Absolutly Zbrush has only OBJ + material and Dxf export (but it's sufficient for any polymodeler :)
some feather ;)
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=58228

Hi.....

any body can tell me little bit about the difference between zbrush vs modo vs silo ?
I come from mechanical engineering, so its far from my knowledge.

thanks

Zbrush is THE PROG for Movie, game industry or Illustration from volume!
It's the standard in 3D for refine or create an organic volume as Autocad is the standard for CAD!
(Modo has a great speedy render inside, Silo is low cost modeler but after you export to Zbrush ;)

He can manage billions of polygons in real time
It import any organic format OBJ DXF file (low or medium poly) for refine it with extreme accuracy!
it can't make animation (except turnable)
it can paint on 3D volume
It can work in 2D, 2.5, and 3D (Drawing, painting, sculpting)
It make a Map hight Quality for put it on model low poly for animation for other prog!
It's the best prog for Sculptors artist! (out the other technology of "voxels" who is born with 3D Coat 3 month ago:)
Sensation of sculpting garanted with a graphic tablet!
Take a look on the gallery ;) You can't see the same anywhere!
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/featured2col.php

Hi All....

I need your advice & sharing experience the best software that I have to use to build 3D doll then send the data to mold maker. I dont want to say that moi not suitable for doll modeler, but in special case like make feather and another organic ornament I think today it is not easy to create those in moi.

thanks for any advices.....

@Pilou...
thanks for the info... :)

-anis

Hi Anis,

The Image below is a .obj from MOI3d imported into 3d-coat
The feather brush is made from an bitmap (in this case from artrage)
Export limitation off 3d-coat is .obj .lwo (so no STL)

I have also Silo3d which can export STL
I use it for organic modeling
For example a human hand is done i minutes(in MOi3D i am still figuring out)
Only minus of the program is the snapping features (and some bugs)

Hi Anis,

> any body can tell me little bit about the difference
> between zbrush vs modo vs silo ?

ZBrush is focused on modifying an object by painting and brush-stroke like operations. It's sort of like you paint directly on an object and the spots that you paint on form valleys or ridges in the object.

Modo and Silo I believe have added some of that in as well, but their main focus is in a different area which is sub-d modeling.

Sub-d modeling is where you have a polygon mesh object where you manipulate a 3D point cage to edit the object. It's a lot more about adjusting points in 3D space.

- Michael

Hi Anis,

> I need your advice & sharing experience the best software
> that I have to use to build 3D doll then send the data to mold maker.

The first step is to consult with your mold maker and find out which kinds of data they can accept.

Specifically, can they accept polygon mesh data in STL format? (or possibly in other polygon formats?)

If so then that would open things up for you to use some of the tools that are more commonly used for building organic character models. Normally the focus of such tools are for rendering and not manufacturing but if your mold maker can accept polygon data then they can be used for manufacturing as well.


To make small organic surface details, I would probably think ZBrush would be a good choice for that.

I would actually suggest using MoI in combination with ZBrush for that task. Create an initial basic form in MoI and then export that into ZBrush for adding finer surface details in there.

When you do that, you will want to use some particular mesh settings in MoI to generate an output mesh that has polygons diced up into more uniformly small pieces. There are some discussion threads on this topic here:

http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=804.26
http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=1549.4
http://moi3d.com/forum/messages.php?webtag=MOI&msg=1045.1

- Michael

Hi Anis,

For the modo/zbrush/silo ... if it's 'just' about displacement painting :
Zbrush>Silo>Modo

Zbrush is a digital sculpture (and painting) software, with an unusual interface and a not so easy learning curve. Be prepared to watch/read some tutorials because it's not super intuitive and require some practice to master all the tools available.

Modo is a good poly modeler, with some cool feature like texture painting, correct uv tools and a good render engine. The displace painting is based on the vector displacement technology, and for the moment, it's far to be good ... fine to add some little details, but not to really sculpt. There are some good learning materials too.

Silo is 'just' a poly modeler, with really smart tools on that purpose (really nice retopology tool for example) and looks like the new uv tools seems quite good (havn't test it). The workflow is just amazing fast and easy. The displace sculpting is quiete nice too, sure you can't move millions of polygones like zbrush, but it's really not that bad. I haven't tried displace/normal exporter yet.

I remember there is a cool bird tutorial on zbrush, not sure it will fit your needs

http://www.3dtotal.com/team/Tutorials_3/bird_of_pray/bird_of_pray01.asp

http://www.3d-coat.com/gallery.html

For both "Clay" type sculpting and 3D texturing I would think this is better value and potential than Z=Brush. The beta of version3 is just amazing. Painting on 3D feathers would be quite simple.

Even so, for very quick ideas--and I know not related to the end results required,---I was quite pleased at how quickly I was able to do this in MoI/Carrara this morning.

Brian

This is just a very quick/rough example of displacement painting of a feather image onto an .0bj plane in 3D Coat.

Brian

Hi paolo....

Looking very nice in 3d coat.
can you post the result that you have done in 3d coat ?

I want to open it in moi or solidworks to see the result.

Thanks

Hi All....

Thanks for all the info comparing zbrush, modo, silo.

Base on your argument the best choice is combine moi with zbrus or 3d coat.
So then the questiion is what is the different between zbrush vs 3d coat ?
Which is the best to combine with moi to build 3d doll model ?
How about the learning curve ?

One think that I have checked 3d coat is more cheap that zbrush:)

Thanks

http://forums.polyloop.net/3d-work-progress-finished-works/17603-mac-bear.html

Have a look at this thread. Especially all the variations listed to look at in post 6.
Whilst Mox used Hexagon as the starting modelling app there is no reason why MoI would not be as good--I would think better! (No way I will return to Hexagon after using MoI!)

Two things about the 3D Coat app as a companion to MoI from my perspective.
First the better price. Secondly, far, far easier to learn for me.
(And the way it is going,with the V3 Beta, I can not see any benefit with using Z-Brush--3DC is going to have things that Z-Brushers have wished for.)

You still need a good rendering app----my choice, still, value for money, comprehensive-ness/adaptability as a true 3d app and ease of use/learning is Carrara6.

Brian

(But remember Blender is free if you can adapt to it's workings!)

Hi Anis,

Do you mean a .obj or.lwo file?

The size will be a highpoly mesh of 295k (1/3 Mb)

@Brian...

your review about zbrush & 3d coat is very useful for me.

@Paolo...

yup the obj or lwo file.
I want to see the result from 3d coat by open the file in moi.

Thanks

Hi Anis - the data that is stored in an .lwo or .obj file is polygon mesh data - it is different than the NURBS surface data that MoI is set up to work on.

You can export .lwo or .obj files out from MoI - MoI will calculate a polygon mesh by dicing up the NURBS surfaces into planar facets.

But you can't easily go the other direction.

In general once you are working with polygons you will be using a different set of tools that are focused on working with that kind of data instead.

So MoI can generate that kind of data from its NURBS surfaces, but once you have that data MoI is not the right tool for working on the polygon data further. You need to use a polygon modeling program for that instead of MoI.

- Michael

Hi Michael...

Just want to make this clear, below is the procedure :

1. create the 3d basic shape in moi
2. export to 3dcoat
3. add 3d texture in 3d coat, in this case feather
4. export form 3dcoat to moi
5. open the export result in moi

Here / inside moi I just want to know the surface result, if the result is ok then I will send the data to moldmaker.

Is what I have describes above possible ?

Thanks

< Zbrush / 3D Coat
3D Coat is like Moi , you can speak with the conceptor Andrew !
With the beta 3.0 you have a new technology of sculpting : the "Voxels" : grain of matter!
It's not polygons but really matter (if possible on a screen ;)
If you want enthusiam of creation in perpetual gestation (like Moi) go there!
http://3dbrush.kriska.hvosting.net/forum/index.php?s=0bb9bcdbf07f0f065239442f92e4d104&showforum=20
http://3dbrush.kriska.hvosting.net/forum/index.php?s=0bb9bcdbf07f0f065239442f92e4d104&showforum=16
Must have a strong video card!

Hi Anis - no that full sequence is not possible.

The initial 3 steps are fine - that will work.

But specifically step #4 and #5 that you describe will not work. (the part about bringing it back into MoI at the end).


Once you have exported the data out of MoI as a polygon data file, it is no longer the kind of data that MoI can work on directly. 3D Coat does not work on NURBS data like MoI does, instead it works on polygon data.

After you are done working on the data in 3D Coat, the result is not a kind of data that can be loaded back into MoI, you would just view it in 3D coat or if you want to bring it into another program you would bring it into a polygon modeling program like Modo or Silo.

Since MoI is not a polygon modeling program, you cannot bring polygon mesh data into it, MoI works instead on an entirely different kind of data (NURBS surface data).

Once you have exported as polygons out of MoI then you won't be able to bring that data back in again, it is a completely different kind of data.

Note - just because you cannot bring that final data back into MoI at the end does not mean that you cannot use it to manufacture with.

Like I mentioned previously as a first step contact your mold maker and see if they can work with polygon data (for example STL or OBJ files) or not.

- Michael

Anis

You don't, basically, take stuff from 3D Coat, or Z-Brush, back into MoI. They are poly modellers not Nurbs modellers. (As I see it, you can not properly create Nurbs(3DM) files from .obj files.)

Normally you would take the .obj file from them into a generalised 3D app--for example say Carrara--BUT, it would be an app that saves to the file type you need--Carrara may not be suitable?

Nothing straight forward in 3D unfortunately.

Brian