rgb Intensity settings will also lend realistic randomness to your work. The more time you put into this step, the more compelling your finished scene will be!

Now that texturing and painted displacements are complete, we are ready to take a look at some of ZBrush’s lighting and rendering options.

Lighting in ZBrush is very powerful. Different options are available, such as colored lights, light intensity, light type (Sun, Point, Spot, Glow, Radial), very precise placement, and raytraced shadow options.

• Duplicate the settings below, or feel free to modify them.

If you wish to learn more about any setting, hold down the Ctrl key and place the pointer over it.

• Rotate the model into a position that you like, then exit Edit Mode (press T).

While ZBrush can do a Best render while a model is in Edit Mode, ZBrush will only render the model and a bounding box surrounding it. To render the entire scene, Edit Mode must be off.

• Turn Render:Shadows on.

This tells ZBrush to render shadows when a Best render is performed.

• Turn SoftZ and SoftRGB on. Set the Antialiasing adjustments as shown.

This will give a higher quality to the Best render.

• Press the Best button to render the scene.

While it certainly took you longer to work through this tutorial because you are still learning ZBrush and also had to read and follow the steps, I’d like to say that I created this whole breastplate in 30 minutes, including rendering. A “classic” workflow (using the other modeling packages on the market) would have taken a little bit longer. :-)

If you are using the model within a ZBrush scene (like we will do later in this tutorial), there is nothing more that you need to do.

• Save your model as ArmorPart3.ztl.

However, if you are planning to use the model in an animation package, it would be a simple matter to create a displacement and/or normal map, and then export a cage object from ZBrush as an OBJ. Displacement and normal maps are really powerful when exported to other applications, and enable you to keep all these wonderful details while working with a much lower resolution mesh. Bear in mind that the quality of the finished work will depend on how your rendering engine implements such features. For further details, see ZMapper.

In Conclusion

This section of the armor tutorial has given us hands-on experience with texturing and painting displacements onto a mesh. Once a model has been dropped to the canvas, ALL of ZBrush’s tools become available for use, including meshes that have been imported from other sessions or programs. This provides an extremely fast and powerful approach for adding high resolution detail to your meshes, which in turn results in far more compelling renders.

More Armor: Upper Arm

In the last three sections, we learned how to use ZSpheres to create a simple mesh and then detail that model through the combined use of ZBrush’s editing brushes and Projection Master. In this section, we will practice those techniques by creating another piece of armor to be used in the finished scene.

In this section, we’ll begin with ZSpheres, and then go all the way through mesh sculpting and projection painting. Let’s dive right in!

• Initialize ZBrush or clear the canvas.
• Select the ZSphere tool and draw it on the canvas.

• Enter Edit Mode and set the Draw Size to 1.
• Activate X symmetry.
• Hold down the Shift key and move the pointer over the ZSphere until the two red circles become one and turn green. Click to add a new ZSphere.

By holding down the Shift key when adding a new ZSphere, we tell ZBrush to make the new ZSphere identical in size to the first one. Making the ZSphere when the cursor is green means that the ZSphere will have the optimal placement for a clean mesh.

• Press W to switch to Move mode, then rotate the model and move the new ZSphere down a little as shown.

• Press Q to return to Draw mode, and add another ZSphere.

• Move the new ZSphere back into the first one until it changes to show that it will create an indentation in the mesh.

• On the opposite side of the root (first) ZSphere from the ones that you have added thus far, create two more ZSpheres.

The easiest way is to create one, move it down so that it is connected to its parent by three linking spheres, then convert the first linking sphere to a ZSphere by clicking on it while in Edit Draw mode.

• Preview the mesh by pressing Tool:Adaptive Skin:Preview (or A on your keyboard).
• Set Tool:Adaptive Skin:Ires to 7.

Ires is an advanced feature covered in the online users guide and by holding the Ctrl key while moving your pointer over the slider. It affects the way that skins are created.

The mesh should look similar to what you see above. If necessary, you can adjust the ZSpheres by pressing A and then moving or scaling them as appropriate.

• Make sure that Density is set to 2.
• With the preview active, press W to switch to Edit Move mode. Using a Draw Size of between 50 and 70, move polygons around to refine the shape as shown.

Feel free to change the Draw Size as necessary while you work.

• Once you are satisfied with the base mesh, increase the Density to 3, and click the Make Adaptive Skin button.

This operation creates a new polygon mesh in the Tool palette. This new mesh has three subdivision levels, so you can return to the lower resolution later if you wish to make large-scale adjustments to the mesh.

• Press T to leave Edit Mode, then Layer:Clear (Ctrl+N) to clear the canvas.

• Select the new mesh in the Tool palette.
• Draw the new mesh on the canvas and press Transform:Edit Object to return to Edit Mode.
• Press Tool:Geometry:Divide a few times until you have 7 subdivision levels.

This step can also be avoided by setting Tool:Adaptive Skin:Density to 7 before skinning the ZSphere model. From here forward, the mesh will be edited at an extremely high resolution using the various Transform brushes. However, if you would like to make large-scale changes to the mesh, you can use the Lower Res button to temporarily reduce the number of polygons. It is then a matter of moving a few points to make major changes to the mesh. When you return to subdivision level 7, the mesh will adapt to the new shape without losing any details that you have sculpted at this higher level.

Multi-resolution mesh editing enables you to sculpt any level of detail at any time. This frees your creativity by letting you work in a non-linear fashion.

• Use Transform:Inflate to exaggerate the ridge. A Draw Size of 7 and Z Intensity of 25 are appropriate to begin with.

Feel free to experiment with different sizes and intensities as you work.

• Use Pinch to sharpen these inflated edges.

Z Intensity of 40 and Draw Size of 25 are probably what you’ll need.

• Switching between Inflate and Pinch, chisel a ring around the mesh.

Remember that you can switch between Zadd and Zsub by holding down the Alt key. This turns Inflate into Deflate, allowing you to cut the ring. The edges can then be sharpened using Pinch.

• Select the Intensity Metal material.

As with the breastplate, it is nice to be able to see a material applied to the model while working, so as to have a better impression of what the finished result will be.

• Using InflatDot and various Z Intensity settings, add bumps and spikes to the armpiece.

• Using a very small Draw Size and a high Z Intensity, add small spikes to the edges.

• Rotate the model to the position shown in the next illustration.
• Activate Projection Master. Make sure that Color, Fade, Deformation and Normalized are active, then click the “Drop Now” button.
• Click the “Create a texture and continue” button in the help dialogue box that will appear.
• Select a pale yellow color, the Single Layer brush, alpha 6, and the Line stroke.
• Paint several lines as shown.

• When finished, press the Projection Master button, then pick up the mesh.
• Rotate the model to new positions and continue adding details.

The Fade setting in Projection Master helps with this. What it does is apply the strongest projections to polygons pointing directly toward the camera and no projections to polygons pointing to the side. This fading effect makes it much easier to blend the details together over several Drop and Pick operations.

Remember that you can also return to using the Transform brushes at any time. Feel free to experiment, using each form of mesh sculpting to add different kinds of details. (For example, cracks can be added most easily using Transform:Std rather than Projection Master).

Also feel free to use color variations and even materials to really “rough up” the armor.

Here is where we finished. You can duplicate our work, or try new ideas of your own. Since this section is meant to refine your skills with the various techniques employed, you should experiment as much as you like!

• Save your model as ArmorPart4.ztl

In Conclusion

While no new ground has been covered in this section, you should already be seeing an increase in your working speed. It undoubtedly took you less time to create this upper arm piece than it did to create the breastplate. In the next section, we’ll sculpt the head of the man who will be wearing our armor.

The Warrior's Head

Since this section builds upon techniques taught in the previous parts of this tutorial, it is highly recommended that you complete those first.

Many people consider realistic heads to be one of the most difficult modeling tasks. It doesn’t need to be! Through the use of ZSpheres, multi-resolution mesh editing, the various sculpting tools, and Projection Master, you can sculpt a believable head nearly as easily as the armor pieces that have been done thus far.

Since this tutorial builds upon the techniques already covered in the earlier sections, we will not go over many of the basics. It will generally be assumed that you know how to do many of the steps.

So let's start!

• Initialize ZBrush.
• Select the ZSphere tool and while holding down the Shift key, draw it on the canvas.
• Activate Transform:Edit Object, and then press the X key to turn on X symmetry.
• As always when working with ZSpheres, change the Draw Size to 1.
• Add two new ZSpheres as shown below.

• Rotate the model to the side, and hold down the Shift key to snap to a perfect side view.
• Move the ZSpheres into their parent so that they will create indentations.

• Add more ZSpheres for the ears, nose and mouth. Move the mouth and ear Zspheres into the parent, as well.

• Activate the mesh preview.

The problem here is caused by the fact that ZSpheres are treated as cubes for skinning purposes. Each face of the cube normally can have one child in order to create a clean mesh. However, in this case we have four children on the same side. This can be resolved by changing the Ires setting from its default of 6.

• Set Ires to 1.

The mesh now looks much more like a face.

• Make an Adaptive Skin, and draw it on the canvas.

We no longer need the ZSphere model. Its sole purpose was to give us a basic face shape that we can then refine using mesh editing tools.

• Enter Edit mode and make sure that X Symmetry is active.
• Using the Move tool and medium Draw Sizes (between 30 and 50), move points around to begin refining the shape.

The following steps are a general guideline, only. Be creative as you move points around. The important thing is to block out the overall shape of the head while there are few polygons to contend with.

Use different Draw Size settings while you work, depending upon how many points you wish to affect at a time. For example, when adding the neck you will probably want to use a large Draw Size. Alternatively, you can use the Geometry menu to go to Subdivision Level 1, move just a few points to create the neck, then return to Level 2.

Notice that for step 6, the mesh resolution has been increased. For this step, we divided the mesh once, adding a third subdivision level.

• Continue to refine the face.

From this point on, different artists have different preferences. Some like to sculpt as much as possible by moving a few points at a low subdivision level. They only add a new level after they have accomplished as much as they can at the current level. Other artists prefer to jump to a high level and sculpt. Ultimately, you should try both approaches and decide which works best for you. There is no “right” or “wrong” way.

• Divide once more.
• Using the Inflat brush, begin adding brows, cheek bones and nostrils.

Change Draw Size and Z Intensity as necessary to get the results that you’re looking for.

• Add ears by using Inflate to create the raised ring of the ear (1), followed by Move mode to push it into shape (2).
• Move can also be used to refine the cheek shape (3) and the eyes (4).

These steps are all illustrated in the image on the next page:

• Divide the mesh once more. Continue using Inflat to add details such as fatty tissues and lips, nostrils, etc.

• Continue work, dividing as necessary to add finer levels of detail.

Remember as you work that even after you have divided the mesh, you can always return to a lower subdivision level. Also, remember that Inflat can be reversed by holding down the Alt key.

At some point, you will want to turn off symmetry and Move large parts of the mesh around a bit to keep the face from being unnaturally symmetrical. At this point, you can also add character to your figure by sculpting details such as veins and scars. You might even rough up the nose and chin a bit to create pores or places for stubble. A lot is possible when you can work with millions of polygons in real time!

Once the face has been sculpted, it’s time to apply a material. We’ll build a skin shader by using ZBrush’s copy and paste features for the Material palette.

• Begin by selecting the Colorizer 1 material.

• Select the S1 channel and press CopySH to copy this shader.
• Select the QuadShaders material.

• Select the S1 channel again and press PasteSH.

What we have done is create a material with four shader channels, the first of which is from the Colorizer1 material. We can now easily modify this to create a complex, four-layered material effect that will appear to be somewhat translucent.

The images below show the settings that you should use for each channel.

As you can see, a lot has been accomplished toward a “textured” appearance for the model without having to use any texture at all! The ability to create custom materials by copying and pasting channels together is truly powerful. Even so, there is only so far that the material will take you. For more detail, it is necessary to paint a texture.

• Activate subdivision level 1.

New UV mapping can only be assigned at the lowest subdivision level.

• Create a new texture by setting Texture:Width and Height to 2048, each, and then pressing New.
• Assign UV coordinates to the model by pressing Tool:Texture:GUVTiles.

This assigns the Group UVTiles mapping method that is unique to ZBrush 2. It is as distortion-free as is mathematically possible, while still keeping the groups of polygons as large as possible. It is ideal for painting on using Projection Master.

• Return to the highest subdivision level.
• Rotate the model so it faces the camera squarely.

Remember that you can press Shift when near the desired orientation to snap the model into position.

• Press the Projection Master button, select Colors and Fade, then press “Drop Now”.

• Use your choice of brushes, alphas and stroke types to begin texturing.

In our example, we began with the Single Layer brush, alpha 7, and the Spray stroke.

The nice thing about the Spray stroke is that it has a random quality that is very suitable to texturing natural objects.

• Turn off Zadd, and activate Rgb instead of Mrgb.

This allows us to paint with color, alone. No depth or materials will be added while we work. Vary your colors, draw size, RGB Intensity, etc. Low Rgb Intensity settings are essential for realistic texturing, since they allow you to build color up gradually, blending it together as you go.

• When ready, use Projection Master to pick up the model and rotate it to a new angle.

Remember that in order to keep your texturing consistent across the entire surface of the model you shouldn’t try to do everything at once! Instead, it is best to repeatedly pick up the model, rotate it to a new angle, and drop it again so that you can texture every part of the head that can benefit from the current settings before you changing them to add a different kind of detail. This process of dropping and picking will quickly become second nature to you.

Here is our texturing in progress:

Many details will be added by the material’s cavity settings. These will not appear, however, until a Best render is performed. Check your work occasionally by doing one while the model is dropped.

The next page shows our finished result.

• Save this head as Head.ztl. When prompted to save the texture with the model, say yes.
• In addition, you should save your material by pressing Material:Save. Call it skin.zmt.

In Conclusion

Using ZSpheres, a very basic mesh complete with edge loops can quickly be blocked out. This mesh can then easily be modified by using the many sculpting brushes available from the Transform palette. More and more polygons are added to the mesh as necessary for the details that we wish to add. When modeling is finished, a complex material can be built by combining elements from other materials. Projection Master then provides an easy way to paint textures directly onto the model without the need to compensate for UV mapping distortions. What’s more, ZBrush offers several UV mapping methods including the new GUVTiles.

Combining Everything Into a Scene

This is where it all comes together! The various elements from the previous five sections will now be used to build a scene, which will be finished and rendered.

Something that you may have noticed in the course of working on this project is that we did not attempt to create a single character but instead created a few pieces. This is because our figure is going to be used within ZBrush and so each piece can be added to the canvas one at a time.

This feature of ZBrush has several strengths. First, we at this point have four very “heavy” pieces in terms of polygons. If all four of them were active in a scene at the same time, your system might very well begin slowing down. But since ZBrush makes it possible to snapshot each piece to the canvas, you actually only have one that exists as polygons at any given moment. You could actually build scenes with figures totally billions of polygons, yet never sacrifice real-time interactivity.

The second advantage to building one piece at a time is that these pieces can be posed any which way you please without the need for skeletal rigs or anything else. Place each part where you want for the scene and you’re done! The third benefit is that pieces can be recycled from one scene to the next. The Smooth brush can be used to remove details, making room for fresh detailing without the need to build a whole new model. The other editing tools make it easy to reshape elements; for example to change the shape of a face and give him a new expression. By building a relatively small library of reusable parts, you can create an endless variety of scenes while saving hours off the time required creating each one.

Before putting together the final composition, you’ll need to define the size of the final image.

• Click Document:New Document.

• Turn off Pro, then set the Width to 1400 and the height to 1200.

With Pro turned off, we can change the width and height values independently, creating documents with different relative dimensions.

The size of your document should be double the size of the image that you plan to export from ZBrush. Ours will be 700x600, so we create it at 1400x1200. This allows us to take advantage of ZBrush’s antialiasing zoom level for the best quality render.

• Click Resize

Your document is now probably too large to fit within the viewable area. This is not a problem, as you can zoom out to get a full view when you need it (such as when blocking out the scene), then return to actual size when you wish to add detail.

• Press the AAHalf button on the right shelf.

The Half-Sized antialiased view is now active, and depending on your display resolution, the entire canvas could well be visible again. The advantage to working in this view is that you can see exactly what the final image will look like while you work.

• Using the Tool palette, Load ArmorPart1.ztl

The model is selected as soon as it’s loaded.

• Select the Intensity Metal material.
• Draw the model on the canvas.
• Move, scale and rotate it into the position shown.

There are two ways that you can do this, depending on your preferences. In the example above, we entered Edit Mode and used the Move, Scale and Rotate icons from the right shelf to position it. That was fine for this piece since there was no need to change the depth.

Alternatively, you could use the gyro. The main difference is that you can change the object’s depth with this method. Also, you can use the sliders in Transform:Info to achieve very precise placement should you need it for a project.

• Load the Head.ztl model.

At this point, the breastplate is now snapshot to the canvas and cannot be moved without clearing the layer and drawing it again.

• Press Layer:Create to add a new one and make it active.
• Select the Skin material.

If this is a new session, the material will not be in the palette. In this case, select any material that you do not plan to use in your scene (Fast Shader 5 is a good one) and then load the Skin.zmt that you saved in section 5. The skin material will replace the other.

• Draw the head on the canvas.
• Activate the Move switch. Use the gyro to move the head into position.

• Use Move, Rotate and Scale as necessary to get the best placement.

• Create another layer.
• Select the Sphere3D tool.

• Choose the Toy Plastic material.

• Draw the Sphere3D. Use the gyro to move it into position within the head’s eye socket.

• When it is positioned right, press Shift+S to snapshot it to the canvas.
• Use the gyro to position the second eye.

Snapshot lets us create an instance of the object without having to turn off the gyro and draw a second copy. This means that both eyes will be the same size.

We now have one layer with armor, one with the head, and one with the eyes. There are several advantages to placing intersecting elements on their own layers. For example, if we decided that we weren’t happy with the head we could clear that layer and draw it again without affecting anything on the other layers. Also, we will be able to paint on the eyes or armor without worrying about affecting the head in any way. Layers are far more than an organizational tool!

• For the background, select the Plane3D.
• Create a new layer.
• Select the Basic Material.
• Draw the plane on the canvas and use the gyro to move it into a background position.

• Use Scale to enlarge the background so that it fills the canvas.

• Paint your background using any method that you like.

We used the Single Layer brush, alpha 01 and the Spray stroke to do the majority of the painting. Because the background is on a separate layer, it can be painted on without affecting the rest of the scene. Modify the material properties if you like to make the background more visually interesting. For example, you could use a little bit of color bump, and even slightly increase the High Dynamic Range modifier to realistically brighten the sky.

• When you are satisfied, press Layer:Bake.

This changes the layer to the Flat Color material and converts the colors that are generated by the material on this layer to unshaded colors. There are two important reasons for doing this: You could now use the correction brushes (such as Highlighter II, Smudge and Blur) to add even more detail to the background. Since these brushes affect unshaded color, you will get the most dramatic results from them when working on a layer that has been baked.

The Flat Color material is impervious to shadows. This means that when we set up our lighting and render the scene with shadows, the man in his armor will not cast shadows on the sky (which wouldn’t be very believable).

• Load the ArmorPart4.ztl tool.

• Select the layer that the breastplate is on.

We’ll keep both armor parts on the same layer so that we can paint additional details and keep them consistent across the figure.

• Draw the arm on the canvas and use the gyro to move, scale and rotate it into position.

• Snapshot the arm, then move and rotate the second one into place.

You may find that the second arm becomes partly submerged in the background layer. This is easily corrected by selecting the background layer and increasing the Layer:Displace Z slider by small increments until the background is completely behind the figure.

Now that the scene is blocked out, it’s time to bring it to life.

• Use the various paint tools, alphas, and stroke types to paint character onto the head and armor.

You can also add soft details using different Draw Size, Z Intensity and Rgb Intensity settings, as well as toggling between Rgb and Mrgb. Activate Zadd or Zsub when you wish to paint depth, but otherwise turn them off. Change layers as necessary to paint the part that you wish.

Don’t forget to add details such as iris and pupil on the eyes. Also, the Shading Enhancer brush is great for adding shadows on the eyes caused by the eyelids. All brushes with the split thumbnail can be reversed by holding down the Alt key. For example, the Blur brush can become Sharpen and Highlighter can be used to darken instead.

Simulate rust on the armor, and in general have fun with the image.

• Adjust the scene’s lighting.

You might want to reuse the settings from part 5, but this time activate ZMode in the Light:Shadows menu.

• Adjust the Render settings to match those from part 5.
• Press Render:Best Renderer.

In Conclusion

ZBrush is really powerful when editing your image to get the best effects using a combination of 2D tools, 2.5D tools and 3D tools in one integrated environment. And all of that in real time! This gives artists the freedom to experiment a lot more than could be accomplished with either a 2D or a 3D program.