Problems with Vertexpaint

[Malo]

Hello.

As the Topic says, i have some problems with vertex paint.

1. I see at the startup it is possible to paint in vertex with high (displacement), but if i go from the voxel room into the paint room, i cant paint with high?

Did that only work if i export and reimport my actuall work again into 3d coat or is there a hidden button for that?

2. I have some trouble to pain only on high or low areas.

If i choose more/less on cavity and if i use a opacity of 200% i have to paint 5 or 6 times the same area to see the full effect of the color.

As far as i see on PPP i have 100% opacity and one stroke to see the full color.

Why is there so a huge difference?

3. I want to paint a modell with vertex color, but my modell have a to low resolution.

How could i subdivide my surface modell to get enough vertex points?

If i resample the surface model, i lost some details, if i change back to voxel i lost some details, too and get ugly artefacts on my lowpoly surface areas.

Would be nice if somebody could helps me with my problems.

Regards Malo

[AbnRanger]

Hello.

As the Topic says, i have some problems with vertex paint.

1. I see at the startup it is possible to paint in vertex with high (displacement), but if i go from the voxel room into the paint room, i cant paint with high?

Did that only work if i export and reimport my actuall work again into 3d coat or is there a hidden button for that?

2. I have some trouble to pain only on high or low areas.

If i choose more/less on cavity and if i use a opacity of 200% i have to paint 5 or 6 times the same area to see the full effect of the color.

As far as i see on PPP i have 100% opacity and one stroke to see the full color.

Why is there so a huge difference?

3. I want to paint a modell with vertex color, but my modell have a to low resolution.

How could i subdivide my surface modell to get enough vertex points?

If i resample the surface model, i lost some details, if i change back to voxel i lost some details, too and get ugly artefacts on my lowpoly surface areas.

Would be nice if somebody could helps me with my problems.

Regards Malo

Can you please post a screen shot of the areas where you are having problems (one with wireframe toggled on, so we can how dense the model is?)? We're trying to help blindfolded, otherwise.

[Malo]

Sure

Basic Surface Mode model with 2.5 Million polys

Switch to Voxel Mode with a new resolution of 10 Million polys

New resolution in Surface Mode with 7.5 Million polys.

As you see, i get in picture 2 and 3 some ugly artefacts, and the clean details on the seams of the cloth get nearly lost or they are to much deformed to give me the result as i have befor "subdividing".

Edited June 17, 2013 by Malo

[AbnRanger]

Sure

Basic Surface Mode model with 2.5 Million polys

wire1.jpg

Switch to Voxel Mode with a new resolution of 10 Million polys

wire2.jpg

New resolution in Surface Mode with 7.5 Million polys.

wire3.jpg

As you see, i get in picture 2 and 3 some ugly artefacts, and the clean details on the seams of the cloth get nearly lost or they are to much deformed to give me the result as i have befor "subdividing".

A couple of things...When you use LiveClay to dynamically subdivide the mesh in local areas, you typically do not want to switch back to Voxel Mode. Why? Because Voxel mode automatically remeshes the object with every stroke or operation and maintains uniform distribution of the polygons. So, you have to plan your workflow a bit. Dynamically subdividing in order to optimize the mesh and then Un-optimizing it (switching to Voxel mode or hitting the ENTER key in Surface mode...which will remesh with uniform distribution like voxel mode) makes no practical sense.....right?

There are times, even early on in a sculpt, where you may want to switch to LiveClay, just to use something like CreaseClay or other tools in the LC toolset, and then switch back to Voxels, without a huge penalty, but LiveClay was primarily developed to overcome the limitations of Voxels....limitations usually encountered only in the high to uber-high resolution stages of a sculpt. Therefore, it's best utilized at the final stages of a sculpt where there is little need to return to voxel mode.

You can clean those areas up with the TSmooth brush in the LiveClay toolset or choose Smooth All, and choose Tangent Smooth (set the levels up to 5-10) in the dialog. It won't alter the shape of mesh....just optimize it so that it's a very subtle smoothing effect. That's what you want in the areas where you have small details/crisp edges.

As for Vertex Paint. I can't tell what the problem is...can't see any setting in the UI to make any kind of determination....blindfolded again. I think it may be an issue that I noticed a few times early on. Not all shaders will show Vertex Paint. That clay shader is bad for not showing anything. Switch to the Pictmat Grey shader and you'll see your color.

[Malo]

I dont want to switch to Voxel. I want to paint from Surface Mode, this was only a test to bring the resolution up and try to keep the details.

It seems, there is no way to subdivide the model automaticly. I have to do it manuall, right?

PicMat dont solves the problems, too.

It is still not possible to paint with depth directly, sure reimport solved that, but why?

Painting with less/more in cavity works, if i use a bigger scale.

As far as i see, i have to be carefull with the CleanBrush if i want to paint with vertex.

[digman]

What we need for Surface Mode is a resampling algorithm that will add resolution but keep the polygon arrangement as close as possible to the existing layout of the polygons, basically a decimater but in reverse. Instead of decimating it adds polygons. We can do that manually now so I think an auto resampler would be possible.

The current resampling averages out the polygons structure, thus losing some details and causing some triangulated artifacts in surface mode. The current resampling works fine for voxel mode but is not good for surface mode using the LiveClay brushes.

Sor for now if you want to paint using vertex painting at a high enough polygon vextex count to get some quality painting, you just have to plan ahead and make sure you have enough polygon vertices without resampling. You also can manually increase the polygon count in specific areas through brushing by choosing in the top menu (Shift Action) / All Detail or Extra Detail. Set your depth to "0"

Hopefully Andrew will see the need for a specific resampler for surface mode separate from the voxel resample

Sometime this week I will put in a feature request.
--------------------------------------
There is no real depth painting in the paintroom when in surface mode. What I mean is when you switch from surface mode to the paint room without first creating your retopo mesh and merging to the paint room.

All depth in that situation must be sculpted in surface mode in the voxel room.

Painting real polygon depth or as it is called now (deep displacement from the new menu) is only available using Microvertex painting.

If I misunderstood your question about depth painting, forgive me.

The problem you are having with cavity painting could be related to one is PPP mode which is normal map based which is not based on vertex numbers and the other is surface mode vertex painting. I would try to increase the cavity scale when painting vertex painting to see if that helps but remember these are only suggestions...

[Malo]

Yes, that would be nicem to have such a resampler.

No, you understand me correctly.

But is there a way to go from Voxel Room into Paint Room to use Microvertex Painting, without export and reimport my work?

Yes ,the scale value helps me, in PPP i need 1 but for vertex paint i need 5 and more to get the same result.

That was a little bit confusing for me.

[AbnRanger]

I dont want to switch to Voxel. I want to paint from Surface Mode, this was only a test to bring the resolution up and try to keep the details.

It seems, there is no way to subdivide the model automaticly. I have to do it manuall, right?

PicMat dont solves the problems, too.

It is still not possible to paint with depth directly, sure reimport solved that, but why?

Painting with less/more in cavity works, if i use a bigger scale.

As far as i see, i have to be carefull with the CleanBrush if i want to paint with vertex.

This is mentioned in the video. You have color and spec channels to paint with in Vertex Paint. If you want depth, you will have to bake your model down to a lower poly, UV'ed mesh (in order to have a MAP to apply depth to). Quick question...Why would you paint depth while you still have the model in the sculpt room...to SCULPT depth? It's redundant for one thing. You already have the model an advanced sculpting environment. Plus, where would you use depth vertex maps? You know of any apps that support it?

Also, regarding the issue with adding more resolution...I can see some usefulness in what Digman suggested, but you have to think about workflow here. A lot of what you want to do isn't very practical, workflow-wise. That's why Digman suggested you plan ahead a bit. You don't want to "Optimize a mesh to sculpt extremely high levels of detail, only to step back down to a mode that is going to undo much of that (convert the local subdivision into uniform distribution). When you do, 3D Coat tries to inform you how much it will need to increase the resolution to try and keep the detail, but there will still be some level of detail lost. It's not the application's fault if we suddenly decide to step all over the floor we just painted, as it were.

When you start applying this localized subdivision, you should be at the stage where you have already add all the global resolution/subdivision you are going to...and now you use LiveClay to add the FINISHING touches.

[alvordr]

I believe 3DC already has the ability to add wireframe depth, as needed. You can see that in the first of the three screenshots Malo provided. If I recall correctly, this was one of the recently added features. Perhaps this feature needs to mature more. I agree that switching from Voxel to Surface and/or the other way should produce identical results.

Going to high-poly and down again is a technique I've seen used and used myself. You want to retain the high-level details but go down in levels to adjust major proportions, etc. However, you should be able to go back up in levels and not lose the majority of your high-level details. ZBrush does this, but even then it's not always perfect.

[AbnRanger]

I believe 3DC already has the ability to add wireframe depth, as needed. You can see that in the first of the three screenshots Malo provided. If I recall correctly, this was one of the recently added features. Perhaps this feature needs to mature more. I agree that switching from Voxel to Surface and/or the other way should produce identical results.

Going to high-poly and down again is a technique I've seen used and used myself. You want to retain the high-level details but go down in levels to adjust major proportions, etc. However, you should be able to go back up in levels and not lose the majority of your high-level details. ZBrush does this, but even then it's not always perfect.

There is no Depth Channel for Vertex Painting. Think about it guys. You use Displacement maps and Normal maps to mimic the look of the uber-dense mesh you have in the Voxel Room....so why would you try to sculpt on a normal map when you have the Real McCoy? Is something not registering here? You need normal and displacement maps on LOW POLY meshes...so that they look like the HIGH POLY version. I mean we are talking about missing hub caps on a Ferrari, so to speak.

[digman]

I believe 3DC already has the ability to add wireframe depth, as needed. You can see that in the first of the three screenshots Malo provided. If I recall correctly, this was one of the recently added features. Perhaps this feature needs to mature more. I agree that switching from Voxel to Surface and/or the other way should produce identical results.

Going to high-poly and down again is a technique I've seen used and used myself. You want to retain the high-level details but go down in levels to adjust major proportions, etc. However, you should be able to go back up in levels and not lose the majority of your high-level details. ZBrush does this, but even then it's not always perfect.

Have you used the downgrade option located in the layer's panel to reduce the resolution for adjusting major proportions but keeping the high level details in place when exiting out of proxy mode.

Two pictures shown, Location of the downgrade option and the settings for it under the voxel menu. It is not perfect either as it could use a little more optimizing to reduce a few smoothing issues when exiting proxy mode when in surface mode.

Voxel mode; It is best to use the reduce settings, You are returned to voxel mode after exiting proxy mode. If you choose the decimate settings when in voxel mode you will be returned to surface mode upon exiting proxy mode.

Surface mode, it best to use the decimate settings...

It is close as we get now for true sub-division surfaces like ZBrush but it works well for it's intended use. Plus a added feature is that you save that precious ram memory.

[AbnRanger]

And using the Decimate option, you can maintain the Vertex Paint appearance in the viewport. Using Reduce, you will not see your Vertex Paint in the viewport until you uncache the layer.

[digman]

@Malo

"But is there a way to go from Voxel Room into Paint Room to use Microvertex Painting, without export and reimport my work?"

Sure, Retopo the mesh in the retopo room, create your uv set or sets and merge to the paint room using "Merge into scene 'Microverts' from the Retopo menu.

The uv sets have to been well laid out. Displacement maps will revel bad uv layouts... Normal maps are a lot more forgiving...

AbnRanger, That is a good point about the vertex paint appearance being kept when using the decimate settings while in surface mode...

[Malo]

@AbnRanger

Why should i not paint into depth. With some custom Materials it should works very fine.

I was thinking that is a good feature. it is on the startup header.

See here

I dont think Andrew put some unneccessary stuff into that window.

Anyway, my problem is, i dont have looked ahead as you say, and now i am stuck. And i am here to find some help to solve my problems.

1. I have uvs and retopo it, but the baking causes problems from the beginning on, see here http://3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=14568 scroll a little bit down.

Snap to outer face solved the most problems but the details dont get baked out realy clear. 8k texture size is to low, maybe with 16k it would work but this is ridiculous

2. I was thinking i use the lowpoly for the bake option from the Textures Tab.

And i want to use now vertex paint.

3. I see, i cant subdivide my model, with out lost my details, see first post, to get the high resolution that i need.

I see i could use Mikrovertex to paint, but that wont works until i export and reimport my model, see first post.

Now i know it, thanks to digman. I have to test it.

After all of my "dont looking ahead", i have to go now a different way, away from the usual workflow, or start everything new from scratch.

I choose the different way, because i am running out of time if i start from zero.

@All

Many thanks for the help.

[alvordr]

@digman,

Yes, I use the downgrade option almost every time I use 3DC. I almost never go out of Voxel mode, however. For my work, it has been completely fine. I wasn't suggesting it's in a desirable state, otherwise. The only time I use Surface mode is when I want to use a method or brush that is specific to it, or to use T-Smooth.

Edited June 18, 2013 by alvordr

[Tony Nemo]

@digman,

Yes, I use the downgrade option almost every time I use 3DC. I almost never go out of Voxel mode, however. For my work, it has been completely fine. I wasn't suggesting it's in a desirable state, otherwise. The only time I use Surface mode is when I want to use a method or brush that is specific to it, or to use T-Smooth.

Methinks you use Zbrush instead of Surface mode. Re: your recommendation to ErichSchriner to keep his zbrush licence in another thread.

Edited June 18, 2013 by Tony Nemo

[alvordr]

I just said I use Voxel mode. ZBrush doesn't have that. Most of my work has been done in 3DC for the past few months. ...and yes, I recommended he keep licenses for both ZBrush and 3DC.