Creating a good UV layout is important when texturing your models. But many times, trying to optimize your model to include everything on one map can create problems with low resolution and the inability to get an appropriate amount of detail on every area of the model. Breaking apart our UVs and textures into multiple texture tiles helps to alleviate this issue. In this course we'll take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of using a multi-tile workflow. We'll also explore the ways that different applications including ZBrush, Maya, 3ds Max, Mudbox, and MARI deal with multiple texture tiles. We'll also talk a lot about the naming conventions of each application and how those names correspond to the placement of the tiles. Once we're done, you'll have a good understanding of what multi-tile texturing is and how you can start to use it in your own projects.

ZBrush has always been a great tool for concepting characters and models and creating highly detailed sculpts. The materials, lighting, and rendering capabilities have also been continually enhanced and we can now get some great final images right out of ZBrush. One important thing that was still difficult to achieve in ZBrush was hair or fur. Many of the characters you create will require some kind of hair or fur to really be finished. FiberMesh, added in ZBrush 4R2b is a great solution. In this course we'll look at the basics of working with FiberMesh as well as a number of different scenarios in which it could be used. We'll talk about creating grass and trees, fur, and different varieties of hair, and we'll go over many of the available grooming brushes. There's no substitute for getting in there and playing with it yourself, but at the end of this tutorial, you'll have a much better idea of what you can do and how to go about getting the results you need for your custom creation.

This tutorial was designed to evolve your workflows, and give you some concepts to keep in mind as you paint and render your creatures in ZBrush. The objectives for this fast-pace tutorial include looking at several updated workflows and techniques for quickly painting your models and adding hair, fur, and feathers. We won't be going step by step, but rather talk in broader terms about some of the tools and methods you can use and what options you have for dealing with some of the issues that may arise. It is recommended you have experience using ZBrush as we cover a lot of information in a shorter span of time. If you’re an artist new to ZBrush the Beginner's Guide courses are a perfect place to start. From there you can check out any of the intermediate step-by-step, project-based tutorials that will take you through the entire process.

In this series of lessons we'll use ZBrush's powerful materials and painting tools to add color and texture to our female hero model. We'll start by adding simple materials to some of the clothing and accessories and look at how we can customize those materials. We'll talk about the importance of adding color variation in getting realistic results as we paint the different articles of clothing for our character. We'll also learn to isolate different polygroups for painting and look at adding dirt and grime. We'll paint and sculpt together to add detail to the model and talk about using UV layouts and texture files to help us finish the clothing. We'll use Spotlight to paint through photographs in order to texture the face, arms, and abdomen. We'll go step by step through the process of texturing our female character so that by the end of this tutorial, you'll have a painted model, but you'll also have the knowledge you need to begin texturing your own ZBrush creations.

The focus of this tutorial will be the creation of the character maquette entirely within ZBrush, with goal of creating a great looking rendered still as an and product. It is intended as an overall introduction to many of the tools within ZBrush which make the creation and output of this kind of illustration possible. The Image you see above was sculpted, textured and rendered in a single 9 hour day using these techniques.

When using the increasingly complex ZBrush models you create in other applications, it becomes very important to be able export the different map types efficiently. In this series of lessons we will explore the use of the Multi Map Exporter plugin to speed up our map creation workflow. We will start by looking at installing the plugin and explore the map types and options available within the Multi Map Exporter. We will then look at how to export maps for single and multiple subtools, including color textures, ambient occlusion maps, displacement maps, normals maps and cavity maps. We will also cover how the plugin will allow you to export your geometry. We will finish up by looking at one of the most useful features of the plugin, the ability to export merged maps over multiple subtools. In the end, you will have a much better idea of how you can integrate this powerful plugin into your ZBrush workflow.

When building 3D assets, the ability of your computer to manipulate those objects is limited, especially when dealing with very high resolution meshes. Because of this, we use 2D images, like normal maps, to simulate the high resolution detail in a way that we can more easily use. In this course, we will build a sword from scratch in CINEMA 4D. Once the base geometry is modeled, we will completely sculpt and paint the sword in ZBrush using a variety of techniques. To finish up, we will generate maps for the color and sculpted detail and use GoZ to quickly transfer all of the data back to CINEMA 4D. When you are done, you will have a better understanding of the workflow involved in building and sculpting high resolution props and set pieces with CINEMA 4D and Zbrush and creating useable assets from them.

ZBrush has been a powerful texturing tool for several years, giving us the ability to paint very quickly and intuitively directly on our models. With the addition of Spotlight in ZBrush 4, we can project existing textures onto our models in a very user friendly way that will get us great results in a matter of minutes. We will begin our project by importing our reference images and learning to save them out as a Spotlight that we can reuse over and over. From there, we will learn to adjust aspects of our images like hue and saturation before painting with them. We will also learn to move parts of our images around to better match with the underlying geometry. We will also cover techniques for filling gaps on the model to blend in areas that we may not have reference of. We will finish up by using LightBox to download any additional images we might need and incorporate those into our existing Spotlight. Once you are done, you will be able use Spotlight to very quickly paint your characters or other models using existing images.

ZBrush is a great tool for putting together characters. You can create base geometry, sculpt and paint your meshes, build accessories and clothing, and work seamlessly between other applications. In this course, we'll go through the process of building up a high resolution character from start to finish using ZBrush as our main application. We'll explore the use of zSpheres in building out our base mesh. We'll use GoZ to quickly take geometry between ZBrush and Maya, although the methods used will apply to other applications as well. We'll also use a bit of Photoshop to edit and create some texture maps we can use in ZBrush to add sculpt and color detail. If you're new to ZBrush, I encourage you to first check out the introductory courses, as well as the courses on some of the new features in ZBrush 4 like Shadowbox and Spotlight. We're going to cover a lot of ground and, in the end, you'll have a finished character, along with the tools you need to create your own high resolution character models.

In this course, we'll go through the process of using Maya and ZBrush to convert a high resolution, sculpted and painted character into a low resolution game-type mesh that can be rigged and animated. We'll start by using Decimation Master to reduce the resolution of our model drastically while retaining much of the visual detail. Once we're in Maya, we'll build low resolution geometry around these detailed meshes to capture the important shapes of the character. We'll create uv layouts for the low resolution pieces and finally extract the color and sculpted detail from our high resolution pieces onto the new mesh. In the end we'll have taken a model of 20 million polygons down to a very useable 8-10k. Once you're done, you'll be able to use the workflow to transfer and convert your own high resolution characters into a more useable state.

Spotlights are a great tool for organizing and optimizing our texture painting workflow in ZBrush. In this tutorial, we'll get a good basic knowledge of working with Spotlight in ZBrush. We'll talk about loading images, organizing them within a Spotlight, modifying them, and using them to paint onto our models.

The UV Master is a Pixologic-developed plug-in, which allows us to effortlessly create unwrapped UVs for our characters within ZBrush. By using this plug-in, the entire UV layout process can be accomplished in a matter of minutes, allowing us to dedicate more time to the sculpting and texturing of our characters in ZBrush. During this course, we will teach you everything you need to start using the UV Master, including the use of control painting to define UV seams, using density maps to control UV spacing, saving and loading control maps, and several other innovative features. Along the way, we will also make you aware of some common issues and complications that you may run into when using the UV Master, as well as how you can usually work around them.

In this course we'll go through the process of building a detailed 3d battle axe, complete with normal maps and textures, using both 3ds Max and ZBrush. Throughout the training, we'll illustrate some of the ways you can use these packages together. We'll start by creating the base axe geometry from scratch in 3ds Max. We'll then completely sculpt and paint the axe in ZBrush using a variety of techniques. To finish up, we'll generate maps for the color and sculpted detail and reapply those in 3ds Max. In the end, you'll have a better understanding of the workflow of building and sculpting high resolution props and set pieces with 3ds Max and ZBrush and creating usable assets from them.

When working with digital assets, the ability of your computer to manipulate those assets is limited, especially when dealing with very high resolution meshes. For this reason, we use things like normal maps to simulate the high resolution detail in a way that we can more easily use. In this course, we'll use a weathered battle hammer as an example to illustrate some of the ways you can use Maya and ZBrush together to build and sculpt high resolution props and set pieces and create usable assets. After building the base geometry and laying out UVs in Maya, we'll go through the process of sculpting and texturing the hammer in ZBrush. We'll finish up by applying all of that detail back in Maya to create a high quality, usable prop.

Over the tutorial, we will learn how to easily create seamless, distortion-free textures for complex characters using ZBrush. Traditionally, using a series of photographic references to create seamless textures for our 3D characters has been a difficult, time-consuming process. However, ZBrush has several features that will allow us to create complex, UV-based textures with just a few mouse clicks. We will use the ZBrush Projection Master to quickly warp our photographic reference images to perfectly fit our 3D character, and project the reference images onto the mesh. Once our textures have been generated, we will fix any texture seams, resulting in a single texture created from multiple photographic reference images. Through the tutorial, we will see how ZBrush can be used for much more than just 3D sculpting. By using ZBrush as a texturing application, we will be able to create complex, UV-based textures with very little effort.

Popular highlights include: Composition and Layout; Working from Sketch; Creating ZSphere Base; Adaptive Skins; Character Posing; Re-working Topology; Quick Shaping the Model; Character Interaction; Adding Multiple Pieces with ZSpheres; Appending Subtools; Adding Temporary Materials; Custom Alphas and Textures; Exaggerating Features for Appeal; Creating UVs in ZBrush; Polypainting; Converting Polypaints to Texture Maps; Exporting Displacement Maps; Exporting Normal Maps; Exporting Geometry from ZBrush; Importing Geometry into Maya; 3-point Lighting Setup; Camera Placement; Subsurface Scattering Effects; Approximations for High-quality Displacement; Using Final Gather with Subsurface Scattering; Adjusting Render Stats of Objects; Rendering Scenes in Multiple Passes; Outputting Color, Occlusion, and Depth Passes; Compositing Multiple Passes with Photoshop; Depth-of-field Effects to Final Render.

Popular highlights include: Setting up base materials in ZBrush; Filling Subtools with Color; Painting Illuminated Panels; Painting with Symmetry; Isolating Portions of Subtools; Working with Polygroups; Cavity Masks to Emphasize Detail; Painting Wear into Armor; Adding Color Variation; Layering Color and Detail for Skin; Blending Textural Detail with Alphas; PolyPainting Techniques; Photoshop Integration with ZApplink; Cloning Photographic Detail; Painting Scarring and Decay; Converting PolyPaint Colors to Texture Maps; Painting with Projection Master; Using Cavity Maps as Texture Guides; Editing Textures in Photoshop; Assembling Textures in Photoshop; Painting Specular Maps in ZBrush.

Popular highlights include: Understanding ZBrush's material attributes; Using Doublecolor Shaders; Using Tricolor Shaders; Using Quadcolor Shaders; Shading Effects; Utilizing Shader Channels; Using Matcap Materials; Building Custom Matcap Shaders; ZBrush Light Types; Controlling and Adjusting Shadows; Utilizing Fog for Appeal; Depth Cue for Distance-based Blur; Anti-Aliasing Settings for Render Quality; Saving Rendered Images From ZBrush; Post-render Adjustments for Appeal in ZBrush.

Popular highlights include: Importing Geometry into ZBrush; Working with Morph Targets; Image-based Texture Painting; Hand-painting Texture Maps; Sculpting on Multiple Subdivision Levels; Controlling Stroke Attributes; Creating Custom Alpha Brushes; Utilizing Layers to Localize Detail; Using Stencils for Sculpting Details; Tuning Alpha Brushes; Simulating Effects of Weight & Gravity; Polypainting Techniques; Painting with Depth and Color Simultaneously; Painting Detail Cavity Masking; Using ZMapper and Displacement Exporter; Generating Normal and Displacement Maps; Using Normal and Displacement Maps in Primary 3D App.

The new backgrounds feature will allow artists to bring in environment images and simulate lighting from those images. This allows us to render our ZBrush models in a way that they integrate very well into a photographic environment.

LightCaps give us the ability to fake very complex lighting setups for our models. We can save or load LightCaps and can even generate backgrounds that match the lighting setup.

Normally, multiple materials on a model will create an ugly transition. Now there are a couple of ways to create smooth transitions between materials including a render-based solution and using the mixer to blend multiple materials.

There are now a number of post-processes we can perform on our Best Preview Renders to tweak the look of the model. There is a wide variety of filters that can be used and they can be combined to create different effects.

Topics covered in this tutorial: Accessing the ZMapper plugin in ZBrush ; Controlling the normal map result within ZMapper ; Exporting resulting normal maps out of ZBrush. For more information on ZBrush check out Detailing Next-Gen Characters in ZBrush, a production-based approach to character creation for games.

Cavity maps are textures (generated based of a high-resolution model) that are mostly white, but are dark in small creases and bumps. They are useful if you don't want to render out a slow displacement map, but you want to see all the detail of your model. A cavity map layered over your texture can make quite a difference! Topics covered in this tutorial: How to set-up a model for cavity mapping; Creating UV's in ZBrush; How to use ZMapper; Different settings for cavity mapping inside ZMapper.