3D-Coat 3.3 updates thread

[michalis]

I'm a mac user, I wont say this again. And the mac build seems to have a lot of problems. I really don't care how this works on pc because I bought the mac version. And I'm expecting to work with this. I remember some expressions like "voodoo" for zbrush. Voodoo exists on 3DC for mac not on zb. Lets finish it. Enough!!!

[philnolan3d]

The spot you're pointing at is just a very tiny polygon issue, that could be tweaked before baking. You can't expect the retopo to be 100% perfect with one click.

You really can't complain when people assume you're using a PC when the vast majority of the world uses PCs. Especially when you don't have it in your sigature or anything. How are we supposed to know?

[Calabi]

I have to say that ear auto retopo looks pretty incredible, not sure how people can moan about this. Its better than the previous method, and very likely more easily and quickly manipulable into a more preferable form than starting from scratch.

[dirtrobot]

The spot you're pointing at is just a very tiny polygon issue, that could be tweaked before baking. You can't expect the retopo to be 100% perfect with one click.

You really can't complain when people assume you're using a PC when the vast majority of the world uses PCs. Especially when you don't have it in your sigature or anything. How are we supposed to know?

Doesn't even need it. If one had to do a closeup shot of an ear in a movie one would simply create an asset built to make sure it looks good. Otherwise who cares?

Being in production means you cut corners and fudge all the time to make budget/shot schedules.

This is why autoretopo is garnering attention, it's a great tool for fudging and cutting corners in SECONDS.

[michalis]

whatever, the truth is that seams are visible here, its not a mac issue but a major 3dc issue. Its not just behind the ear, it happens in mouth openings too or in any other visible area. This app is not stable IMO and you all have to understand it.

You already read my complains, most of you, even you phil, you may already know that I'm a mac user. This is not my point.

Its not my imagination. Normal maps especially tangent mode have visible ugly seams, blender never does this, zbrush is just perfect here. Someone must sit down and fix this MAJOR problem. I can't discuss this further with you, its pointless, I'll talk to Andrew personally.

[philnolan3d]

Well all I can say is that I'm not seeing that particular problem. I certainly have seen other bugs and issues, but not that one in particular.

[artman]

whatever, the truth is that seams are visible here, its not a mac issue but a major 3dc issue. Its not just behind the ear, it happens in mouth openings too or in any other visible area. This app is not stable IMO and you all have to understand it.

You already read my complains, most of you, even you phil, you may already know that I'm a mac user. This is not my point.

Its not my imagination. Normal maps especially tangent mode have visible ugly seams, blender never does this, zbrush is just perfect here. Someone must sit down and fix this MAJOR problem. I can't discuss this further with you, its pointless, I'll talk to Andrew personally.

Do you use 3DCoat auto-mapping?

[GCastro]

is the auto mapping in the current mac trial? i can't seem to figure out how to test it.

-George

[michalis]

Hi Artman,

Do you use 3DCoat auto-mapping?

Never, I'm always testing it for fun though. Its not the mapping that has the problem, it works to other apps like ZB, blender, when baking there. Mostly I do portraits, UV unwrapping is easy. Its the issues "snapping of topology" and "the baking tool". These are related.

Lets say, re-topo a head, fast (~5 min), using ~300 quads. Subdivide it once, edit a little and have some nice topology, loops etc. But snapping methods have problems, around ear and on eyes and mouth openings, a mess. The slow snapping mode works better but still problematic. Relaxing, smoothing, subdivide end in a quad mess. I had to import it to blender, delete these quads and re construct. I did it on the shirt of my last posted portrait. No way to bake of course. Even so when I tried to paint the shirt, painting editor had problems again, distortion in projections didn't work either. So I did this in blender (excellent UV editor). I also exported the simple quad mesh from re-topo and did the sculpt in blender and zbrush.

Now, if 3DC was working as it should, I could finish easy and fast with a nice quad model.

The new auto quad method wont solve the problem. I don't like what I see here, ear topo is in a mess. IMO of course.

3DC remains a great first sketch app, some fast manual retopo and export to next app. Nothing else.

Andrew has to work hard to fix all these. New functions don't help. The problem exists in all versions.

The problem starts when we're trying to adopt a tri model using a quad cage. This is really difficult. This is the challenge.

[polyxo]

I'm a mac user, I wont say this again. And the mac build seems to have a lot of problems. I really don't care how this works on pc because I bought the mac version. And I'm expecting to work with this. I remember some expressions like "voodoo" for zbrush. Voodoo exists on 3DC for mac not on zb. Lets finish it. Enough!!!

Man,

you are really a vain and unfriendly guy.

How can you assume that anyone knows your System-specs and is even interested at all in your

(completely irrelevant) personal thoughts on Mac and Windows OS?

Just add the relevant stuff in your Signature and don't get on our nerves permanently

with your both aggressive and cryptic postings...

[Racush]

I like how this new Retop stuff is working out I gave a previous voxel sculpt a try though I did not have time to really draw the guides. So this is what I got with letting 3d coat just do all the work and it seems to do ok for the most part looking forward to more updates

Voxel here - http://www.3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=5467

here is the result of the auto retop

[michalis]

vain, unfriendly guy, (completely irrelevant) personal thoughts, both aggressive and cryptic postings, ...

Thank you sir, its obvious that you understand what I'm trying to say six months now. Thank you.

[Mykyl]

Wow, What on earth is going on here? I use 3dcoat and to be honest the seams issue I have seen myself. For me its not important at the moment so I just let it go. The current version I am using is a beta so I expect to see some issues.

One thing though. I see lots of comments like How are we supposed to know your on a mac. Well the answer is if you actually read the thread you will have noticed he stated that he was a mac user much earlier and even said he was not sure if the issues he sees are across the board and on the pc version as well or not. In fact this was stated mid conversation with at least one of the individuals who asked why he was not testing himself. (Mac users dont have .09 yet.)

I am a mac user as well. I have seen issues but as I have said before, the current version I am using is a beta version. Some examples:- hardly ever do I see proper symmetry when quadrangulating a model or sometimes it seems to show two sets of quads where one IS symmetrical and the other is not. When 3dcoat starts up it hangs for a few seconds before displaying anything etc etc.

It doesn't bother me and maybe that's because I am just that kind of person but I am bothered when people wrongly accuse someone of something without reading the evidence before them.

Anyway I love 3d coat and understand it could always improve and that is the beauty of it... It IS improving and I am very happy I purchased it even if at the moment I only use it as a relaxation tool.

Cheers

Mike R

[kay_Eva]

I have a .obj file I want to use the quadrangulation on but how do I make it work? It's not a voxel object and I'd prefer to keep it just as polygon mesh.

thanks!

[Taros]

I have a .obj file I want to use the quadrangulation on but how do I make it work? It's not a voxel object and I'd prefer to keep it just as polygon mesh.

thanks!

Currently impossible to autoretopo regular meshes. Only voxel models can be autoretopologized. That is a point I mentioned some posts before, we need this function in the future.

@Michalis: I can understand your point of view. If you really have this isses on the mac (what seems to be), then this problems should be fixed soon, there is no discussion about it.

Best wishes

Chris

[philnolan3d]

I believe Andrew said it works with not just voxels, but poly objects too. I don't see that anywhere in the build we have so maybe it's in the update he's uploading soon.

[polyxo]

vain, unfriendly guy, (completely irrelevant) personal thoughts, both aggressive and cryptic postings, ...

Thank you sir, its obvious that you understand what I'm trying to say six months now. Thank you.

You can be sure that I see as many problems in my use of 3D-Coat as you do.

For tremendously long I am for instance waiting for the Nurbs-Import-Support which was already in

testing state but never got released as other things got higher priority.

I was not critisizing that you are complaining. I myself do that very often.

Only the way how you do this was what I was refering to. One could get the impression that

you consider Andrew to be the guy in charge of eleminating your personal workflow limitations foremost

as what you do with the program is the only way to go anyway.

[michalis]

It doesn't eliminate anything, You already know my personal workflow. Please, my english are poor but try to read first.

A few months ago some people were selling their licenses, I wont do the same.

First it was my fault, then it was a mac build issue, now it may be a pc issue too, now I'm not polite, next what?

You may don't like the way I complain, please this shouldn't be your concern.

So, once more: IMO

The problem starts when we're trying to adopt a tri model using a quad cage. This is really difficult. This is the challenge.

[GCastro]

So the auto retopology tools are in the 09 build is that correct? which means it's not available on the mac trial yet right? Just want to make sure i'm not blind cause i can't find it in the latest mac build

Thanks,

George

[Lawless]

So the auto retopology tools are in the 09 build is that correct? which means it's not available on the mac trial yet right? Just want to make sure i'm not blind cause i can't find it in the latest mac build

Thanks,

George

When I got confused (as you are) I started to scroll back on this thread - to find where Andrew posted on the most recent update. I found it, read it, and he explains that this is a windows beta update and not mac. Mac will come out later and he explains why.

-B

[kay_Eva]

A few months ago some people were selling their licenses,

those who really did sell their license must be kicking themselves so hard

[philnolan3d]

I really think only one person that I know of did I think Don was going to but changed his mind.

[GCastro]

When I got confused (as you are) I started to scroll back on this thread - to find where Andrew posted on the most recent update. I found it, read it, and he explains that this is a windows beta update and not mac. Mac will come out later and he explains why.

-B

Ahh, i found that post now too. Thanks for that.

-George

[Taurus]

Michalis if 3DC is crucial for your work you should buy PC, most ported application crashes on MAC including Zbrush, go and read the forums.There is simple solution - buy PC,MAC people are niche market and they should be happy app are ported at all, there are consistent reports about many serious app crashing under Macs and there must a reason for that, it's too complicated to port or there is something messed up with mac OS.

[Lawless]

Michalis if 3DC is crucial for your work you should buy PC, most ported application crashes on MAC including Zbrush, go and read the forums.There is simple solution - buy PC,MAC people are niche market and they should be happy app are ported at all, there are consistent reports about many serious app crashing under Macs and there must a reason for that, it's too complicated to port or there is something messed up with mac OS.

I work on a mac everyday using zbrush 3.2. My wife works next to me everyday, on a PC, using zbrush 3.5r3. We have worked like this every day for the past four years. Both programs crash now and then, not one more than the other, regardless of the operating system. From my experience your assessment is inaccurate.

[philnolan3d]

One downside about using a mac that's a pure fact is that many programs often get their updates later than the PC version, sometimes much later depending on which program you're referring to. Many plugins don't come out at all on the mac side. For example there are vastly more plugins for LightWave available for PC users.

[Lawless]

One downside about using a mac that's a pure fact is that many programs often get their updates later than the PC version, sometimes much later depending on which program you're referring to. Many plugins don't come out at all on the mac side. For example there are vastly more plugins for LightWave available for PC users.

True but there is a reason for it. Apple switched from carbon to cocoa a couple years ago. Software companies that had been spending time developing mac apps in carbon got set back. This year the major software companies are caught up. Programs are coming out in 64bit for the mac finally. Maya, Mudbox, Modo 501 should be out late this year, CS5, etc.

Switching from carbon to cocoa was an anomaly.

[philnolan3d]

That may be the case it just seems to me I've been hearing people say "when does the mac version come out?" for a loong time.

[AbnRanger]

I really think only one person that I know of did I think Don was going to but changed his mind.

That was because there were a host of bugs in the Retopo room and as you know, some real bottlenecks in the Voxel Sculpting process. After speaking with Andrew, I realized it was more productive to send him video captures and copies of work files along with bug reports. It wasn't long before those bugs got squashed.

Cache to Disk and Multi-threaded merge made got rid of those frustrating bottlenecks.

I hope that others here will take a similar approach to dealing with their frustrations. If you demonstrate the problem with a screen capture, and then contact Andrew directly with copy of the file, he has more to go on and can quickly target the problem. It's more productive than broadcasting your frustrations here, that can negatively poison other users thinking in the process.

[Crispy4004]

Yup, just as I thought, this Auto Re-topo stuff rocks. Best of all, I can have all the benefits of apps like Mesh Mixer and Sculptris without worrying about the tris.

There is still room for improvement, I had to maybe an hour of work in Maya cleaning up the symmetry line and the fingers, but I'm absolutely convinced this is the future.