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3D-Coat 3.3 updates thread


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Ok, here's the thing, I think I am, because I just checked the settings, under compatibility, and it appears to have the use compatibility for vista sp 2 checked, and the run as admin checked, but I think I also told it to update these settings for all users, since they are checked, but now greyed out.. Hope this helps what you were thinking..

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Oops, your post disappeared?

Anyway, it's like a case dealing with your 3DC options.xml file. I've had similar (and not so similar) issues pop up because of a corrupted options.xml file, simply deleting the file and opening 3DC again will create a clean new options.xml. So it's probably not the theme, but likely the aforementioned problem, since the theme is linked to the options.xml. (That's a whole lot of re-typing of options.xml, lol)

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Ok, here's the thing, I think I am, because I just checked the settings, under compatibility, and it appears to have the use compatibility for vista sp 2 checked, and the run as admin checked, but I think I also told it to update these settings for all users, since they are checked, but now greyed out.. Hope this helps what you were thinking..

When you start it up, just right click>Start as Admin (or whatever it is, on XP right now so I can't recall precisely).

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exactly.. heheheh Now you knew the nightmare I was dealing with.. heheh I will try that fix also just to be sure.. I wonder could this also be the issue with my model not showing up at all inside voxel tab? Because that wierd bug is happening also.. But I'm adding that topic to the voxel sculpting bugs forum, and I moved the other bug to semi-correct forum thats why it disappeared.. Please let me know when you see that error listed in the voxel bugs forum if it is related to the same issue.. Thanks for the help Phil..

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Out of curiosity, are you running 3DC as Admin?

For me fixed. I uninstalled the driver of the tablet, installed the latest driver. Good to go.

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For me fixed. I uninstalled the driver of the tablet, installed the latest driver. Good to go.

Me too dude, I just removed the posts in here that said that I got it fixed, so I wouldn't clutter up the forum.. but yea, Geo's tips about deleting options.xml and setting it to run as admin only, I removed the compat. for vista sp2, since it wasn't needed, good to go! Just make sure your not using a theme or options that is inside Program files folders, preferably My Documents\MySome3DCoat subfolder, if you still notice problems, shutdown 3dc, delete options.xml as geo stated, then restart and 3dc will recreate it, then select your theme, and the only extra thing I did, was set the pressure levels to 1024, sensitivity to .86, and good to go! I'll leave this here, just in case, to help some others out, or until Geo or Phil think word has gotten around enough, and removes it.. *NOTE* Phil / Geo if you think it would be better somewhere else, tell me, and I'll move it.. Only reason I left it here, is I only noticed this after the update, which must have corrupted my options somehow. BTW: Thanks again for the help guys.. I am once again Super D Duper Happy!

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Updated to 3.3.13 (Win only, Mac+Linux - very soon)

Changes:

- Long-standing request implemented - painting over disconnected objects. You may choose the style of picking - see http://bit.ly/99A93S http://bit.ly/aKLRNk http://bit.ly/9pJsxe

- Vox tree + shaders will be accessible from the retopo room for convenience.

- Clone & Clone with symmetry will clone child objects too.

- I improved vertex picking in retopo room so that it will be much easier to pick desired vertex to be tweaked. Now it picks closest vertex inside pen radius + picks vertices that are outside the reference mesh.

- I found and fixed major snapping/baking problem to voxel surafce in surface mode.

- Edit projection/layers in external editor instability fixed.

- Solved the applink issue mentioned there - http://bit.ly/bwWPho

- Desaturate/Darken/... etc in paint room will respect mask.

- EXR/32 bit TIFF padding problem fixd - http://bit.ly/aBNKEE

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It's very handy having the Vox Tree in the Retopo room.

Yeah, the shaders are helpful too, as you can choose a semi-transparent shader to see where your vertices are (when they are beneath the voxel surface). All this make it easier to clean up trouble spots when Relaxing or Subdividing the mesh.

I think, especially for new users, that there should be an Auto-Retopo button in the tool pallet (under the Create section), as well as "Paint Details" button. That way all the tools for the job are easily found and in one logical location. Ultimately, it would be preferable to have a "Paint Details" button link to the Surface freeze tool without being sent to the Voxel Room...so users aren't having to bounce back and forth between rooms. Let the user do everything Retopo-related....in the Retopo room.

It could be a bit of a turn off, for some trial testers and interested studios, to see that you have to use different tools scattered in different rooms/locations for one task. Allowing the Vox Tree panel in the Retopo Room narrows it down to having to do that only once, thus far. So, that's good progress anyway.

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Wow, new retopo seems faster? The edgeloops are surprisingly good on a very soft-featured female head as well.

I'd like to see a way to paint multiple density colours like UVMaster in Zbrush. I was hoping that changing the slider for the density factor would give me a different colour to paint with but it simply re-maps the value to the black painted areas (btw density of 0 gives an interesting 'minimum polys here please' option).

Great work Andrew!

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Thanks for the update Andrew! Can't wait to test it.

A couple things related to the update. Can we have the VoxTree and Shaders palettes in the Render room also? And sculpting over multiple vox objects would be useful too.

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Alrighty,

Great work andrew, just finished a bout of testing last night, I was using and abusing the voxels and scraping and carving my way around, trying to re-implement the J - R Letters, out of Simple Cube Object Primitives I added, then bent backwards, I then used the carve tool to trace my outline around the cube, then got into it, once I figured out, which were the best paint tools to use, to allow you to take larger chunks out at a time the process went rather quickly.. I'm impressed with the Speed of it all Andrew..

It does a great job, removing, and then smoothing or fixing up the edges on the fly, and it manages to do this quick enough that it can almost keep up with your moving brush tool, that is unheard of, I know with CB Model Pro, Molding a blob Model, it keeps adj. the surface even after your done with the surface, you can C long after like little nano bots smoothing out and fixing your faces, 3D Coat does it faster, just slower than your paint tool moving and that's w/o low res txts. selected, and that's w/ hires modes, w/ linear texture filtering etc.. One req. / quest. tho, I tried to follow Geo, Phil's suggestions about using the Merge tool to get my mod. into the vox room. I Imported my model in for ReTopo as it's connected with the vox. room, I Thought this might work to use vox. room, 3DCoat Puked on it Badly, freezing / (not responding) under win 7, 3D Coat shutdown, I mean the win. disappeared.. I'm not sure if my obj model has too many faces, subdivided, UV Auto-Smooth'd, Tex. was 2048x2048, some reason it didn't like it... There's a New Bug Report, back to my question, where is this Merge Tool inside the Voxel tab? or do they mean select Merge from the File Menu while inside the Voxel Tab??? Sorry 2 B such a newb on this part, trying to avoid multiple poly copies in the newly saved OBJ file when I'm done sculpting / adding voxels / re-painting it..

Thanks in advance..

BTW: Andrew you never Cease to amaze, the updates keep coming, and 3D Coat is somehow getting faster, even with more features, I Love it, BTW: I'm doing my part talking to others on other sites about how amazing 3D Coat is, including 3D Game Studio, Paul Jr. Designs facebook page, the People at P-Active, and of course through my product review of my Pen Tablet monitor at Amazon, and basically with every 3D Artist I talk to on the Fragmotion 3D and MS3D, CB Model Pro Beta Tester Website.. To Be Honest, Andrew, it is the speed that you manage to update 3D Coat, and the quality of the updates, most people #1. Don't update this fast, and #2 if they do, the updates are like oh I changed a word on the main menu to this, not great feature enhancements, or new features entirely ?!? What I'm saying is Awesome Good Job, Keep it Up Bubba!

Totally Impressed,

StOrM3 aka Ken

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Hey guys, is it just me or do you still feel the need to use UVLayout just because it can smooth out the edges of the UV islands? In 3DCoat's UV room you can use the brush tool + SHIFT key to smooth out the tension of the UVs, but only inside the island or selection itself. You can never smooth out the island edges algorithmically, only manually, which is tedious and a serious bummer.

Or am I missing something?

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Hey guys, is it just me or do you still feel the need to use UVLayout just because it can smooth out the edges of the UV islands? In 3DCoat's UV room you can use the brush tool + SHIFT key to smooth out the tension of the UVs, but only inside the island or selection itself. You can never smooth out the island edges algorithmically, only manually, which is tedious and a serious bummer.

Or am I missing something?

When you merge into the painting room there are options to smooth the edges of the islands.

2010-08-23_1328.png

You may also find my post in this thread helpful:

http://www.3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=5855&pid=48090&st=0entry48090

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The only time I find it necessary to use the UV tools is when the model was exported from Lightwave itself, which creates an extra set of faces Just inside one of the cube sides when you create a cube, hidden but 3dcoat tries to texture them, this caused me headaches, so I stopped using L.W., similar things happen when I export vert/face modeled objects from fragmotion 3d, forget to turn off 2 sided faces, also if I don't weld all the verts, weld all doesn't fix it, even using weld verts from 3dCoat import OBJ. I Only Manually UV Edit, when painting and a face messes up, letting me know that the UV of the face, is NOT as it should be. I go into UV, and select: -add clusters(lft menu), -islands(top opt.), then click the face, -upd. Islands, -unwrap, -Apply UV Set -yes I understand, viola the face is fixed, and now it paints works perfectly. I have ran across a few models, I was unable to fix no matter how much I tweaked. I can never select the verts / faces that I need to del. / upd., even if I follow the hints closely.. Ex. is the 2 faces from the L.W. cube model, I wanted to del. the extra 2 faces, even though I managed to select & hide the outer faces, I still could not select the inner 2 bad faces, even with outer faces hid, while I tried to click on the inner ones it selected the hid outer ones.. So I tried editing the UV's, hitting del. on the selected bad face, nogo, so then I looked at all options on left menu, none seemed as a delete option, I selected a few which were wrong, like clear, I still couldn't manage to del. the faces from the model, so I just redo my model, using other tech., other programs, welding all verts, no extra faces, I also select: remove all orphans, save a *.ugh frag3d backup file for future adjustments, export the object, hold my breath, cross my fingers, import the new model, usually it works.

Sometimes I have to do some wierd stuff, export the obj file from 3d coat, use U3D to adjust the UV's, deleting extra faces etc.. save it, re-import into 3DC, finally paint it. The bucket fill tool, Modulation fill's, Allow you to create custom fills, and even use them in other tools like paint. It is a really good tool.

I hope this information helps users both new / pro's, as well as gives Andrew some insight into how users are using 3DCoat and some of the issues causing tough problems.. Also, I'm glad to see Andrew fixed the Paint.Net stuff, as I had been working with the psd plugin author of paint.net to fix the issues, whenever you would select the rle-compression option in the psd file save dialog of paint.net, is when I noticed all the crashes happening between paint.net and 3d coat, eventually paint.net was unable to read the psd files, and 3d coat was telling me their was a problem with the format.. That was before I'm going to heavily test the fixes Andrew stated he did for Paint.Net support today, as I make use of Edit Projections in External Editor Quite often, mostly because I can't figure out how to draw a straight line in 3dCoat.. Ok, I'm off to do some more testing, I hope this helps MadDox understand about the UV mapping, and Andrew alike..

Thanks,

StOrM3

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When you merge into the painting room there are options to smooth the edges of the islands.

2010-08-23_1328.png

You may also find my post in this thread helpful:

http://www.3d-coat.c...t=0entry48090

That's good and all, but not being able to brush smooth UV island edges is a real PITA. It would be nice to have the option to do so.

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In my 8 years of using LW I can't say I've ever heard of it creating a set of hidden faces. You cold try hitting M (merge points) and Shift+I (merge co-planar polys) before exporting.

Thank you for the tips, it's LW 9.3, if that helps. I will try your suggestions tho.. I'm not an LW Pro or anything, I bought it at one of those consignment stores where people donate stuff, and I found it in a pile of disks and CD's, and I've had it for a while, and finally decided to install it and give it a go.. Your tips are great stuff, thanks Phil.. I have more to tell ya, but not here, as I'm already off topic too much in this msg.. I'll pm you later.

Thanks

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That's good and all, but not being able to brush smooth UV island edges is a real PITA. It would be nice to have the option to do so.

Glad that you got my point, Geo. Anyone that has ever used UVlayout knows exactly what I was talking about, and considering how 3DCoat exceeds UVLayout in most aspects (usability, stress feedback, relaxing, etc) it's AWESOME that Andrew has just - as in 5-minutes ago, according to his twitter - added this feature to its suite :drinks:

AndrewShpagin: It will be possible to smooth UV islands edges in UV room in brush mode.

Go Andrew go!! :yahoo:

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Hello there,

just downloaded 3D Coat from the download page, and wanted to claim that the ptex export isn't working, but than I realized that it's not the latest build which I have. Why the current build is only accessible through the forum is another point, but more urgent I need to discuss the problem I have now with the .ptx export. 3D Coat crashes whenever I try to export the texture as .ptx.

BUILD:

3D-COAT 3.3.13(CUDA)(GL64)(trial)

OS:

Win7 x64

BUG DESCRIPTION:

Crashes before exporting .ptx file

STEPS TO REPRODUCE:

I've imported creature.obj for ptex painting from the samples folder, and applied some color to it. Then under the Textures menu I chose Export->Color to Ptx. Then it crashes.

Regards

Lorenz

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Voxel performance on OSX seems to have decreased significantly with the new build. Loaded up my old power armor sculpt to try to auto-quadrangulate and it was incredibly sluggish. This is on a new i7 imac with 8 gigs of ram and a better vid card than the 3 yr old imac I did the sculpt on originally. Wondering if this has anything to do with the new graphics update apple released a week ago, just not playing nice with 3dc. Down rez-ing all the voxel layers helps, but it has also proved to be unstable doing any scene management. Crashed several times just trying to optimize my scene for smoother display updates. Also, trying to retopo one voxel layer in particular generated an empty mesh layer. Others seemed fine. I'm only moving the pieces over to zbrush anyway since I much prefer to detail and sculpt there in general. 3dc is still largely only a block out solution for me when it comes to sculpting though. The rest of it is evolving nicely. Would still love to see some way to manage and group paint layers though - especially when dealing with multiple objects, and importing images. Would be nice if the option were there to name layers automatically after the imported image. It's a real pain to manage multiple normal, diffuse, spec and AO maps, in addition to the extra layers for each I often generate.

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That's good and all, but not being able to brush smooth UV island edges is a real PITA. It would be nice to have the option to do so.

May I ask some question? In which kind of way for what tasks this feature could be helpful? (please write detailed answer not just general phrases like "to simplify uv editing process")

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