Zbrush 4R5 Panel loops videos now online.

Pixologic has made videos available showcasing the new features found in the latest upgrade of Zbrush (4R5). Check out the great demo below on the use of Panelloops in 'The making of the Dragon Flyer' by Pixolator. The new features are pretty awesome. After watching the demo you can check out several cool videos by Michael Pavlovich, who you might now from his instructional DVD's at Eat3D. In his new free videos he'll be showing you more on the very subject of hardsurface modeling done completely in Zbrush using panel loops (at this moment 3 of 5 videos are online). Is this the future for hard surface modeling? The latest upgrade of Zbrush shows that the guys at Pixologic certainly seem determined to give Autodesk a run for their money.

Zbrush4R5 Ryan Kingslien.

Okay, so no official demos yet of the new features found in Zbrush 4R5, due to the busy schedules of everybody during the holidays, but Ryan Kingslien from Zbrushworkshops has been so nice to offer us a couple of videos about working with 4R5's panel loops. Great! Check it out below, or visit his Youtube account and don't forget to subscribe if you want to keep updated. Thanks Ryan!

Panel Loops

With Panel Loops you can convert your model’s PolyGroups into panels of polygons with or without thickness, or even as extruded surfaces. The edges of these panels are created with a custom bevel around them defined by an editable curve. This is a great companion to ZBrush’s existing Mesh Extract feature, providing advanced control over the final result. Borders will have clean polygons loops even on low resolution models. They can have inner or outer panels (or both) and can be created as an extrusion from the original surface or as entirely separate pieces.

Panel Loops are a remarkably fast way to create armor, machined surfaces or anything else where a panel shape is called for in your hard surface sculpting or product design. And because they are derived from your model’s PolyGroups you can take advantage of ZBrush’s many auto-grouping features to quickly and intelligently break your model into these paneled segments.

Zbrush 4R5 upgrade.

Hey guys, just a quick update right before Xmas. Pixologic has just released a great new update for Zbrush, introducing some attractive new features and much needed improvements. Most important are of course the introduction of the Autosave feature and a new, see-through option for the GUI, while the Posterize feature let's you easily create great looking cell shaded renders, mimicking traditional 2D artwork. A demo video is still in the works, so check out all the info below or go here.  Have a great Christmas everybody!

Polish by Features - A new set of Polish sliders has been added in the Tool >> Deformation sub-palette to improve your surface and make them cleaner, especially for hard surface models and product design objects. It includes Polish by Features, but also Polish by PolyGroups and Polish by Crisp Edges. DynaMesh functionality has been greatly enhanced and can now retain more of your shape in a lower polygon count than ever before, thanks to the new Polish by Features volume preservation characteristic.

Curves by Features - Creates curves based on the model's PolyGroups, creased edges or its outline. These curves can then be used with any of the curve-based sculpting brushes.

Panel Loops - Based on PolyGroups, this feature will transform the selected model into individual panels with thickness. Or it can extrude those panels from the surface with clean borders and bevels, perfect for hard-edge sculpting.

Delete Loops - Allows you to remove unnecessary edge loops. At higher settings it can also drastically change the shape of your model.

Align Loops - An alternative to the Delete Loops feature, this produces the same visual effect but doesn't change the model's topology.

Dynamic Brush Size - Makes it possible for the brush size to dynamically change as the model moves closer or further away from the camera. This becomes extremely helpful when sculpting items such as bolts, alpha pattern, scales, etc. No matter the distance the model is from the camera the bolt, alpha pattern and scales will remain the same size due to the brush dynamically changing.

Above: Yes, rendering great looking comics with a 3D modeling package is indeed very possible! Check out the interview with Olivier Thill and Benjamin Alcover here to know how they created their graphic novel using Zbrush.

PolyGroup Enhancements - Several functions have been added relating to ZBrush's PolyGroup options. You can now group by normals, merge stray groups (useful when groups have been auto-assigned), crease or uncrease by PolyGroup and also a Smart Polish By Feature function to improve your mesh shape without losing volume.

Posterize - Posterization takes a smooth gradient and converts it to fewer steps with abrupt changes between them; a staircase kind of effect. With additions made to the profile curves, Material Mixer, BPR Filters and a new 3D Posterize feature, you can now easily create a cell shaded render.

See-Through Mode - Makes the entire interface transparent so that you can see open windows behind ZBrush. As an example, you can use your browser to find a reference image and sculpt against it without even needing to import it into ZBrush!

Auto Save - Auto Save uses the same mechanism as QuickSave and periodically auto-save your work in the QuickSave folder. It will also auto-save when ZBrush is idle, such as if you're away from your computer or switch to another application without first closing ZBrush.

Pixologic update: Zbrush 4R2b introduced.

In October Pixologic announced Zbrush 4 R2, an improved and upgraded version of their 3D sculpting software Zbrush 4, featuring new tools like DynaMesh, Mesh Insert, Curve Mode and Clay Polish, before moving on to a major new release. Yesterday however, Pixologic introduced another early upgrade to their flagship software: Zbrush 4 R2b.

Pixologic states that Z4R2 has been put to the test by ZBrush users on many different system configurations and workflows and that they found some ‘rough corners’ which they would like to polish. Therefore, they released an update patch allowing you to take full advantage of the powerful features in Z4R2 now, without having to wait until Z5 is released.
This version again brings new features like FiberMesh to create true 3D fibers, fur and hair which may be sculpted, painted, UV mapped and even exported to other applications.

Here's a complete list of all the new cool stuff:

• FiberMesh to create real 3d fiber, fur and hair geometry with export capabilities.
• New set of dedicated FiberMesh "Groom" brushes and corresponding Brush settings.
• MicroMesh support to render fibers or single polygons as separate 3D objects.
• New set of BPR filters and operators to greatly improve your final ZBrush renders
• BPR Global Shadow and Ambient Occlusion settings simplifying shadow management.
• New Cavity Mixer: define different material shaders based on the mesh cavities.
• Improved small details creation through Alpha and Mask. Alphas may be placed using TransPose.
• Surface Smoothness feature detects mesh curvature for Mask creation.
• New global deformation with Transpose Curve deformation and UnClip.
• Improved Mask operations with Shrink and Extend.
• Topology editing additions: Group Mask and Edgeloop Mask Border.
• New JPEG Exporter with Crop, Preview and adjustment settings.

Pixologic also has information about the two new plugins 'NoiseMaker' and 'QRemesher', which they are developing in collaboration with Verold so head over to ZBC for more details and videos.

Pixologic upgrades Zbrush 4.

Pixologic has the new Zbrush 4 R2 out. Although not a full new release yet, It introduces new features like DynaMesh, Mesh insert and Curve Mode and Clay Polish. The guys at Pixologic stated they will continue to develop the new features the next months until they're ready for version 5, which will be 64 bit for Windows and Mac.

Zbrush is a digital modeling tool that, unlike other 3D packages, uses brushes that allow you to 'paint' highly detailed 3D models. It is actually like sculpting digital clay. Instead of pixels it uses 'pixols', depth-enabled pixels, that have a Z-dimension added to create high resolution geometry.The software was released in 2000 and has since developed to define the industry standard for high resolution digital modeling today. For more info visit Ryan Kingslien's channel.