alvordr

Interesting...I've learned some things today.

I did this, but never bothered with Mudbox. I created a heightmap and then used it as a mask on a thin-ish box from the top down perspective: http://3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=11351&page=4#entry95901 This allowed me to get the affect I was after. Certainly, there are many ways to do this, but this was an experiment for me with 3D Coat to see how well it would work.

I believe all you're after is depth settings. I work with normal maps all the time now, and have found that either by setting the depth (usually from around 1-27, as anything above that seems too powerful) or adjusting the depth modulation in the Blending Tab, just to beside the Layers Tab in the Paint Room. You can also either hold Cntl + Left Click to paint inversely or toggle the Invert Tool Action option near the top of the UI, under the menu. Same works for Specularity (E.g. Specular Modulation, Specular Intensity, etc.). This + a good set of Materials and/or Masks and brush settings can knock out a decent stone or rock in no time.

Hi, Clay and welcome! While it doesn't act exactly like ZBrush's Stamp Tool, there is the Airbrush Tool in 3D Coat for use in Voxel Mode that, when combined with various brush options and/or materials or masks, can effectively do the same thing. It constantly grows the surface beneath the brush. If you're looking at the Paint Room, rather than the Voxel Room, there is an Airbrush Tool there, as well. I do like the preview that the Stamp Tool in ZB gives, but I also like the "feel" of the Airbrush Tool in 3DC. Both programs really compliment each other well, despite many people sort of pitting them against each other. I use both, but spend most of my time in 3D Coat, especially for commercial work.

Hmm...it should have still worked, but as a rule, you don't want N-Gons anyway. Good to know.

Well, it sounds like you've got a workflow in MOI that works better for you. If that's the case, I would use that. I love using 3D Coat, despite some of the issues I've had with it. It works for me and I do almost 100% of my work in it, now. That said, if I need to do something that works better, elsewhere, then I turn to that. It is more desirable for me not to have to move outside the app to do what I want, but many of us are patiently waiting for fixes/features to roll into 3D Coat to address those issues. The updates have been more frequent in 3D Coat than just about any other app I've seen. Unfortunately, I do find that aggressive schedules like this tend to re-introduce problems that have been fixed before.

If all you're looking for is a reason to believe 3D Coat can do hard-surface modeling, you need only look at the examples on the 3D Coat website and/or gallery. As far as good topology, I believe your thread here: http://3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=15571&hl= illustrates that the concept of good topology is something to study, and that is true for all of us. The ship/building model you had in that thread is much easier to topologize at a much lower poly count than you mentioned. As AbnRanger pointed out, knowing how to use the tools is crucial, but it's also very important to understand what you're doing, regardless of the application in terms of topology, etc. You mentioned in here that the suitcase is a simple model. Can we see an example of such an item's topology as you would do it in another app? This could help identify what you perceive as simple and having good topology. I'm not in any way saying that hard-surface is going to be easy in 3D Coat. Doing thin surfaces, like swords are much harder than most would think, depending on your process and workflow...but it can be done.

I tend to work, at times, with various parts of a complete model, retopo'ing each and then combining them via a send to the Paint Room. As AbnRanger points out, these separate retopo'd parts have their own UVs, but in my case they get placed onto one complete UV set. I then can still freeze various parts in the Paint Room, however, by freezing the materials or sub-objects...depending on how the process was done. I'm still not sure if that's what you mean by merging materials, but if this gets you closer, I can be more descriptive.

I meant materials...sorry...I'm used to playing with both sub-objects and materials at various times, so I messed up the term.

You might also consider just importing your model into the Voxel Room, altering the morphs as needed, there...and then going to the Retopo Room and importing your reference mesh as before. It should ask to snap it to the surface of the morph in the Voxel Room and you're counts SHOULD be the same, assuming there isn't a bug in 3DC. Then export the mesh as you have been. Come to think of it, how have you been importing/exporting the changes? Your import/export process might also reveal more useful information, both in 3D Coat and the other app.

Did you get it working? Normally, if you're seeing black spots you can't paint over, it's because the occlusion layer didn't bake well, which can be caused by a problem with the edge flow of the retopo mesh, how well it's mapped to the surface of the high-rez sculpt/model, and/or bake settings. Shaders you've chosen in the Voxel Room (assuming you've been in there, prior to doing all of this) can also affect this.

You can also tweak the intensity using the Blending Tab next to the Layers Tab. Just make sure you're on the correct layer you want to adjust settings for. Sometimes opacity will work for this, but you might find other settings, such as Brightness or Contrast more useful.

To my knowledge there isn't a way, other than recreating a poly where the flip needs to occur. Are they happening on import from another application?

When you say material, are you speaking of sub-materials or paint layers?

That's one of the things I most want/need in my work.

This is why I manually retopo my own work. I could use the autotopo, but often it simply doesn't produce desirable results, either for baking or low enough poly count with acceptable edgeflow, etc. If you want just static models, then it's pretty simple to do you're own mesh. Once you get the hang of it, it's pretty fast for what you have there. For animation, as AbnRanger points out, there's more work to be done, as your edgelow, vert count and edge loops need more focus. 7K polys is pretty high for that model. With manual retopo work, you could easily get it down to around 100-200 or so.

I would say most people at least try to do their work with Autotopo and then manually fix, if necessary, but can't be sure. I prefer to manually retopo my own work.

For what it's worth, I did a tutorial on 3D Coat on Udemy.com (https://www.udemy.com/introduction-to-3d-coat/?sl=E0IacF9XQxMALBoeCRAcKBM%3D) that is intended for the new user. Feel free to take a look at the free videos in that course to decide if it's right for you.

Welcome to the forums! I, too, enjoy using 3D Coat quite a bit. The hard surface techniques in 3DC range from easy to somewhat hard, but I would say they're mostly very easy...especially in voxel mode.

Finally....thank you AbnRanger! This should have been obvious to me, but I didn't see it.

You can enter an edge loop in Points and Faces mode by holding down Cntl. Perhaps that can be expanded to allow a .5 snap by holding down Cntl + Alt or Cntl + Shift.

Very nice work!

Let's look at this another way. Let's say you finished a character that has a cape. You want the cape to be paper thin, as a cape likely would be, so you don't model it as a shell, thereby saving this character in as low a polygon count as necessary for the game engine it will appear. However, you want to paint it with white on the inside and red on the outside, or at least to be able to render it in the Render Room, where both sides of the cape are visible. I don't see a way to do this, as currently, it appears that you have to shell it. Being able to do this saves both time and polygons. I know AbnRanger has asked for a shell / thickness tool in the Retopo room. That solves both time and work for areas where we need a shell. My question addresses areas where that isn't desired. As it stands, we work harder by having to shell everything or carry things over to another app. I'm OK with this, but wondered if I missed some gem in 3D Coat.

Either to have different textures on either side or to at least not have the program cull the backside of polygons. This isn't new stuff to the 3D world, so I'm left wondering why there doesn't appear to be a feature like this in 3D Coat.

Here is another example of where something like this is useful: http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthread.php?54288-Double-sided-Faces