3D-Coat 3.0 ALPHA

[philnolan3d]

I'm curious, what's the point in having the X to close the windows? It seems kind of redundant.

Edit: I posted this in Beta Support but that forum is pretty dead, so I'll post it here too:

I have auto save turned on and I've been using 3DC quite a bit lately, but after a crash I just checked the auto save file to see if it was newer than my current save. Nope, last auto save was done 10 days ago. Which was the one day I that was using 3DC's standard painting tools on a work project. Can it be that the auto save does not recognize changes made to the volumetric mesh, so it doesn't know to save?

[artaq]

Just for clarity. This is when you toggle smooth by pressing shift when having PEN as the main tool right?

Because smooth slider seems to work fine for me when i use CARVE. Is that the same for you?

3dioot

Yes, I know this has been answered by SonK, but it's in regard to the Shift+Smooth function... I'm presuming this will be an adjustable parameter, much like carve...

[akira]

Yeah the realtime shadows work will on my 5 year old pc too. The smooth slider seems to not work either, it seems to apply only a set of strength regardless of what value i use. Also annoy bug is the "draw with pen" tool, if you hold down left mouse button it'll create a spike....

@Akira, can you add SSAO to the LambLight and LambLight_shadow shader? :unsure :

LOL yeah I've tried to, but haven't succeeded. I need more information:

1. is the depth buffer value in screen space? or it's the distance between sample points and viewpoint in world space?

2. if it's screen space value, WorldViewMatrix and ViewMatrix is needed for some calculation.

3. it it's world space value, i need to know a way to reproduce world space coordinates from the depth value.

and i didn't see any shader code that calculates depth buffer, is it in the shaders folder?

thanks

akira.

[Andrew Shpagin]

LOL yeah I've tried to, but haven't succeeded. I need more information:

1. is the depth buffer value in screen space? or it's the distance between sample points and viewpoint in world space?

2. if it's screen space value, WorldViewMatrix and ViewMatrix is needed for some calculation.

3. it it's world space value, i need to know a way to reproduce world space coordinates from the depth value.

and i didn't see any shader code that calculates depth buffer, is it in the shaders folder?

thanks

akira.

You can see examples of getting depth from texture using sample

Shaders\UserShaders\Depth\mcubes.hlsl

Depth is stored in screen space, the range is 0 (eyes) to 5000 (far plane). Depth is linear.

float4 c0 = tex2D(DepthSampler, In.uv);

float3 d=float3(1.0,1.0/255.0,1.0/255.0/255.0);

float v0=dot(c0.rgb,d); //linear screen-space depth is there

You can see how to transform depth to correspording to xy scale in sample (recovering normals from depth buffer)

Shaders\UserShaders\Normals_from_Depth\mcubes.hlsl

Also there is set of auto-variables (matrices and viewport related)

g_ViewportInvWidth

g_ViewportInvHeight

g_WorldMatrix

g_WorldMatrixInverse

g_ViewerPos

g_WorldViewMatrix

g_ViewProjectionMatrix

g_WorldViewProjectionMatrix

g_ProjectionMatrix

g_ScreenMatrix

g_ScreenMatrixInverse

g_NormalMatrix

g_NormalViewMatrix

g_TimeSec

g_FrameTimeSec

Thank you for efforts

[rimasson]

Yeah! Rimasson is back.

The problem you describe with the "discs" i think thats caused because of lack of a working falloff working for the carve brush.

Is this what you mean with blending? working falloff?

Here is a post about depth/orientation sampling depth and orientation sampling

Here is a post with a request for profile curves request for profile curves

Andrew is working on refining the brush engine/brushes now (well, after his weeked :lol: ) and i hope all of this gets in which should make everything feel alot better allready.

3dioot

I like to way the carve brush works : createing sharp carve n the model. i don't know if a faloff is useful for this brush (maybe i'm wrong)

here is a picture that depict what i'd like to have with the carve brush : a slider that raise or bury the brush shape.

[3dioot]

I like to way the carve brush works : createing sharp carve n the model. i don't know if a faloff is useful for this brush (maybe i'm wrong)

here is a picture that depict what i'd like to have with the carve brush : a slider that raise or bury the brush shape.

Hmm.. Why would you want to have to manually smooth the sharp carve? I find that pretty horrible to have to do all the time. Currently clay brush is a combination of smooth and a normal brush and its pretty bad on low resolution meshes and still much too erosive on high res meshes to work on the fine shapes. I do pretty much all my sculpting with the carve brush. With fallof working you can always tweak the blend. So that if you want to have a sharp edge you set it to zero and if you want a blend you turn it up. Also i think your complaint about "discs" forming is directly related to the lack of fallof.

Regarding your wish to have an option to embed or raise the brush. Could you explain why you would like that? Because i have trouble seeing what would be the benefit of that. The carve brush used to work a little bit like that and it gave all kinds of problems. Ofcourse having a -seperate- slider for it wouldnt be so bad because then you can simply leave it to default. Im still really curious why you'd want this though; can you give an example?

Here are some posts regarding the problems with the pressure curve in regards to depth and stroke width with the "old" carve system which worked through changing the depth by litterally lowering or heightening the position of the carving sphere. I personally think it got a lot better after these suggestions were implemented which normalized the pressure curve for depth and width. I would be really dissapointed if carve would go back to the old broken system instead of being "finished" by depth/orientation sampling and brush faloff.

Carve brush radius/depth bug version 1

Carve brush radius/depth bug version 2

Also wouldnt it be better to create the brush shapes you used in the example through profile curves? This would give you all the control you need in a much more predictable way imho.

3dioot

[BluEgo]

I think not all of us will be agree on how carve should work

For example, I don't like the thikness that this tool has in its current version. Why there is an offset between the stroke and the surface ?

[philnolan3d]

I think flattening out the tool was a good idea, but I don't think there's a need for smooth edges. I see Carve as a tool for when you need to really gouge into a surface or build it up really quick, so it doesn't have to be neat and pretty until it's done.

[3dioot]

I think not all of us will be agree on how carve should work

For example, I don't like the thikness that this tool has in its current version. Why there is an offset between the stroke and the surface ?

Lack of depth sampling worsened by the fact there is no fallof to the brush. But im beginning to feel im just repeating myself. I know Andrew is making it alot better (you could say complete). Its the bread and butter brush of volumetric sculpting for adding and removing "clay" (and yes it beats the clay brush hands down atm).

The only thing im afraid of is that with requests like "it should act like X" is that people seem to forget there are options to brushes for a reason. If the principles are sound, and the options are good, everyone can get their own perfect brush just by changing the settings around. This is why fallof should be in. Not because -i- want blended curves but because everyone will be able to choose then wether they want a sharp carve or a blended one. This is why profile curves should be in. Not so -i- can have a sharp/slasher brush but because everyone will be able to choose wether they want a soft rounded brush, a slasher brush or any other profile they can come up with. This is why the basics have to be sound. Im certain Andrew will make wise decisions that will allow all of us to work with the brush the way we personally want to.

Aside from that there are "techniques" that increase brush behaviour period which is for example the depth sampling (or lack thereoff; i really dont know wether thats allready working but i got a hunch it isnt). If its not in its one of the reasons for the fact the brush feels "ofsetted" from the surface. Im beginning to get the idea that rimmasons request actually has to do with this problem. It may mean the need to manually offset will dissapear with good depth sampling altogether.

3dioot

[otsoa]

A video sample to see the bug when I switch to plan tool with another tool.

bug plan

[akira]

You can see examples of getting depth from texture using sample

Shaders\UserShaders\Depth\mcubes.hlsl

Depth is stored in screen space, the range is 0 (eyes) to 5000 (far plane). Depth is linear.

float4 c0 = tex2D(DepthSampler, In.uv);

float3 d=float3(1.0,1.0/255.0,1.0/255.0/255.0);

float v0=dot(c0.rgb,d); //linear screen-space depth is there

You can see how to transform depth to correspording to xy scale in sample (recovering normals from depth buffer)

Shaders\UserShaders\Normals_from_Depth\mcubes.hlsl

Also there is set of auto-variables (matrices and viewport related)

g_ViewportInvWidth

g_ViewportInvHeight

g_WorldMatrix

g_WorldMatrixInverse

g_ViewerPos

g_WorldViewMatrix

g_ViewProjectionMatrix

g_WorldViewProjectionMatrix

g_ProjectionMatrix

g_ScreenMatrix

g_ScreenMatrixInverse

g_NormalMatrix

g_NormalViewMatrix

g_TimeSec

g_FrameTimeSec

Thank you for efforts

Wow nice, thanks for the info!! I'm almost there.

but for SSAO an additional value is required:

the position of the top left corner of the view frustum in world space(top left corner of the far plane)

and the view ray is calculated in vertex shader like this:

Out.eyeRay.x = inPos.x * camFrustumTopLeftX;
Out.eyeRay.y = inPos.y * camFrustumTopLeftY;
Out.eyeRay.z = camFar;

I've downloaded a sample shader for Ogre engine from this thread:

http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/to...amp;WhichPage=1

hope it helps.

regards

akira.

SSAO_12_05_Red5.zip

[philnolan3d]

A video sample to see the bug when I switch to plan tool with another tool.

bug plan

In the future try Jing

http://www.jingproject.com/

or If you want to use your own capture software try uploading to Photobucket:

http://photobucket.com/

Both are free and they will convert it to Flash video as well as host it for you. I'm pretty sure you can use Photobucket outside the USA. I know you can Jing outside because I learned about it from Andrew using it.

[3dioot]

A video sample to see the bug when I switch to plan tool with another tool.

bug plan

I have the same bug. When you use the flatten tool it will "open up" the mesh leaving gaps. In this example i used symmetry to show you that when you convert back to voxels it also breaks symmetry because it deals with holes randomly. Please make good voxel versions for flatten and pinch so this problem goes away.

http://screencast.com/t/HeK0CCXkA

3dioot

[philnolan3d]

Yes I also has issues with the Flatten tool tearing open the mesh. A couple of times I absolutely had to use Flatten though so I just let it make the tears, then filled them in and smoothed with Spray.

Here's a Stormtrooper helmet I'm working on. I started with a fairly small sphere that I imported and have increased the res twice since then. Still a little lumpy, but I'm gradually getting it smoothed. I'll start adding more detail and sharpening it up next.

[3dioot]

@philnoland3d

Nice stormtrooperhelmet! I see you have shadows turned on too. Im playing with some low res sculpts just for relaxation and its absolutely super to sculpt with shadows on. It feels fantastic. They are quite fast too!. When i turn them on for my skull it gets a bit too slow though but thats only fair since i dont have a super fast system (i can still spin it around so thats good). But overall its fantastic for perceiving depth. Im really chuffed with them to be honest! :lol:

3dioot

[otsoa]

In the future try Jing

<a href="http://www.jingproject.com/" target="_blank">http://www.jingproject.com/</a>

or If you want to use your own capture software try uploading to Photobucket:

<a href="http://photobucket.com/" target="_blank">http://photobucket.com/</a>

Both are free and they will convert it to Flash video as well as host it for you. I'm pretty sure you can use Photobucket outside the USA. I know you can Jing outside because I learned about it from Andrew using it.

Ok, thx.

[Monsoon]

Problems I'm having....

I can save to .3b but when I open it up there's nothing there...

When I select mesh, I have to do it twice as nothing shows up the first time, just the widget...

Whenever I use snake and spike with either pen or mouse, I get unwanted parts floating all over the place...

Here's what I mean...

http://screencast.com/t/rUBbZqBXecK

[3dioot]

@monsoon

If you open a *.3b file with a voxel sculpt you still have to press the cube for voxel sculpting at the lower left. Then your saved voxel sculpt will "appear".

You have to see voxel sculpting at the moment a bit like a mode. If your not in the "voxel mode" with the menu showing in the upper left your voxel sculpts will not show up. But when your in the "voxel mode" by pressing the cube your voxel sculpt will become visible.

3dioot

[Monsoon]

That's exactly it....it's not working. All I get back is the original voxel sphere.

hmmmm.....

[philnolan3d]

Whenever I use snake and spike with either pen or mouse, I get unwanted parts floating all over the place...

Here's what I mean...

http://screencast.com/t/rUBbZqBXecK

This has been discussed a few times in this thread and others. Here's my response from a few pages back.

http://3dbrush.kriska.hvosting.net/forum/i...post&p=8359

[Yushituku]

HI

I'm loving this volumetric sculpting so far, even in this Alpha state is already great, i like it a lot.

Can you answer this questions PLEASE.

1-real time fast brush speed and interaction in HI resolution meshes (equivalent to ZBRUSH 3.1 and the new MUDBOX 2009)...Is this in your plans for the first version of the volumetric sculpting?

2-Speaking of fast performance. Do you have plans to take advantage of a 64 bit system and a GPU accelerated Gracphic Cards?

I don't know the technological stuff behind the programs but it seems that this is one of the key areas that give the new MUDBOX 2009 it's amazing performance with millions of polys....perhaps voxel sculpting can benefit from this kind of hardware as well..?

3-Masking for freezing....any plans to include this?

4-You have now the "Increase resolution" option, which is good. But are you going to implement Subdivision levels, going back and forth the highest and the lowest , preserving the details of the higest levels...?

Thanks

Yushituku

[philnolan3d]

HI

I'm loving this volumetric sculpting so far, even in this Alpha state is already great, i like it a lot.

Can you answer this questions PLEASE.

2-Speaking of fast performance. Do you have plans to take advantage of a 64 bit system and a GPU accelerated Gracphic Cards?

I don't know the technological stuff behind the programs but it seems that this is one of the key areas that give the new MUDBOX 2009 it's amazing performance with millions of polys....perhaps voxel sculpting can benefit from this kind of hardware as well..?

4-Are you going to implement Subdivision levels, going back and forth the highest and the lowest , preserving the details of the higest levels...?

Thanks

Yushituku

Ohayo gozaimasu

I can't speak for Andrew but from what I have read 3.0 will have 64 bit support as well as CUDA support for nVidia cards GeForce 8 and above. Andrew says he's planning to have a "reduce resolution" function, but has to figure it out first.

[philnolan3d]

Here's another video showing the new and updated tools. Plus the slicing tools that I missed in the last one. Hope I didn't forget anything this time.

Vimeo version. Slightly higher quality, but lacking the annotations.

http://www.vimeo.com/1836662

[Christoph]

Symmetry is not working right

It has happen already three time so i suppose it's a bug.

1-Activate symmetry across X - axis

2-Start the volumetric mode and select "Merge"

3-Then hit "select mesh" and select the sphere from the samples folder of 3dcoat 3 alpha.

4-Scale the sphere to make it much more smaller than the default volumetric sphere.

5-Subdivide several time until it gets smooth and hit enter.

6-Delete the other default bigger sphere with the carve tool and the lasso.

7-the little sphere is now about 30000 triangles.

8-Begin to shape the sphere using a lot of the "move tool" in BIG size and also the "Spray/thaw" tool.

9-Eventually the yellow dot that represent the opposite side will not be in the right place, which mean that could be in the air or to much inside in the mesh....In any case it is not in the exact spot in the opposite side...Some time this mean that you brush one side and the other is not influenced...or viceversa..you brush one side very lightly and the other side receive a big and strong influence....

I must add that the symmetry plane was always exactly in the center and also the sphere that i merge in the scene..at the beginning i check that the yellow dot is represented in the exact spot in the opposite side..this happen just some time later after using the brushes...mainly the MOVE tool and the spray/thaw tool...

Please Andrew fix this BUG...

Thank you.

[UnCommonGrafx]

I am SO lost.

And I like that I am: it's like having a whole new program at my disposal.

However, could we get some documentation that's all together? Right now, I am trying to figure out how to import a mesh to voxel sculpt it. I am getting the mesh in but it's tiny. I can get a scaler but nothing works, it doesn't scale the object up.

I would have to use a .03 on some settings to not obliterate the object with a .125 brush. ;O

That snake thing is wickedly cool. Lovely stuff.

Take care of the family.

Robert

[philnolan3d]

Hope this helps.

http://screencast.com/t/gXpdEvPi

[Bo Atkinson]

I'm seriously planning some time to learn 3DC and very much appreciate the successes posted here, especially our super-developer, Andrew. Kudos and thanks, always.

Additive-sculpting and additive-framework processes: This is what i attempt in real life concrete, ferrocement and various other materials. Easy solutions in real life are parallel surfaces and subdivision, but both of these seem very difficult to control in non-linear, compound-curved 3D. <a href="http://www.midcoast.com/~bo/index.html" target="_blank">http://www.midcoast.com/~bo/index.html</a>

My first effort will be the honey-comb dome seen in first picture... Not just any honey comb, but rather one which reflects the true, cementitious, molding-method (along with my ringed reinforcement methods). Additive voxels sound great to me, after all iron has cubically arrayed atoms, (as far as voxel cubes are concerned). I love the plans to accept hi & lo res profiles for brushes. However, may i ask: Is there any hope of at least tracing over a photo in background, while navigating with connexion device-- Live video as trace-source is another reason i seek this feature (instead of ordinary underlay) . For years i begged formZ to include a transparent background in the window, (or semi transparent background). Currently on the Mac, i use Haxies, (except that OSX has bloated the GUI interface- so my Haxie only won't work in 10.5, only works in 10.4).

[Andrew Shpagin]

Thanks for feedback and bugreports. I am fixing bugs now. Seems to be much small animals in code...

Bo, nice application of 3D in real life!

Do you mean showing some background picture for reference?

[Bo Atkinson]

Why not some sort of paid Alpha-Beta version? (With import-export)... Where eventual release will be a small upgrade price?... Also Why not subdivide huge features into add-on, pay as you go pluggins or scripts. In this scenario, such payments should compliment inspiration and progress.

My personal focus would be on production of complex geometry, faceting and structural aspects. I already have invested in an expensive ap for rendering and animation (formZ). OGL or such is good enough, IMHO. I respect the gamers interests and possibly this focus would win most payers. Yet at least it could be better verified, what is most wanted.

[Bo Atkinson]

Bo, nice application of 3D in real life!

Do you mean showing some background picture for reference?

Yes sir