JBT27

Thanks Michael - actually I did try voxelizing before posting the question, but if you look at the attached, you'll see what switching from S to V did to this model - the voxelized version was 10 million polys or so, like the surface - I also tried 20 million - got the exact same result. Unless I'm missing something.

The original object from LW is 638,392 polys. I just took that into the Sculpt Room, then exported it via the above route, at 0% reduction, and it worked fine. I then used Res+ on it once, giving 2,553,568 polys - that also exported fine. An additional Res+ took it to the 10,214,272 polys, which has exported, again with 0% reduction. However, if I export this again, with 50% reduction, I get that fragmented thing happening. So it seems like it's something to do with the reduction at export time.

It's version 4.5.16(CUDA)(GL64), running on Win 10 Pro 64bit. The object is a surface sculpt, in the Sculpt Room, exported via the File-Export-Export Object command, and exported to a LWO primarily, though as I mentioned, I also tried OBJ and FBX - with the same result. In the voxel tree, the density of voxels to the original is 0.2 - may or may not be relevant.

I have a 10.2 million triangles object in surface sculpting. But when I export this object to LW object format, or indeed OBJ, or FBX, at a reduction of 50%, the object that I get in LW is not only around 189,000 polys (way less than what it should be), but also all I get are scattered individual polys. Exporting works, of course - tried other objects, though not as big, and they're fine. Any ideas please what might have caused this and importantly how to fix it? Retopo is one rescue I guess, though arguably I shouldn't have - surely it should just export like any other object? Two attached screengrabs show the overall sculpt, and the other a section of what I get in LW from the exported file. I'll concede that doesn't warrant 10 million polys in the flatte areas, but this is still being worked on - exporting it being a part of that. Thanks. Julian.

Thanks very much Javis - holes it was - more reasons not to be working so late. Much appreciated - got the mesh working now. Julian.

I have the start of a sculpt, which is shown in the screengrab below; I've used Surface and Live Clay Tools. When exported, you can see what happens in the other image - a screengrab from Lightwave. When I started the sculpt and did an export, it looked fine, and thinking about it, that may have been prior to using the Live Clay Tools. Attempting to send the sculpt to an Autopo crashes 3DC every time. I can select the Retopo room and work on it manually, but it seems unpredictable as well as unreliable. Have I got the workflow wrong? I'm posting this in the urgent section because I need to move along with this landscape for a production job. Yes, I've checked the manual but I'm not seeing specific dos and don'ts about this workflow. I'd appreciate guidance on the workflow, if I have it wrong, or some insight as to what I can do to troubleshoot this sculpt. It's late here in the UK, so I'm posting this now and will resume in the morning. I'm running a six core i7 with 64Gb DDR3 RAM and a single Titan Black (latest driver), so I'm not convinced it's lack of RAM doing this. Thanks. Julian.

Abort mission - found the 'problem' - it was me, staring me in the face, as usual. Julian.

OK - I've wasted enough time on this, but don't get it: accuse me of not RTFM, but I can't see what's up. I've reasd the manual, and I'm sitting watching Adam Gibson's starter 4.0 courses - I reckoned they'd be worth it just to try to get round stuff like this, though so far they have revealed nothing I didn't know, and importantly show it working where mine is not. Trying out 4.0 - I have 3.0 - I create a voxel primitive, a sphere, I grab the Grow tool and start sculpting. Except what I get is a green rectangle drawn out, with pixel dimensions displayed; let go of the LMB and it disappears, leaving a rectangular block on the object or in space, depending where I drew it. Lots of tools are doing this. Some work, but most do this. Maybe something is set wrong by default, but it makes no sense to me. I have tried the Cuda and non-Cuda OGL versions, 64bit - both do the same. Basically, most of the tools in voxels seem not to work for me. Any ideas please? Thanks. Julian.

Will do - thanks. Julian.

Importing the mesh does not offer any options to keep anything - it just imports - I'm in the Retopo room. Julian.

This is a problem that hung around in 3.x and it's still there in 4.x. Importing a 'big mesh' for retopo, saved out of LW with a UV and image map assigned in LW - when displayed in 3DCoat, the UV is flipped vertically - it's correct on the U but not the V. I could do with it the shown correctly for reference purposes. Any ideas? Thanks. Julian.

Great - thanks. Oh yes - the bane of reporting problems on forums: 'Works fine for me!' This has been a problem across two different cards and two or three drivers, though I still wouldn't rule that out of course. OK, so I'll check some more, maybe sort out a video - haven't got any of those tools but will check now. But perhaps the key problem is sculpting with the wireframe visible, as you suggest, though the fact the cursor gets hung-up on verts, as opposed to general sluggishness, and the fact it gets worse as you zoom in, tends to suggest there's more going on here. Thanks again - I'll post more fully shortly in the Bugfixes threads. Julian.

I often bring in a terrain mesh from LW and add some detail in Sculpt. But I've noticed over several versions that performance and workflow can be very erratic. I have a mesh right now which is about 137,000 quads, that I need to detail. If I have View-Wireframe on, the cursor appears to get stuck on vertices (snap is off), so if I'm in Draw mode, that area keeps getting taller or deeper, depending what Depth I set, and no matter how I move the mouse, the cursor is stuck for several seconds. With Wireframe view off, this does not happen. It can also happen using the Ctrl+LMB key, with and without Wireframe on. It also, when Wireframe is on, seems to be affected by how far I am zoomed in to the mesh. It's a bit subjective, but when zoomed out and sculpting large areas, and with Wireframe on, the sticking does not happen, but the closer I zoom in the worse it gets. Sorry I can't be much more specific than that. Using the GL-64 version 3.3.01 - about to upgrade to the .04 version. Thanks. Julian.

I'd like to second Mantis' request for a Polystrip tool. I often start out with a terrain mesh, and onto that I reconstruct old settlements and paths, with levelled areas for them to sit on. Yes, I could do that from scratch in LW Modeler or Modo, but quite often I have to start with the pure terrain model. The Retopology tools are absolutely stunning for this purpose, leaving anything Modo or Modeler has in the shade. .....BUT - it would be great if there was an option not just for a Polystrip, but if there was a way to specify that each polygon in that strip should be level, or within a certain angle side-to-side, like a real road or path. So drawing the strip down a steep slope, especially if the path is heading diagonally across the slope, you would be able to retopologise the terrain complete with levelled areas and paths. Of course having applied some form of levelling away from the average slope in that area, you would still then need adjoining retopo'd polys to resume following the terrain. I hope that wasn't too garbled. I've got 10 days left of my trial version, and today I have used these retopo tools for the first time.....talk about an eye-opener.....absolutely brilliant. Julian.