 I reviewed a Beta of ZBrush many years ago when it was in
its infancy. I am glad to have the opportunity to now review
ZBrush 2. ZBrush 2 is an interesting combination of a
2D, 2.5D, and 3D painting and modeling program. It differs from
traditional painting programs because it can paint with depth. It
differs from traditional 3D modeling programs because it sculpts
its 3D objects. Basically, ZBrush is about working with all kinds
of depth. It has created, what it coins as a Pixol, which is a
pixel with depth, materials, and orientation built into it. It is a
different and amazing program. ZBrush works with "instances." Users
familiar with Macromedia's Flash, for example, know that instances
are representations of the original object. In ZBrush, when a user
has finished creating a model, the model is housed in the Tool
palette; in Flash it is housed in a library, and what is seen on
the stage is an instance or "snapshot" of the object. Thus, you are
able to keep file size down because if you use the same object, you
are not actually recreating it. Whereas other 3D programs strain
memory to the limit when rendering because one is often rendering
millions of polygons, the count in ZBrush is irrelevant because
there is only one object active at a time. While this might seem a
detrimental factor to artists who likes to constantly rearrange
their subject matter on the canvas, a lot of this is overcome
because multi-limbed figures can be constructed with ZSpheres as
well as various shapes can be grabbed and the Alpha Image made into
a 3D object, which will be automatically saved as a tool.
ZBrush is available for both the Mac and Windows operating system.
A demo of version
1.55 is available for downloading. Even though it will differ
from version 2, you will get a feel for ZBrush. ZBrush is a
downloadable program. Both the demo version 1.55 and the current
version 2 have practical guides that can be downloaded. They are in
pdf form and, thus, searchable. The guides are in the form of
tutorials, but questions can easily be answered by using the
previously mentioned searching capability. For those interested in
ZBrush, downloading the guide from the above link will also give
you a lot of information as to how ZBrush operates. While I do not
like to bore people with miscellaneous filler about why I write
reviews, I feel I need to preface this review. This review has a
target audience. It is namely those people not familiar with
Zbrush, and those who might have tried a demo and then decided that
they just couldn't learn it. I, initially, fell into the latter
category. When I first acquired ZBrush 2, I fiddled with it for
months and then decided I couldn't learn it. I knew it was a
powerful program, because I have seen many objects created in
ZBrush, but I thought it was just too confusing. As a matter of
fact, I kept getting lost in it until I reviewed Gnomon
Workshop's Introduction to ZBrush presented by Meats Meier. See
the review. It was as if a light came on, and I found
I could work in ZBrush. Not only that, but ZBrush actually made
sense and I began to enjoy myself as I created 2.5D objects such as
flying fish, that I wanted to use for some scenes in Photoshop. I
began to see what a truly powerful and innovative program it was.
While ZBrush seems daunting at first it is because it's interface
is unlike most other programs' interface.
ZBrush is packed with tremendous possibilities for the
manipulation, deformation, and refinement of objects. The more you
know about 3D programs, the more familiar you will be with the
commands and the more you will realize what ZBrush has to offer.
The areas that I knew the most about seemed the least confusing.
However, once familiar with the commands, they made sense and I
found that I was using them naturally. Below is the lighting
palette. All palettes can be expanded and moved to the shelves that
surround the main canvas [on the image above, the Alpha palette is
docked on a shelf to the left of the canvas].
ZBrush can be customized. Most of the palettes can be moved around
and docked and undocked as the need of the user varies. Those used
often, such as the Alpha palette, in this example, can be kept open
on the tray section of the interface while it is in use and then
can be closed and removed from the tray if desired. Also, when
working on ZBrush, a ZBrush script can be created to record all the
movements, changes, etc. This way, one can create a set of scripts
so as to remember how certain actions were accomplished as well as
to share their scripts with others. As stated in the beginning of
the review, ZBrush can work in 2D, 2.5D and 3D. One can paint using
not only xy (two dimensional coordinates), but also including a z
depth factor. ZBrush will integrate shadows and highlights through
the lighting and 3D setup in your scene. When one first opens the
Tools palette or the Alpha palette, it seems that most of the
implements are called brushes. Brushes have a different meaning in
ZBrush than in Photoshop, for example. To add noise to an object,
one uses a Noise brush. When people stated that ZBrush was like
sculpting, I questioned the statement having created many figures
in clay myself. Once I began to understand concepts like zadd and
zsub, whereby a tool could add spheres or remove them, for example,
and different tools like the smudge tool could be used to smudge
pixols so they appeared like fluffy clouds with depth, I began to
get the feeling of sculpting. In the some of the pictures below,
notice the indentations and extrusions. These are a cinch to do
with ZBrush because all you do is push or pull the material and/or
have zadd or zsub on and these 3D dimensions-like projections or
indentations are created. This aspect of it is 3D like because
while not actually able to rotate in space, the information has
depth. It exists in z space. Even a blank canvas contains z depth
information.
Notice in the screen capture above, in the upper left corner, there
is a tool called the MRGBZGrabber. It will grab both alpha and
texture information so that it can be used in other documents. The
grabber is part of the tool's palette. This concepts will be
elaborated on shortly. One of the factors that is so unique about
ZBrush is the number of ways that polygon meshes can be created as
well as how they can be controlled, i.e., their resolution, depth,
and smoothness, for example, are all easily controllable through
sliders. It is very easy to redraw meshes as you make these
changes.
The above image shows some of the settings used for creating meshes
from alpha data using Alpha Skinning in ZBrush.
One can see the mesh using (Poly) Frame mode. I found that I needed
a piece of wood for a project I was doing in Vue. It took me less
than 5 minutes to take a cube and customize it using 2.5 D brushes,
grab the alpha information, and create a two sided 3D object that I
could put a wood texture on and export as an obj. It opened
perfectly in Vue. Below is a screen shot while it was still active
and could be rotated, scaled, or moved. When finished, I could
export it as well as save it as a tool to be used again.
It is a hard concept to get across, but you can create a tool from
a tool (a cube is a tool), and save what you create as a tool, to
use to create other tools in addition to objects which you can
export. But, that is basically what can be done in ZBrush. I
created the striped wedge below. The two-sided arrow points to a
rectangular shape above the word tool. Each time I use that
rectangular shape, it will appear as the wedge. I can keep Alpha
Skinning it, for example, and keep creating tools as well as
exporting these tools as obj's or dxf's. I hope I have made clear
this unusual but exciting concept.
There are other ways to create 3D objects. One can start with a
primitive, initialize it in tools to decide on the number of
divisions, and then turn it into a polygon 3D mesh by clicking that
button. Once that is done, one can start sculpting. There are many
controls for polygon division and subdivision for roughly blocking
in the sculpture as well as for extreme detail control. In ZBrush
the user has tremendous control over the mesh.
The last method to be discussed in this review is ZBrush's own
ZSpheres. With ZSpheres you can create jointed limbs by adding one
ZSphere to another and, then, turning this skeletal-like object
into a polygon mesh for editing.
To skin the ZSphere, you can use a Unified skin or an Adaptive
Skin. Once skinned, it becomes a 3D object, which can be modeled,
projection painted, etc.
Projection Mode painting is just great. One can alternate between
having the object dropped to the canvas to paint or picked up again
to work on. When dropped, which is the necessary state for
projection painting, one can be as sloppy as one wants because once
picked up, only the paint on the model remains.
New to ZBrush 2 is GUVTiles. It is an automated mapping system
designed so that details can be seen on unwrapped meshes. If there
is no texture on the object, ZBrush will assume a size of 1024 x
1024. One also can use AUVTiles. Once mapped, ZBrush can create
both normal maps and displacement maps. How to accomplish all of
this is explained both in the User Guide 2, as well as in ZScript
tutorials, which are an internal part of the ZBrush download.
Rendering in ZBrush is fast and easy since one rarely deals with a
large number of active polygons at one time compared to other 3D
programs. As I stated in the beginning of the review, this review
is geared toward newbies or "want-to-be newbies." I found as I
worked with the program, I wanted to include more and more of its
features. However, the purpose of this review was to basically
outline the possibilities of ZBrush for the beginner. Once, how to
use ZBrush clicked in my mind, there seemed to be no limit to what
it could do. The only downside I encountered at this level was that
import and export are limited to obj's and dxf's. I wanted to
import a 3D object with a different file format, and I had a hard
time converting it to either an obj or a dxf that would import into
ZBrush. However, it could have been the conversion utilities I was
using. I recommend ZBrush. But for a novice, if you are not very
familiar with 3D programs to be able to see what ZBrush can do, I
recommend the Gnomon Workshop's tape Introduction to ZBrush. I also suggest visiting
the ZBrush Central and looking at the galleries and
the forum as well as the Pixologic
web site. Also, be sure to stop by Renderositys Zbrush forum.
- Pixologics Zbrush 2 Download Version $489.00
[USD] [Backup CD available for a nominal price] Upgrade version
also available
- Recommended System Requirements: OS: Windows
2000 or newer CPU: Fast PIII or newer with optional multithreading
or hyperthreading capabilities RAM: 512MB (1024MB for working with
multi-million-poly meshes) Monitor: 1280x1024 monitor resolution
(32 bits)
- PC Minimum System Requirements: OS: Windows 98
CPU: PII with MMX, 200MHz RAM: 256MB (512MB recommended)***
Monitor: 1024x768 monitor resolution (32 bits)
- Mac Minimum System Requirements: OS: OSX 10.0
or newer CPU: G3 processor or newer RAM: 256MB (512MB recommended,
1024 for working with multi-million-poly)*** Monitor: 1024x768
monitor resolution set to Millions of Colors
All supporting images are copyright, and
cannot be
copied, printed, or reproduced in any manner without written
permission from the artist.
- The Paula Sander's Report is a regular
Renderosity Front Page featured column, where Paula investigates
and comments on graphic software, techniques, and other relevant
material through her reviews, tutorials, and general articles.
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