ZBrush
Encyclopedia
ZBrush is a digital sculpting
Digital sculpting
Digital sculpting, also known as Sculpt Modeling or 3D Sculpting, is the use of software that offers tools to push, pull, smooth, grab, pinch or otherwise manipulate a digital object as if it were made of a real-life substance such as clay....

 tool that combines 3D/2.5D
2.5D
2.5D , 3/4 perspective and pseudo-3D are terms used to describe either:* 2D graphical projections and techniques which cause a series of images or scenes to fake or appear to be three-dimensional when in fact they are not, or* gameplay in an otherwise three-dimensional video game that is...

 modeling
3D modeling
In 3D computer graphics, 3D modeling is the process of developing a mathematical representation of any three-dimensional surface of object via specialized software. The product is called a 3D model...

, texturing
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

 and painting
Digital painting
Digital painting is an emerging art form in which traditional painting techniques such as watercolor, oils, impasto, etc. are applied using digital tools by means of a computer, a digitizing tablet and stylus, and software. Traditional painting is painting with a physical medium as opposed to a...

. It uses a proprietary "pixol" technology (see below) which stores lighting, color, material, and depth information for all objects on the screen. The main difference between ZBrush and more traditional modeling packages is that it is more akin to sculpting.

ZBrush is used as a digital sculpting tool to create high-resolution models (up to ten million polygons) for use in movies, games, and animations. It is used by companies ranging from ILM to Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts, Inc. is a major American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers...

. ZBrush uses dynamic levels of resolution to allow sculptors to make global or local changes to their models. ZBrush is most known for being able to sculpt medium to high frequency details that were traditionally painted in bump maps
Bump mapping
Bump mapping is a technique in computer graphics for simulating bumps and wrinkles on the surface of an object. This is achieved by perturbing the surface normals of the object and using the perturbed normal during lighting calculations. The result is an apparently bumpy surface rather than a...

. The resulting mesh details can then be exported as normal
Normal mapping
In 3D computer graphics, normal mapping, or "Dot3 bump mapping", is a technique used for faking the lighting of bumps and dents. It is used to add details without using more polygons. A common use of this technique is to greatly enhance the appearance and details of a low polygon model by...

 maps to be used on a low poly
Low poly
Low poly is a term used to describe a polygon mesh in 3D computer graphics which has a small number of polygons. It is, however, a relative term, usually referring to meshes in real-time applications . That is to contrast them with meshes in animated movies and special effects of the same era...

 version of that same model. They can also be exported as a displacement map, although in that case the lower poly version generally requires more resolution. Or, once completed, the 3D model can be projected to the background, becoming a 2.5D image (upon which further effects can be applied). Work can then begin on another 3D model which can be used in the same scene. This feature lets users work with extremely complicated scenes without heavy processor overhead.

ZBrush was created by the company Pixologic Inc, founded by Ofer Alon (also known by the alias "Pixolator") and Jack Rimokh. The software was presented in 1999 at SIGGRAPH
SIGGRAPH
SIGGRAPH is the name of the annual conference on computer graphics convened by the ACM SIGGRAPH organization. The first SIGGRAPH conference was in 1974. The conference is attended by tens of thousands of computer professionals...

. The demo version 1.55 was released in 2002, and the version 3.1 was released in 2007. ZBrush 4 for Windows and Mac systems was announced on April 21, 2009 for an August release, but was later postponed. Version 3.5 was made available in September the same year, and includes some of the newer features initially intended for ZBrush 4.

Through GoZ ("Go ZBrush"), available in Version 4, ZBrush offers integration with Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3ds Max, Cinema4D and Modo
Modo (software)
modo is a polygon and subdivision surface modeling, sculpting, 3D painting, animation and rendering package developed by Luxology, LLC. The program incorporates features such as n-gons, 3D painting and edge weighting, and runs on Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows platforms.-History:modo was created...

.

Pixol

Like a pixel
Pixel
In digital imaging, a pixel, or pel, is a single point in a raster image, or the smallest addressable screen element in a display device; it is the smallest unit of picture that can be represented or controlled....

, each pixol contains information on X and Y position and color values. Additionally, it contains information on depth (or Z position), orientation and material. ZBrush related files store pixol information, but when these maps are exported (e.g., to JPEG
JPEG
In computing, JPEG . The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality....

 or PNG formats) they are flattened and the pixol data is lost. This technique is similar in concept to a voxel
Voxel
A voxel is a volume element, representing a value on a regular grid in three dimensional space. This is analogous to a pixel, which represents 2D image data in a bitmap...

, another kind of 3D pixel.

Features

ZBrush comes with many unique features to aid in the sculpting of models and meshes
Polygon mesh
A polygon mesh or unstructured grid is a collection of vertices, edges and faces that defines the shape of a polyhedral object in 3D computer graphics and solid modeling...

.

3D Brushes

The initial ZBrush download comes with 30 3D sculpting brushes with more available for download. The brushes come with many attributes pertaining to them, including hardness, different stroke types, and alphas, which apply a shape to the stroke.

Polypaint

Polypainting allows ZBrush users to paint on an object's surface without the need to first assign a texture map.

Illustration

Since ZBrush also gives the ability to sculpt in 2.5D
2.5D
2.5D , 3/4 perspective and pseudo-3D are terms used to describe either:* 2D graphical projections and techniques which cause a series of images or scenes to fake or appear to be three-dimensional when in fact they are not, or* gameplay in an otherwise three-dimensional video game that is...

, the ZBrush package comes with more than a few brushes for sculpting in 2.5D. A pixol put down when sculpting or illustrating in 2.5D contain information on its own color, depth, material, position, and lighting information.

Transpose

ZBrush also has a feature that is similar to skeletal animation
Skeletal animation
Skeletal animation is a technique in computer animation in which a character is represented in two parts: a surface representation used to draw the character and a hierarchical set of interconnected bones used to animate the mesh...

 in other 3D programs. The transpose feature allows a user to isolate a part of the model and pose it without the need of skeletal rigging.

ZSpheres

Probably one of the more unique features of ZBrush, ZSpheres allow a ZBrush user to create a base mesh with clean topology and then convert it into a sculpt-able model. A ZSphere starts out with a simple sphere that you can extract from until you have the basic shape of the model you want to sculpt on.

GoZ

Introduced in ZBrush 3.2 OSX, GoZ automates setting up shading networks for normal, displacement, and texture maps of the 3D models in GoZ-enabled applications. Upon sending the mesh back to ZBrush, GoZ will automatically remap the existing high-resolution details to the incoming mesh. GoZ will take care of operations such as correcting points & polygons order. The updated mesh is immediately ready for further detailing, map extractions, and transferring to any other GoZ-enabled application.

DynaMesh

New in Release 2, DynaMesh is a topological-free sculpting process. When sculpting with traditional techniques, polygons become stretched and difficult to work with. Now with a quick gesture, ZBrush will instantly generate a new sculpting-friendly model with uniform polygon distribution. This makes it possible for users to focus only on the visual aspects of their model, without worrying about its underlying geometry.

See also

  • 2.5D
    2.5D
    2.5D , 3/4 perspective and pseudo-3D are terms used to describe either:* 2D graphical projections and techniques which cause a series of images or scenes to fake or appear to be three-dimensional when in fact they are not, or* gameplay in an otherwise three-dimensional video game that is...

  • Digital sculpting
    Digital sculpting
    Digital sculpting, also known as Sculpt Modeling or 3D Sculpting, is the use of software that offers tools to push, pull, smooth, grab, pinch or otherwise manipulate a digital object as if it were made of a real-life substance such as clay....

  • Heightmap
    Heightmap
    In computer graphics, a heightmap or heightfield is a raster image used to store values, such as surface elevation data, for display in 3D computer graphics...

  • Mudbox
    Mudbox
    Mudbox is a computer-based 3D sculpting and painting tool. developed by Autodesk, Mudbox was created by Skymatter, founded by former artists of Weta Digital, where it was first used to produce the 2005 Peter Jackson remake of King Kong...

  • Normal mapping
    Normal mapping
    In 3D computer graphics, normal mapping, or "Dot3 bump mapping", is a technique used for faking the lighting of bumps and dents. It is used to add details without using more polygons. A common use of this technique is to greatly enhance the appearance and details of a low polygon model by...

  • Pixel
    Pixel
    In digital imaging, a pixel, or pel, is a single point in a raster image, or the smallest addressable screen element in a display device; it is the smallest unit of picture that can be represented or controlled....

  • Sculptris
    Sculptris
    Sculptris is the brainchild of programmer Tomas Pettersson, who developed as an unpaid hobby project and a work-in-progress sculpting tool since early December 2009....

  • Blender
    Blender (software)
    Blender is a free and open-source 3D computer graphics software product used for creating animated films, visual effects, interactive 3D applications or video games. The current release version is 2.60, and was released on October 19, 2011...


External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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