3D-Coat 3.0 ALPHA

[splodge]

Is there anyway of getting rid of the defualt sphere?

Press the 'Clear' button.

I'm not sure if that's what you wanted. Or did you mean that you want 3D Coat to start up with an empty work space?. If so - a default sphere is good for people that are new. It can be intimidating being new and having to root through strange menus just for a basic shape to work with. And add to that the fact that 3D Coat's process of adding shapes to the workspace isn't the most conventional method.

I personally would like to see 3D Coat start up in Voxel mode with a sphere screaming "sculpt me dammit!!". I reckon it's the voxels that are now 3D Coat's main feature.

So yeah, think of the noobs!.

[Pimpmymonkey]

Press the 'Clear' button.

I'm not sure if that's what you wanted. Or did you mean that you want 3D Coat to start up with an empty work space?. If so - a default sphere is good for people that are new. It can be intimidating being new and having to root through strange menus just for a basic shape to work with. And add to that the fact that 3D Coat's process of adding shapes to the workspace isn't the most conventional method.

I personally would like to see 3D Coat start up in Voxel mode with a sphere screaming "sculpt me dammit!!". I reckon it's the voxels that are now 3D Coat's main feature.

So yeah, think of the noobs!.

QFA "sculpt me dammit!!" :lol: NO! NO! Sculpt me!

I do think tough that we could use a few more user preferences. Perhaps a default mode for new users and a user defined mode for people

to be able to work in a manner that suits them the best.

P. Monk

[tree321]

Using new filled curve feature for creating bizarre and ugly sea monster.

[philnolan3d]

Yes, get rid of the sphere when clear. If we want a sphere we can load one in our selves.

I don't mind the sphere, I start most of my sculptures from that sphere, so it's nice to have it already there.

That's an awesome sea monster BTW.

[Eric Dandoy]

Wow! Very nice and clever modeling! Bravo!

[haikalle]

Psmith, I liked your post and I agree. I Really like the insider renderer of 3d-coat. The quolity verses speed is enough for me and I hope that in the future we could have control lights intensity and color more than now and maybe even add multiply lights. Shaders for example are really pleassure to study because only thing what you need is text editor. You edit your shader code and save it, go to 3d-coat and you are able to see change right away.

[Skaven252]

The Filled Curve tool is awesome! Perfect for creating large, flat, curved objects like ears, wings, flags, et al. Wooohoo! \o/

I noticed that it's very easy to make holes into the voxels with the Smooth tool, if you create a thin Filled Curve surface. Since there are separate Surface and Volume tools, could there be a Surface Smooth tool what would allow you to smooth the voxel surface whlist avoid making holes? Or is there one already?

About the manipulators: I think color indication on mouse float would already help immensely, without need for big modifications. Let me explain: currently the manipulator's elements (the Rotate circles, the Move arrows, the Scale cubes) only turn yellow when you click on them. So you're not always sure what you're pointing at before you click. Changing their color already on mouse over, ie already when the cursor is over them without requiring the user to click, would make the manipulators more intuitive. Then you would immediately see what part of the manipulator you're going to access.

[artman]

I noticed that it's very easy to make holes into the voxels with the Smooth tool, if you create a thin Filled Curve surface. Since there are separate Surface and Volume tools, could there be a Surface Smooth tool what would allow you to smooth the voxel surface whlist avoid making holes? Or is there one already?

It would be a very welcomed addition.

Once people start using 3Dcoat volumetric sculpting they will inevitably whine and complain about smoothing making holes in thin surfaces.

I can see that in the future.

[Crusoe]

BUG:

GL version, 3D grid still overlays object in all cases.

[splodge]

QFA "sculpt me dammit!!" :lol: NO! NO! Sculpt me!

I do think tough that we could use a few more user preferences. Perhaps a default mode for new users and a user defined mode for people

to be able to work in a manner that suits them the best.

P. Monk

Oh yah, 3D Coat definitely needs an interface for beginners. There's far too many obscure options at the moment, options that are of little concern to a new user that just wants to play around and have fun. But I also think we should relax and let Andrew experiment and work at his own pace. Maybe the beginner mode can come later when things have settled down a little.

[tree321]

About the manipulators: I think color indication on mouse float would already help immensely, without need for big modifications. Let me explain: currently the manipulator's elements (the Rotate circles, the Move arrows, the Scale cubes) only turn yellow when you click on them. So you're not always sure what you're pointing at before you click. Changing their color already on mouse over, ie already when the cursor is over them without requiring the user to click, would make the manipulators more intuitive. Then you would immediately see what part of the manipulator you're going to access.

Your right about this.The indicators should turn white when hovered over.I just assumed this would be done.

Right now the current manipulators are difficult to use.The rings are hard to click on, it's easy to to grab the wrong thing,the rings overlap so you can't select the right one when screen is turned a certain way, scale indicators are hidden at times in the same way...It needs to be changed.I'm referring to merge mesh transforms now.

There have been request to unify the look and feel of manipulators for the various functions that use them, this is where we're headed.I love the playful style of the primitive manipulators and hope we can translate that look to the other transforms as well.

Just to clarify the importance of good manipulation of objects in a scene, remember good work flow is of utmost importance when using any modeling software.

An artist wants to create on the computer similar to real world experiences.In the real world you can easily place an object anywhere in space without much thought at all, it's just intuitive, with modeling software you rely on the navigation controls to move your virtual space around and use the manipulators to align objects in relation to other objects. This is where good manipulators come in.The manipulators should be intuitive enough to allow you to grab an object in the scene and move it to wherever you want without much fuss,frustrated artists is not the goal.With the current transform manipulator I spend as much time moving the controller as I would just moving the object to where I want.It doesn't snap to object when selecting object it doesn't move with the object as you move object etc.This is very time consuming and frustrating.

For those working on a single mesh this may not seem like a big issue ,but if you use multiple objects in the scene like I do you will quickly see the importance of this.

I know this issue is being addressed so I'm not losing any sleep worrying about it, just wanted to voice my opinion on the subject as it stands now.

Let's give as much feedback to Andrew right now on any issues that concern us about 3D-Coat .We want this to be a successful release for Andrew so he can be rewarded for all his hard work over these past few months.We as alpha testers have a responsibility to voice our opinions before release so he can correct any issues beforehand.Remember somebody is going to give a review on this software when it comes out, lets do all we can to ensure it's a good one!

Happy modeling,

Rick

[polyxo]

One very important thing which greatly helped was to grey out all interface components which currently are not available.

Presently in Voxel mode nearly all Main Menu entries are not usable. In the current interface this would mean for the Main Menu alone:

Items not used at All:

• Layers
  
• Freeze
  
• Hiding
  

Menu-Titles and all entries should get greyed out completly

Only partially used:

• File
  
• Edit
  
• View
  

Here the unrelated Menu Entries should get greyed out

Fully used:

• Symmetry
  
• Language
  
• Help
  

Nothing gets greyed out.

[3dioot]

Havent had time to -really- put it through its paces but im impressed.

-Surface to voxel seems quicker in general (but still not fast enough on my system to make it a truly smooth experience).

-The surface clay is very, very fast in comparison to say voxel extrude (which is my bread and butter voxel brush) and feels pretty good.

-Interpolation seems to work to some extent but if you make your stroke faster it will just "skip" on parts. Also pressure interpolation (if its there) is totally not working. Look at the stroke thickness; its truly weird.

A: pressure interpolation all wonky

B: Stroke "skipped" as brush stroke picks up speed

- Fast and rough is pretty awesome but it gives you guaranteed garbage when you use it to subtract with. Please fix that cause it has alot of potential.

General note on surface flatten. It raises the surface to the high points. It works like a filler brush. Please make it flatten towards the -average- of whats under the brush. As it is now its not really usable which is a shame. Remember the scrape explanation. You made scrape to remove to the depth of whats under the brush. Flatten should both remove and add to the -average- of whats under the brush.

JW

[Ondrej Svadlena]

I've been using 3DCoat (mostly alpha49) extensively in the last weeks and noticed that quadrangulation only uses one core on my Q6600. Are there plans to make this process multicore enabled? I've had some tough times converting some of the more complex parts of my model. Sometimes it took more than 30 minutes to quadrangulate so it would be great if the process used all available cores in the future.

Also, I believe TOXE already mentioned this earlier, opacity sliders for each voxtree layer would be very helpful. Or at least a semi-transparent shader for now. It can get quite chaotic, especially with complex models (please see the image below), so an "x-ray" view would be very helpful.

Cheers,

Ondrej

[splodge]

Umm.. don't tell me.. a sculpture of Angelina Jolie's capillaries?.

[Ondrej Svadlena]

Umm.. don't tell me.. a sculpture of Angelina Jolie's capillaries?.

Ehhh, not quite.... but close enough . I've posted the full story in the vox WIP

[ldzywsj]

3DC v3.0 will release in the first quarter of 2009, is it to say, there are only two weeks 3dc v3.0 will release?

Edit:my stupid,six weeks! :P

[David Walters]

FWIW, Q1 is January through to the end of March. So six weeks

[artman]

It doesn't snap to object when selecting object it doesn't move with the object as you move object etc.This is very time consuming and frustrating.

Me too.

I can deal with everything else but I need the manipulator to follow object to be efficient .

Zbrush has the same problem with transpose line.

I really like 3DCoat primitive manipulators,they are very clever and intuitive.

[Andrew Shpagin]

What do you think about cube placer manipulator? By my opinion it is good enough. It has all transforms. Maybe only thing to be changed there - set overall scale to (0,0,0) - control will look much more lightweight.

[artman]

What do you think about cube placer manipulator? By my opinion it is good enough. It has all transforms. Maybe only thing to be changed there - set overall scale to (0,0,0) - control will look much more lightweight.

Cube manipulator is my favorite one

[tree321]

What do you think about cube placer manipulator? By my opinion it is good enough. It has all transforms. Maybe only thing to be changed there - set overall scale to (0,0,0) - control will look much more lightweight.

Not sure if I understand what this is.Can you post a drawing or pic. of it?

Edit:Is it this?or are you referring to the one in the primitive cube selector in 3dcoat?If it the one in coat used for transforming the cube,I like that one with the exception of the components getting squashed together as Juan mentioned in his video.The other thing is would this work on more complex shapes?

If you decide to go with this my only other suggestion, besides the squash issue, would be to make the rotation gears smaller.Maybe this is all we need.

[nuverian]

Looks like a lattice...which sounds nice. Or am i confused?

[tree321]

Just another thought as I'm working with the cube primitive is that the controls overlap in orthographic views making it impossible to scale correctly.With the one I did the controls are visible no matter what view you have.Unless I'm missing something.

Edit:To uniform scale with mine just press shift and use anyone of the scale icons.

[Maximus3D]

I think that 3DC 3.0 would benefit from more time spent on developement before it's finalized and released for sale to the rest of the world. And i mean that developement should be spent on other things besides these sculpting feature, i know it's a big main feature of the new 3.0 but it's not everything as not all of us have much use of it.

/ Magnus

[JimB]

I think that 3DC 3.0 would benefit from more time spent on developement before it's finalized and released for sale to the rest of the world. And i mean that developement should be spent on other things besides these sculpting feature, i know it's a big main feature of the new 3.0 but it's not everything as not all of us have much use of it.

/ Magnus

Well said I cannot agree more, sculpting while very interesting is still a minority thing,it is so easy to be flattered by the few

and forget the many.The title was even changed from 3dBrush to 3dCoat to renew the original emphasis on what the program

was all about and that was to coat your model with details that would be difficult to do in a modeler.

Jim

[tree321]

While I can agree with you guys on the further development of the paint aspect of 3d-coat I take issue with the fact that you seem to think the sculpting aspect is of lesser importance than the paint features at this time.I feel that there are plenty of sculptors out there that would love to take advantage of the new VS features.Remember Zbrush was initially a paint program with some sculpt features but over time the sculpting aspect took priority over the painting, to a large degree at least.Everything I see in the zbrush galleries are models made in other programs detailed in Zbrush.3d-coat has the potential to model almost anything from scratch directly inside of the application making it one of the most powerful and useful of all 3d packages out there. 99 percent of my work on these forums has been done completely in 3d-coat eliminating the need to go back and forth from modeler to detailer, it's all right here.If 3d-coat 4.0 or 5.0 decides to concentrate on polygonal modeling I may never use another modeler again.This program allows complete freedom over form as opposed to polygonal modeling where one has to be confined to edge flow and quads etc.Not to say it doesn't have it's purpose I know it does but I see 3d-coat as more of an artist studio than a paint program.But combine all aspects of creation in one package and you have a winner that satisfies painters, sculptors and designers.After 20 years in the sculpting business I got sick and tired of trying to find local sculpting resources, weather it was getting

clay to sculpt with or a foundry to cast a bronze, but painting supplies were everywhere.With 3d-coat it's all in one place.I for one am thrilled by the fact that Andrew has spent this time developing the VS aspect of 3d-coat and am sure the thousands of other sculptors out there will as well.(Hello Zbrush users!)

Let's not throw a wrench in the gears that are turning at this time, it does nothing but slow the enormous potential of this program.It's all up to Andrew as to weather he wants to take time away from developing the VS features more and further the already good paint aspects of the program.I just don't think this is the time to say ,"hey good enough let's move on."

If anything I would change the name from 3d-coat to 3D Artist Studio, cause that's what is is to me.

Can't please them all.

[JimB]

I stick by what I said earlier all the same,remember we are all 3dCoat users and have a right to our opions.

Also there was no need for the angry gif

[Ondrej Svadlena]

I completely agree tree321, just wrote something similar in the vox WIP thread, lol. I don't like to use this word, but the voxel part really is revolutionary in the CG world. Some people are still missing that point. There is no other (reasonably priced - cough cough, ClayTools, cough) program bringing such a degree of creative freedom to the modeling process. Just wish it came earlier... All those hours lost, fiddling with loft nurbs and later, polys.

[Maximus3D]

Jim: Thanks i'm glad to see atleast someone agree with me on this forum. I thought i were the only one who wanna see attention directed towards other parts of 3DC instead of the sculpting stuff.

Tree: As it seems you're part of the larger group of active users on the forum who favour the sculpting tools in 3DC ahead of everything else the application offers i understand why you support it so much, and i also understand why Andrew puts all his attention on it as when he manages to get the sculpting system fully functional and ready then he will have a application which can compete with the giants like Zbrush, Mudbox and now also Modo. There's alot of money in that market, and i'm sure he wants some of it by attracting new customers with these sculpting tools. BUT, 3DC 3.0 cannot be all about sculpting. It has other sides such as painting, retopology, lowpoly model painting (which needs to be resolved), uvmapping and more that should get some well deserved time and attention from Andrew to be properly developed. Not forgetting the userinterface and over all workflow in the application. These parts i think are all way more important than sculpting is. They may not attract as many new customers and bring in more money, but for the application itself to be useful in production these parts can't be ignored. I got plenty of wrenches in my toolbox..

/ Magnus