3DArtist

Thanks chingchong, I'm glad you like it. I'm attaching a 3DC theme that I currently use in case anyone finds it useful. Just remove the ".zip" and install it through 3D-Coat -> Install extension. 3DC_Theme_GregDark.3dcpack.zip

I bought Hex a while ago, I think around the time it was taken over by Daz. It's lying around here somewhere collecting digital dust. @kay_Eva, the theme is something I made inspired by the zbrush interface. At least for me, it's nice to have a dark interface so it doesn't visually compete with any color of the project I'm working on. Similar to matting a photo with black. I'll post it in the exchange section of the forums in case you want to use it.

I forgot about this. You can load an .obj file into the brush palette and a window will pop up allowing you to create an alpha from it.

Currently, not that I know of but it is possible with an update to a shader I'm working on. And if we could save a render as a 16-bit tiff, then the alpha would be smoother. @michalis I can't wait to get some time to try out the new booleans. Thanks for the link.

On a simpler note, I've been brainstorming on some "simple" features that I think will help alot with working with shaders, rendering in 3DC and compositing in an external app. 1. As mentioned previously, making the shader settings window a palette for quick access and unobstructing the view of the model. 2. Add Save and Load buttons to manage multiple textures and settings for each shader and for easy sharing between objects. These settings and files (variables.xml and only the images that are different) can be saved in subfolders in the shaders folder. Add a drop-down menu (top-right of palette similar to brushes palette) to select any subfolders (presets) in the current shaders folder. Also add an Export button to export the current preset as a standalone shader. 3. An option to Link the multiple objects shaders together, using all the same settings and realtime updates. Useful for objects with the same surface but many parts. Either by right-clicking on another object and selecting an option in the layer menu to "Link shader to selected" or "Share shader with subtree" or some other way. 4. Global variables for Variables.xml. Right now a variable is defined by <ID> tags in the variables.xml and is only visible to the current shader that is using it, add something like <GID> and make it "global" so that any other <GID>'s with the same name in other used shaders mirrors the number/texture. This would be useful for mirroring only specific settings between shaders (i.e. environment map, picmat/lightmap, spec settings, fog etc) but allow for the other settings to work independently. Other uses (and maybe more important) would be to easily enable/disable render passes (depth, spec, vertex color, shadow/diffuse, normals, object id, etc) for all objects in a single click (if a checkbox control was added). Other ideas posted in Mantis here.

Thanks cakeller!

wailingmonkey, otsoa, thanks!

Thanks guys, I appreciate it! I just posted them in the Exchange Library.

[DX ONLY] Snow, Car Paint and Tire/Rubber shaders. Turntables using these shaders here. You'll need to take the ".zip" off the file to be able to install it through 3D-Coat. To install, go to File -> Install Extension -> then select the .3dcpack file. The Car Paint and Tire shaders use a PicMat base with some cube mapped texture noise/scratches. 2 spec layers that you can set the color and sharpness of the spec. And instead of using a PicMat based reflection, it uses an environment reflection (same thing used in the paint room "Environment Shade" under View). It looks a little more realistic especially on flatter surfaces. Top is PicMat, bottom is environment reflection. Hope someone finds these useful. GC_ShaderPack_01.3dcpack.zip

One way is to use a LC brush with zero depth and set the resolution in the Tools palette, but it would be nice to have a global increase/decrease res in surface mode.

Tire and Car shaders:

I've been working on some multitexture/multilayer shaders the last few days and want to share the progress so far. I hope to clean up the code, add some final touches and release a small shader pack (currently DX only). These shaders are a combination of PicMat, textured, and reflection shaders rolled into one with some fresnel thrown in.

I have had similar ideas rolling in my head also. Mine have been more towards manipulating a dense sculpt via a low poly frame, especially for hard surface sculpting. The pose tool is close with the "Use free form" option, I just wish we could select a mesh from the retopo room as the free form geometry. Combine that with an option in the voxel room to "assign snap" from a layer in the retopo room to a layer in the voxel room so that the low poly will follow the sculpted surface of the voxel. A bone-like posing system would be a welcome addition too. Curves are almost there, they just need to be able to manipulate the surrounding geometry via a falloff envelope and/or vertex weight painting. And if you created the base for a character with curves, your bones are already done.

The nice thing about Silo though is that you can create your own on-screen button interface complete with icons and tabs. Which is something I would like to see in 3DC.

As I was working on this velvet-like shader, it made me realize how flexible "multilayer shaders" could be. Currently the velvet shader is a combination of picmat and the cube-mapped texture shader. It also uses a separate image for the environment/reflection that it applies over the underlying layers and vertex paint (via screen transfer mode). Try painting black on any "reflective" picmat (Gold, Nickel, Silvery, etc) and the reflection disappears. On the right is the stock PicMat_Silvery and on the left is the modified version applying a second "reflection" layer over the picmat and vertex color. An idea for a multilayer workflow would be: (example: to create a matte material base with shiny vertex paint, environment/reflection map modulated by a falloff picmat) 1. Select a multilayer enabled shader 2. To set a picmat base color, Right-click on a shader and click "Assign to Slot 1" in the menu. 3. To set a picmat to influence just the vertex color, assign it to slot 2. 4. Assign an environment/reflection map to slot 3 5. And assign the falloff picmat to slot 4. Each of these "slots" act like the CustomSampler in the shader code. So assigning a shader to a slot, renders that shader and sends the image to the multilayer shader as "SlotSampler1..2..3". then the multilayer shader combines the slotsamplers however it wants to for the final output on the model. And have options to save and load the "slots" Also, organizing shaders into folders would be very useful and breaking out the shader settings dialog box into a regular palette.

+1 for shader folders!

One of my favorites. Nice work!

Thanks Andrew! I was just thinking of how nice something like the layer tool would be a few days ago.

Read the tooltip for the "Respect negative volumes" checkbox in the Merge tool. It looks like any sub-object with a "_negative" at the end of the name gets subtracted first before merging.

It looks like it happens when you have "Material Groups" selected in the blender OBJ export options. I don't know if this is helpful or not, but I found an obj file on the internet that sheds some light on how zBrush 3.5 exports vertex color using #MRGB tags. # The following MRGB block contains ZBrush Vertex Color (Polypaint) and masking output as 4 hexadecimal values per vertex. The vertex color format is MMRRGGBB with up to 64 entries per MRGB line. #MRGB ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff # End of MRGB block[/CODE]

haikalle, with the new vertex paint feature in 3DC, would it be possible to export the vertex color to blender also?

I'm using LW 9.61 and I can load a lwo with vertex painting, but I had to do 2 things before it worked. 1. Change my shading method to multitexture shading from glsl shading in the Display Options -> GL dialog. 2. Assign the vertex color map to the surface in Surface Editor -> Advanced -> Vertex Color Map. Also, several times I almost exported my painted sculpt from the paint room instead of going back to the voxel room. On another note, Andrew I would love to be able to assign shortcut keys to each room.

Great character! I emailed a sample vertex painted LightWave object to Andrew so hopefully LWO export from 3DC to blender will be possible in the future.

I love the vertex painting so far, it helps bring concept sketching to another level. Requesting LWO export with vertex colors. What I've tested so far, LWO files seem to work the best to import into blender preserving the vertex colors.

Seems like Andrew just needs to add a "Paint Instances with Brush" and a "Fill Freeze with Instances" feature, along with distribution options to get something similar. Not sure about the performance though for densely hairy things.