ZBrush How to speed up the texture workflow

The case we are going to talk about today is a warrior with the Sword of Honor, this 3D artwork is carved in zbrush®3d graphics software, then used 3ds max and modo modeling, then using Quixel to add textures to all armor and swords, while skin textures use Mari. By choosing to use marmoset and rendering in real time, you can get instant feedback on the final image and use Quixel and marmoset to spend more time focusing on the artwork itself. Next we'll learn how to use Quixel to quickly and easily add textures to real-time game characters and speed up the texture workflow.

1, started in ZBrush

When carving warriors, more than 150 subtools may be involved, so before you add textures to a character, you need to combine related parts to clean up the scene. It is best to reduce to 75 subtools without losing detail details, and to combine subtools with the same number of subdivision levels, make sure that the ' Merge with Uvs ' is turned on.

2. Separation of Subtools

Once the ZBrush main scene becomes easier to control, you can detach subtools by attaching the subtools to the new ZBrush scene (Tools), and then putting together parts of the same texture map, such as each part of the armor, such as shoulder armour, Waist armour and wrist guard. As can be seen from the above picture, the artist separated the shoulder armour with 5 subtools.

3. Export Map

Before preparing for quixel, you need to export a material ID, Tangent Normal, and an optional object space normal map, and if you have a lot of details on the ZBrush model, you can choose to create an object normal. To create a material ID texture, you can use the color Fill object in ZBrush to set similar objects in the same color, because they share the same type of material in Quixel, so all armor is blue and orange belts.

4. Export Settings

Using the multiple map exporter, verify that the correct check box is checked and all the settings that you want are selected. This is where the most important part of the texture separation is to enable Subtools and merge Maps in the export settings, which will export each visible subtool map and combine them into a map. You can also hide all the subtools, except for the shoulder armour Subtools, but this method is too cumbersome when using more than 75 subtools.

5, from Modo to Quixel

Use the FBX exporter in ZBrush to import all parts into the Modo, and then continue to bind the parts. As many combinations as possible, because material IDs will be used to apply different textures to different parts of the quixel. Reduce the number of 75 Subtools to 16 grid groups, because 16 grid groups are feasible in the quixel of faster computers, it is recommended that fewer grid groups the better, and export. obj files as separate groupings.

6. Export Uvs

Quixel requires all Uvs from 0 to 1 if you are using Mari Udims, you need to create a temporary scene and make sure all Uvs from 0 to 1. After you export textures from quixel, you can reuse Udim Uvs by returning to Mari and import. Before exporting the. obj file in modo, you need to change modo preferences, save meshes as groups, or it will export each network island as a separate grouping, generating hundreds of grid groupings in the Quixel.