Magian

When I click the link for this training I receive a message that states "Services are suspended for this server". Does anyone know if this might be resolved soon?

No need to apologize. I am nearly convinced it is something foolish I am doing. I'll go through everything again this evening.

I am already fairly familiar with the Retopo tools and if I start doing retopology manually I have no problems. However, I thought that I could use the Auto Retopo function and then still be able to edit the topology in 3D Coat after the Auto Retopo completed. As a matter of fact this workflow was recommended to me by someone else on here at the forums within the last few weeks I believe. Is it not possible to use Auto Retopo and then continue to edit the topology after it completes?

Thank you all for your responses. Unfortunately, I am still having trouble. I have uploaded another video (only a couple of minutes this time) that further details what I am experiencing.

I am still having this same problem after following the above advice. I have uploaded a video to YouTube and I hope that someone can help me figure out what I am doing wrong.

The auto retopo works quite well but there are always a few edits that need to be made. However, once the auto-retopo procedure completes I am having trouble editing the topology in the retopo room. I see three groups appear and I can edit the retopo to some extent, but I see some kind of topology/mesh beneath it that throws me off. I open the Layers view but I don't see anything to hide. I hide the different group layers and that doesn't really seem to help either. Not sure why I am so confused - I am sure this must be something simple. EDIT----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Also, if I export the RETOPO, open a new scene and load it back in for per-pixel painting, the mesh does not look exactly the same as what I saw being exported. Specifically, the middle of the character along the y axis has quite a few triangle polygons where there were none in the retopology prior to export.

After completing the Auto Topo for per pixel painting, I would like to make some very small corrections. For example, there a couple of polygons missing and some tris where there should be quads. Can I go back into the Retopo room to fix these problems without causing problems with the initially generated occlusion map and normal map?

Have anything to do with the Vista trouble you were having?

Question 1: Has either the free or the paid webcast that you performed been released? Question 2: Um... sci-fi creature sculpting? When...ish?

Nice video, much easier to decipher. Thanks.

Right-clicking does not seem to move faces when in the Select and operate mode of the Topology tool. It works fine for me using vertices or edges.

In all other applications where I have seen the LSCM unwrapping algorithm there is a way to pin vertices and allow the algorithm to unwrap around those vertices. Is this not necessary in 3D-Coat or is this something that is to be implemented later?

As if I would be upset if you didn't get it in today. :lol: Take your time, Andrew. Your immense effort is greatly appreciated but I am extremely happy with 3D-Coat so no worries.

While working with the Unwrap tool when I enable symmetry one half of the mesh disappears and the edge loop running along the symmetry axis become distorted. When I exit the UV tool, active the Draw with a pen tool, and enable symmetry it works correctly. Am I doing something wrong? EDIT------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It seems to still be working despite the graphical glitches while using symmetry with the Unwrap tool. It just looks really ugly while doing it...

No offense taken; I am not even sure what you are referring to. :lol: I hit <SHIFT><S> (or <CTRL><S>, (whatever the shortcut is - I can't remember unless I am actually in the application...) and did that yesterday. I don't recall what the poly count was now but it was not anything close to what 3D Coat was saying. It seems to me as though it was under 100,000. That's part of the reason why I don't understand the slowdown. Sorry, I should have specified this before.

Actually, I am not completely sure how I ended up with a mesh that large. It was subdivided somewhere within 3D Coat. However, back in XSI I don't think the total number of polygons were near that high. I didn't load any maps into XSI so I am not really sure what slowed it down. I have had fairly large meshes in it before and it has performed very well. I am just learning 3D Coat so hopefully I will figure this out shortly...

If I use a displacement map that will physically affect the geometry, right? My goal is to start producing a HD DVD with these models so they will need to be highly detailed. I am thinking that using displacement maps will be better than using normal maps for this. Am I correct?

Should I subdivide in XSI before exporting to 3D Coat or would it be better to subdivide in 3D Coat before I start sculpting?

I have done quite a bit of sculpting work on a mesh within 3D Coat and exported as .obj to XSI 6.5 Essentials. After loading the mesh into XSI I notice some slowdown when working in the viewport. This worsens dramatically when I try to perform any point operations with the manipulator. According to 3D Coat the mesh contains 2,434,851 polygons. The scene in XSI is borderline unusable because of the slowdown. I am certain this will get worse as I bone and rig the mesh to prepare for animation. My workflow to get to this point included creating the base mesh in XSI, subdividing 3 times (I did this to give 3D Coat plenty of polygons to work with while sculpting so that I could add quite a bit of detail), exporting to 3D Coat (I chose not to subdivide the mesh in 3D Coat), lots of sculpting, and finally exporting back to XSI as .obj. Here is a screenshot of the mesh in 3D Coat. Is there anything I can do to prevent this problem in the future? Is there perhaps a way to subdivide a mesh within 3D Coat and use that solely for sculpting within 3D Coat and then export the lower polygon "base mesh"? If not, is there anything else I can do? All tips are greatly appreciated. Respectfully, Darren

After quite a bit of scultping in 3D Coat I noticed a few "black spots" on the mesh that looked like holes torn in the mesh. When I perform any scultping operations on these areas they have no effect and the black spot remains. Here is a screenshot taken of the mesh showing the spots. There are a few around the eye and one near the nose. Is there anything I can do to fix this? Aside from saving often, which I didn't do.

Thanks for not saying "RTFM". :lol: Actually, I had already seen that and tried it but I was doing it wrong. I didn't realize that you had to hold the <TAB> key down and left-click and drag to move the plane. Your posting prompted me to mess it with it some more and get it to work. Thanks.

Why does the gargoyle show up off centered on the grid? Is there any way to center it without exporting to a 3D package? If there is not, then is there a way to move the symmetry plane so that I can use it with the gargoyle? Thanks, Darren

Wow, excellent work! It really sparks the creativity just looking at it. I hope my aptitude with this app increases soon...

Thank you very much for the information. I am still unclear on how to specify exactly where in the image that you want to paint from but hopefully with what you have given me I can figure it out. Also, I will definitely check the image you are referring to.

Could someone post a very simple walkthrough for texturing from an image? There is a very brief video of this in the videos section which tells me nothing and there is a short section in the new manual which basically tells me how to load an image into the Materials tab. I want to know how to paint from the image and how to manipulate the image so that I can line up what I am painting with what is coming from the image. Also, how do I get the image to appear in the background and is placing it in the background useful aside from providing a reference? Thanks, Darren