Book Image

Sculpting in ZBrush Made Simple

By : Lukas Kutschera
Book Image

Sculpting in ZBrush Made Simple

By: Lukas Kutschera

Overview of this book

Embark on a creative journey with ZBrush, the leading software for creating characters, creatures, and props in films, games, and 3D printing. This guide will take you through its powerful yet user-friendly workflows, allowing you to explore its dynamic organic sculpting, painting, and hard-surface modeling tools. The first part of this book is dedicated to helping you become familiar with ZBrush’s user interface and learning the very basics, from sculpting brushes and painting the model with Polypaint to setting up lights and rendering images. You’ll also create a demon bust with the help of ZBrush’s concept sculpting tool, DynaMesh. In the second part, you’ll get to grips with the creation of a humanoid character that is optimized for 3D printing. Focusing on anatomy, poly-modeling, and preparing the model for 3D printing, you’ll acquire the skills essential for sculptors. The final part delves into portrait sculpting, where you’ll learn everything from basic facial anatomy to hair creation with FiberMesh. By the end of this book, you'll have developed the expertise necessary to succeed in the ever-evolving world of 3D character modeling, complemented by portfolio and social media tips for showcasing your standout work.
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Part 1: The Adventure Begins: Sculpting in ZBrush
9
Part 2: Creating Characters from Scratch: A Comprehensive Guide
13
Part 3: Sculpting a Female Head: Tips and Techniques

Using the Gizmo to move objects

The Gizmo is a tool with multiple functions – though it allows you to complete simple tasks such as translating, rotating, and scaling objects, it also lets you assemble and build up your 3D scene, change proportions, center objects, or apply more sophisticated deformations to models (the last of which we will see more of in Chapter 9).

To access the Gizmo, press the Move, Rotate, or Scale button located above the canvas in the default ZBrush UI. Alternatively, you can access them through the Transform menu, or by pressing W for Move, E for Scale, or R for Rotate on your keyboard. A colorful icon with two arrows should appear, like so:

Figure 3.6 –  The Gizmo

Figure 3.6 – The Gizmo

The Gizmo tool should appear close to the selected subtools; however, in certain scenarios, it can be located somewhere in empty space and hard to locate. In that case, you can select Tools | Masking | Go To Unmasked Center.

Once you have the Gizmo...