lowedennis

I'm starting to detail my model and thought I might have a go using the curve function to draw precise lines. Is there a way to edit the parameters of the curve to stop it wanting to jump onto another surface while I try to steer it on my path ?

Thanks artman, God I feel so stupid, it is so obvious as well. When it's finished I'll post it properly

Yipeee I'm in the paint room, Is there a way to supress the glossiness on all my layers, I can't find the knob ! I've gone through all the blending options and the gloss is still sticking to the layers. My layer 0 is matte

I'll use those options artman, you were right, I was using v3.2.05 - I'm off to look for the older build now. thanks again

Thanks digman - it was staring me in the face I know, I should ask Andrew for an 'ARTIST' button that does this when one finishes retopo ! In fact that would would be great to have a beginners menu that would do the simple tasks and when aclimatized we could all jump into the advanced section for fiddling purposes.

Hi, I've been reading the 'Manfriday' post and I'm following the suggestions. But--- I've built this figure in voxels, I've used symmetry ON for the main sculpt and symmetry OFF for the odd details that don't need to be duplicated (left side trouser pocket for example) but generally the symmetry is on for most of the sculpt. I then moved to the Retopo room and for some reason the symmetry was mis aligned on the X axis so I realign best I could back to the center again and started my retopo mesh and went on to the marking seams. I did a unwrap UV and repack - all went OK. I read through a similar post (Manfriday) and went to the voxel room and quadrangulated object - and accepted the defaults BUT switching OFF symmetry (as in the 'Manfriday' post) - all went OK. I go to the Retopo room and 'merge to Microverts' and in the window change the poly count to 1 million with carcass at approx 51,000 polys, auto mapping is selected (is this because I have already retopoed the object?) and then select 2048x2048 for the map size. The process seems to get stuck at 31%, I usually wait for at least 40 minutes knowing that it's a long process, then I just kill the app. Should I change the symmetry back ON? before 'merge to microverts'?

Thanks again digman, all this is quite a learning curve

I'm trying to place the sphere accurately on the voxel model. When I place the curser (from the front view) it is obviously displaced on the Z axis. Is there a way to adjust the sphere seperately from the object? as the transform gizmo only relates to the whole object (including the sphere)

Thanks digman, I'm trying it now and it works well

Hi I'm in a bit of a pickle, I'm trying to attach an obj to the surface of my voxel model. I've made a simple obj and imported it to the curves rollout. My problem is that the object is repeated many times and overlaps itself. I can't seem to find a why of spacing them out at a distance that they don't overlap. I can scale them with the few parameters in the curves layout but can't seem to seperate them.

I started working on a figure in the voxel room and transfered it via 'merge per pixel painting' for painting and used the original UVs from a crude .obj mesh that I filled with voxels for remodelling. It wasn't until I transfered it over to Max that I found that the definition of the paint layers looked too low although they are 4095x4096. A quick look at the original UVs determined that they were really inefficient at the image distribution. I therefore jumped in at the deep end and started to learn the Retopo system, baring a few snags I managed to get it well distributed (I think) and it's now in the paint room. This time I would like to have a go at microverts method as this seems to yield a higher res model for transfering to Max. My question is: is it possible to transfer my paint layers fronm the 'per pixel painting' setup into the microverts setup? as I have already done a lot of work in the paint room on the other model.

Thanks many times, artman, it finally worked!!!..... at first try it gave me weird uvs when I imported the normal map into Max, then it wasn't until I noticed that I needed to change the method to XYZ space and everything fell into place. I'm going to sleep well tonight Thanks again

The microvert conversion has finished but I can't see where to set carcass size also the paint room is empty - nothing there, I think that happened when I deleted the sub objects

I used it because I thought it would add to the 'bio-mechanical' look that Giger originally designed in the ship. But not understanding the workflow too well I tend to leave everything in place. The painting side was a piece of cake once the setup was done.

That skeleton BTW was in the paint room menu under the sub objects - I think it came from the voxel original although the original is still OK when I goto the voxel room.

I'm trying the microvert workflow now, it's taking some time, even on my nice new box.

I think this is where my problem lies - after switching off some layers !!!!! I must have rubbed out the model at some point

I tried the Crazy Bump map convertor and it seems to just enhance what is already there, I think my problem lies in the fact that the normal map came from the low res model and not the voxel original so I'm loosing at least 50% of the fine detail. I guess there is no way to save the painting configuration and start again by making a higher res copy (to get better normal map resolution) and transfering it to the higher res model?

I'm done with the detailing but just want to get that bit extra detail from the voxel sculpt as it looks just right for my needs so I'll check out your link, sounds promising.

I added the Meshsmooth (gave 1 iteration) and this is the nearest I can get the model to look like the reference from 3D Coat. Here are the two for comparison - I had to tweak the colours quite a lot as I expect that the lighting in 3D Coat has no 'normal' state. The contrast in Max was adjusted by me to 52 and brightness up to 29 as well as the saturation strength up to 27 Does this mean there was something amiss when I started out painting do you think - if so can I go and recorrect so that it balances more accurately? BTW I had to wack up the amount of the normal map to 135 to get anywhere near the 3D Coat painting Next big question. I think I might have to add more detail to the model via some kind of bump map in addition to the normal map I have - Can I extract such a bump map from the original vowel sculpt or am I dreaming?

Thank you for your explaination. My file export doesn't allow me to select a high poly mesh (see File Export.jpg & File Export02.jpg) only a low poly and mid poly mesh which the mid poly just gives me 76480 faces in Max. I know Max fairly well but this conversion just stumps me as I can't seem to get the workflow sorted.

I've got the painting to a stage (Derelict-finished.jpg) where I need to see it in 3dMax - just let me get this straight. (1) - I go over to the voxel room and export the original voxel sculpt (Derelict-finished02.jpg - 9.7 million triangles) at a lower res - something like 100,000 quads? and as an .obj file i.e. File> Export> Export Object (2) - I export my carcass mesh (Derelict-finished03.jpg -540144 triangles) that I used as a painting object and export that at it's original resolution? i.e. File> Export> Export Object (3) I texture bake all those layers that are visible (Derelict-finished04.jpg) - will I need the tangent space map? I'm still not sure what that does. Question: do I need to export the Quadmesh1? in the Retopo room (Derelict-finished05.jpg - 76480 triangles) and use that instead of the others I mentioned?

Thanks, it's the 'Derelict' ship from Alien for a series of documentaries I'm making on the 'back room boys'- those that never get a chance to say anything about what it was really like.

Thank you ifxs, that's a really useful tip - it makes sense now.

I have 8 layers with 'overlay' option on the opacity and need to blend them all into one (they are slowing my computer down) and when I merge the top layer to the next one down (they are all using overlay as well) they look completely diferent. See before and after pics. Another problem is that I cannot undo the action so I have to save before any of these actions.