Basic High-to-Lowpoly workflow

[vivi]

Hey guys,

my name is VITO and I am a NEWBIE in 3D Coat. I was downloading the demo because I am looking for a solution to make roots. I am talking about many roots...to be precise..I am currently working on a short movie. The enviorment is basically full of fantasy trees and huge roots which seem to have grown by a magic force. Now those roots are actually one of many challenges we are taking with our short movie.

If you are curious watch our production blog at www.watersoul3d.com

We are a small team at the moment but if u fancy helping out, I would appreciate your help.

So back to the topic (>_<)

Basically I wanna make an animatic of the whole short movie. 15 minutes to be precise.

This should be done using lowpoly sets to layout a basic version the world of "Water Soul"

Color and specular texture is not necessary, but for now I just wanna know how to get the complete thang!

I used Z-brush until now, but I wanna switch to 3D coat.

So what I need is : In Z-brush I can model an object, then export a lowpoly version and calculate the normal to get all my details.

In 3D Coat...I can only use Auto-Retopo? The problem here is that if I have roots..many roots...also tiny ones,after I Retopo, those fine roots or tips, are lost.

How can I get a lowpoly version of my Voxel object with the normal map creating all the details I have in the high resolution version?

If someone has an advice, I really would appreciate!

Thanks for now!

VITO

[Psmith]

Vito:

If you have a bunch of existing models of tree roots and all you want to do is paint some displaced detail on them - and then export the normal or displacement map for your details, you can simply "Import for Microvertex Painting" or for Ptex.

If you need large mesh displacements in addition to a good displacement or normal map, use the first option above. If, on the other hand, you are going to have some close-up shots of the fine details on a particular tree root, use Ptex.

By using your existing models that contain the root tips, you lose nothing. Importing these models into the Voxel Room for detailing may cause some loss, as you noted.

Greg Smith

[vivi]

Hey Greg,

thanks for your respond.

Well the thing is that I am creating the roots in 3D coat! I don't import it from a different software.

I already create them using, mucles and spikes etc.

Is there a way to get a low resolution mesh of it?

vito

Vito:

If you have a bunch of existing models of tree roots and all you want to do is paint some displaced detail on them - and then export the normal or displacement map for your details, you can simply "Import for Microvertex Painting" or for Ptex.

If you need large mesh displacements in addition to a good displacement or normal map, use the first option above. If, on the other hand, you are going to have some close-up shots of the fine details on a particular tree root, use Ptex.

By using your existing models that contain the root tips, you lose nothing. Importing these models into the Voxel Room for detailing may cause some loss, as you noted.

Greg Smith

[Psmith]

Vito:

Fine points on long appendages seem to be a problem for the AUTOPO algorithm. A simple workaround is to run the routine with a very low number for the "Approximate Polycount" in the wizard, and draw "slices" as close to the end of each root tip as you can, knowing you are going to get the ends cut off.

Once the routine is finished and you merge your AUTOPO mesh into the scene, simply go to the Sculpt Room and use a combination of the "Move" tool and the "Smooth" tool to finish the root ends as you like. This is the simplest and fastest method, I believe. You also end up working with a fairly organized quad mesh.

The other method, which leaves you with a total triangle mesh is by sculpting in voxels at a very low resolution, (where smoothing is most effective), and, from the Voxel Room select "Export Object" - adjusting the reduction percentage to as high a number as you need. The result is a triangle mesh, but this might work fine for trees and tree roots. You can also get a much lower res mesh this way.

Greg Smith

[AbnRanger]

If the roots are indeed a key part of the story and need to be highly detailed, you're going to HAVE to make some sort of compromise, I'm afraid...as displacement mapping and normal mapping only get you so far. You may try to keep the large roots and medium-sized roots low-poly, but thin roots that jut out on their own will either need to be higher poly objects or utilize a hair/fur utility to take care of those. That is how I would try to handle it. You probably have some of your own ideas how to get around high poly counts, but I'm just throwing some ideas in the air to see if any of them might help.

Another option you may want to explore is using splines (you can make them be renderable), maybe see what options you have to taper the look, and a Noise modifier. Or you could also paint a few different thin roots in Photoshop and make cards from them, so you can instance those throughout the scene. for splines, you should be able to select the instances and adjust their seed in order to randomize the noise effect, independently. You can use a particle system to scatter them among the larger root models, by making them be the source emitter. What I would do from there is paint an area to distribute them where you want on the model. The following are some examples/options in 3ds Max, but you could use similar tools in other apps., such as Maya's PaintFX.

http://download.autodesk.com/us/3dsmax/2011features/modeling_texturing/3dsmax2011_nfv_model_textur_objectpaint_617x407.html

http://area.autodesk.com/tutorials/particle_leaves_fast_tree

http://area.autodesk.com/tutorials/painting_particles_in_a_scene

http://area.autodesk.com/tutorials/pflow_for_creating_a_grass_land

http://area.autodesk.com/tutorials/paint_hair_growth_areas_with_vertex_paint

Another feasible, low-rent option would be to paint them in at the post stage....depending on the shot. Combustion, Toxic (now Autodesk Composite), Fusion, and Softimage's built in compositer have good paint tools.