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Mesh is constantly lumpy, never smooth.


Cyrdion
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Surface. I dont know how to check how many it actually has but I cant get my head around "detailing" with live clay or whatever its called.

Here I was simply trying to block out the face and I noticed ive been spending an unnecessary amount of time for a simple blocking of the lips. Coming from zbrush, id just start low then subdivide untill I get a nice smooth look. If I need some quick topo then I zremesh. Quick and easy.

Here in 3Dcoat it does not look like I can just quick retopo it and then continue to sculpt on it because of rooms. So I went lo poly, made a base that was relatively smooth, then tried adding details.

Im constantly having to mess with the detail slider and the clean tool. Its pretty frustrating to be honest. I have yet to get a clean smooth surface. It seems more technical.

I cranked up the detail further in the pic, trying to get some smoothness however then the surrounding area doesnt smooth evenly. So then im stuck. 

Am I supposed to ignore live clay and sculpt as I would in zbrush? 

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So you're saying I should do lips in voxels? Im assuming im going to have to raise the resolution of the voxels to get a decent pair of lips?

When exactly am I supposed to use live sculpt then if at all? 

It would be great to see a character from start to finish in a tutorial somewhere. It seems impossible at the moment to get any creases done like I can in zbrush.

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When you have varying levels of subdivision on the same mesh, you're naturally going to get non-uniform if not sometimes lumpy results. Do that with a mesh in your preferred 3D app, like Maya, Max, C4D, Modo, Blender, etc....and you'll notice a difference, there, as well. In general terms, the key to using LiveClay or dynamic tessellation, is to apply a uniform amount in a given area, and try to relax the geo along boundaries, so there is a smooth transition between low subdivided areas and highly subdivided parts. There are some exceptions to this, though, when creating wrinkles or sharp creases, but you need to leave the high detail work last...not early on. Even in ZBrush, you can get yourself in a little bit of a jam if you try to do high detail in the early to intermediate stages of a sculpt.

You can use the PINCH brush (which has no dynamic subdivision capabilities) for wrinkles and creases, too, but you still don't want to get lured into the bad habit of adding details early in a sculpt

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I usually spot-subdivide in zbrush around the lips. I think the smooth algorithm in there works better or something because even with a difference like that, its NEVER lumpy unless its crazy high but I never go that high. Although i do use a mix of dynamic trim and smoothing. I was assuming the lumps were from using tris.

If I can get around this I'd love to use 3Dcoat but its just simply not clicking. Using live clay even at low detail always leaves lumps along the transitions and inside. Its like I cant get a middle ground, its either too low res or too high and lumpy. Its frustrating. Relaxing seems to undo the detail I attempt to add. Ill give it another shot, maybe it will click.

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That actually did help. Now im wondering though what is the benefit of using live clay instead of subdividing the entire model evenly? If I use live clay, I have to do extra work on smoothing and correcting the detail it seems. What would be the benefit if Im putting in more time fighting the program instead of sculpting art?

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1 hour ago, Cyrdion said:

That actually did help. Now im wondering though what is the benefit of using live clay instead of subdividing the entire model evenly? If I use live clay, I have to do extra work on smoothing and correcting the detail it seems. What would be the benefit if Im putting in more time fighting the program instead of sculpting art?

As mentioned in the video, you don't have to go through all those steps if you are cognizant of the proper workflow/usage of the tools. All that supposed "fighting" with the application was actually cleaning up a mess (created to demonstrate the issue of lumpiness that some users complain about). The more you get comfortable with the tools/brushes, the easier it will be for you. A person brand new to ZBrush could also find themselves frustrated with the workflow until they know how to properly use the tools.

In general, LiveClay can be used early, but it's not a good idea/practice, if you are still blocking out forms. So, use a more uniformly distributed mesh until you have reached the final stages of a sculpt, where you start adding details. You can break this rule of thumb in some cases, like the creases of the lips, but using the Pinch brush in Surface mode could do this easily without dynamic tessellation, as it pulls the surrounding geometry closer. If you want to make the mesh uniform after using LiveClay, hit the ENTER key (that will voxelize it and switch back to Surface mode on the fly). That is sort of like using Dynamesh in ZBrush. So would be switching the layer to Voxel mode. But the sculpting tools in Surface mode are much better than the Voxel brushes.

If you want to keep the dynamic tessellation, it's just a good practice to smooth the transition between the low poly and high poly, knowing that you are going to later sculpt across the two. That's not fighting with the app. That's just using the tools smartly.

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20 hours ago, Cyrdion said:

It gets frustrating but I'll soldier on until my trials up. I see great potential in 3Dcoat. The sculpting is the one gate thats keeping me from using this and possibly suggesting it in the workplace. Thanks for the help thus far.

Use Surface mode for Sculpting and use the Presets, because many of the brushes have been tuned to behave much like ZB brushes.

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