Pixologic
TextureMaster.
ZBrushCentral
DAZ3D

 
MAKING A PIECE OF CLOTH
Flowing cloth in ZBrush

TO START


To complete this small tutorial it is assumed that you will have a basic working knowledge of ZBrush and that you are familiar with the general interface. This tutorial can be followed by people using the DEMO.

I use a PC and the commands reflect this. Mac users change to your own commands or send me the money to buy a Mac and I'll add the Mac commands :)


THE MESH


This short cloth tutorial gives you one way to make simulated cloth for drapes, tunics, curtains, capes or robes.

This page deals with a single piece of material, later tutorials will cover skirts and trousers.

To start...

-Open ZBrush ;)

-Start with a Plane 3D from the TOOL PANEL

-Use TOOL>MODIFIERS>INITIALIZE and increase the mesh resolution. I used 200x200 for this exersise but you can in theory use any size. Find a size that suits you and your machine. It is also possible to OPTIMISE the mesh at the end to bring down its file size.

Figure 1
 -Draw the Plane3D into the document window. Gyro or EDIT mode (T) will do.

-Using
TOOL>MODIFIERS>
DEFORMATION

rotate the mesh so that it is lying flat in the TOOL window. (Figure 3)

(Rotate X 90 should do it)

Figure 3

Figure 2
-Back in the document window we can rotate the plane however we like. Put it flat on the canvas (Figure 2.)

-Hold down the CTRL key and paint some vertical stripes onto the canvas. Holding CTRL makes the program draw an Alpha mask onto the object. Darker areas will be unaffected by the deformations that we will apply.

NOTE: Some one will want to do this using the COL and ROW commands in the selection panel. This is fine too but it gives very 'regular' patterns.

-We now have an ALPHA MASK applied to the plane. Use the GRAVITY slider seen in Figure 3 to make the mesh droop where it is unmasked. Don't forget there is an UNDO!

-As we rotated the mesh forward it uses gravity to drop folds into the mesh. (See Figure 4 and 5)
  
Figure 4
 
Figure 5
THE DETAIL

 Figure 6

-It can help to have some Photographic reference to help you shape the cloth. If you are making a mesh for a specific project try to visualise the end result at this stage.

- It can help to pick a color at this stage. I used blue in Figure 7.

-Using the DRAW POINTER and MOVE tools in the TRANSFORM panel you can now modify the mesh to suit your needs. (Figure 6)

- Here I just used MOVE to pull and push the cloth into a curtain shape. Use different brush sizes to get different effects on different parts of the cloth.

-Focus on the ends of the cloth and increase the size of the folds there.
Figure 7
-Depending on the project you may wish to bend or twist the cloth into diffent shapes.
Figure 7 shows how useful the SBEND can be.


This is found in the TOOL>MODIFIERS>DEFORMATIONS panel

Figure 7

-And that really covers it. There are a lot more deformation sliders in the tool panel that can be used to alter this type of model. Try them and see what you can come up with!