Volumetric sculpting/painting

[Frankie]

I'm so excited by this, I couldn't resist posting a first list of things that I'd like to see in the upcoming volumetric support in 3dcoat

The ability to voxelize an imported mesh & textures (i.e. to import hi-res scans for further sculpting)

Voxel painting, not just sculpting.

The ability to sample down or up a piece

The ability to select and manage pieces of voxels (a selection of voxels): copy/cut/separate/move/rotate/scale/paste/combine. To me this is a big part of the power of voxel modeling, the ability to create arbitrary libraries of pieces that can be modified and combined at will, without the topology constraints associated with surfacic modeling.

Also for information, here's is the ClayTools quick reference card so you can have an idea of the tools this software offers. This might bring new ideas.

ClayTools_QuickRef.pdf

[Andrew Shpagin]

I also can't wait to continue voxel programming

Several days I will be busy with support/service updates, so I am working over voxels in half of power.

Of course I will make importing/voxeling, copy/paste, making libraries... Really this is a big advantage of voxels.

Thanks for info!

[Frankie]

Wonderful first alpha version already

Tools that I would like to see in the sculpting category:

-Flatten brush (of course :P)

-Scrape/fill brush (scrape by default, fill when using CTRL). Scrape flattens peaks down to a certain level depending on the pressure. It is not an average like regular flatten. It acts like scraping only the summits of peaks. Fill works the opposite by filling the crevices and cavities up to a certain level depending on the pressure.

-Push/attract brush. This one is a bit tricky as it pushes the voxels beyond the brush radius as it tries to conserve the matter. So if you push on a thin plane, the voxels on the other side will be pushed away until it cracks. It is like pushing clay with your fingers. This is a very usefull and creative brush they have in Claytools, and I'd love to see it here too. Attract works the oposite by sucking the matter toward the brush.

-Drag or deform (FFD deformation). Select a point and a falloff distance (maybe with a profile attenuation curve) and drag around. Then apply the transformation (or realtime if it's fast enough). Claytools does this realtime on the generated polygon mesh by moving the vertices around, and then applies it to the voxels underneath when the user validates the transformation.

If I'm not clear enough I can make drawings of the intended brush interaction.

Franck.

[Andrew Shpagin]

Thank for ideas!

it is interesting - is there tool like pinch in claytools?

[Frankie]

it is interesting - is there tool like pinch in claytools?

Not really. The attract tool is the closest one to a pinch tool although it attracts in all directions and makes it difficult to control. To create sharp edges, it's often easier to carve each side with a flat tool.

Regarding the push/attract brush I mentionned earlier, taking the brush's direction vector in account would be interesting. It would mean pushing/pulling matter along the normal vector if your brush is not moving and you only exert some pressure. But if you move the brush laterally you could push matter sideward, along the tangent/binormal. Claytools alows to push the matter in any direction because of its 3d arm, but thinking about it this would be a nice way to do it in 3dcoat with a 2d device like a tablet.

[PoopaScoop]

Thank for ideas!

it is interesting - is there tool like pinch in claytools?

There's a pinch tool in Zbrush/Mudbox It allows you to create sharp edges.

[Frankie]

I find it a bit non-intuitive to align the 2d plane. Especially with a pen.

What about having the ability to rotate the plane with Alt+Ctrl, and changing the plane depth with Alt+Shift. Or something similar.