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Try these settings. Lets you and I go back and fourth a bit until we get the feel you need. The default brushes can be modified to do thousands of different things.
Knife brush preset is the new and improved Scratch tool.
Knife brush preset is the new and improved Scratch tool.
Here are some samples of the things happening with the scratch brush. Some times I can get it, more often I cannot. As a traditional sculptor this tool is very useful. Trying to use mudbox and not getting it to work each time, feel crippled without it.
The first photograph shows how going around a surface the scratch brush does not stay clean. This happens a lot. This is at level 5
The next pictures shows that I can get it to work, at least much better while working on a plane. I believe this one is at level 4 or 5
but working on a cube, same level, the scratch brush does not act the same.
It is the most temperamental tool, but one that I could really use.
Thanks for any assistance. It could be user error, as I am new, but I am getting a good feel for all of the other brushes, jsut have problems with this one.
thanks in advance,
bridgette
Sorry I think these photographs might post in reverse order
I guess I really need to know if this tool acts this way for everyone, or if it is my system and soemthing that I can do.
The first photograph shows how going around a surface the scratch brush does not stay clean. This happens a lot. This is at level 5
The next pictures shows that I can get it to work, at least much better while working on a plane. I believe this one is at level 4 or 5
but working on a cube, same level, the scratch brush does not act the same.
It is the most temperamental tool, but one that I could really use.
Thanks for any assistance. It could be user error, as I am new, but I am getting a good feel for all of the other brushes, jsut have problems with this one.
thanks in advance,
bridgette
Sorry I think these photographs might post in reverse order
I guess I really need to know if this tool acts this way for everyone, or if it is my system and soemthing that I can do.
Hi Bridgitte,
1. for the head 6 subdivisions will be enough, for the cube since it starts off with four faces vs the few thousand on the level 0 of the head
you need at least 8.
2. If geometry gets awkwardly spaced (long rectangle , or any shape not close to a quad)
while sculpting lower levels and using some brushes like bulge at large strength etc the higher levels at that point will not have enough resolution for the knife tool as that area is essentially low res compared to other areas.
Solution smooth your lower levels of the stretching polys and get them as close to geometry around them as in quad shaped and the artifacts will dissappear.
3. using heavy strength on lowres with some brushes will cause artifacting on highres , use a strength thats just right for the particular level, lower levels lower strength ( this is esp true of knife tool) . look at how the sharp lines in level 8 have softened in level 6 , if i dig into level six , the lines will not look clean in level 8, leave sharp stuff for highest levels.
in settings put the steady stroke on , i use the value 1, it makes the path smoother.
make sure you have wireframe turned on when troubleshooting polyspacing ( right click outside model in viewport and toggle wireframe on)
img 1 how it should be at level 8
img 2 artifact caused at level 6 will not be strong at level 8 but it wont be very good either.
img 3 at lower level 3 the poly is too far stretched compared to surrounding polys leading to the artifact on higher levels.
1. for the head 6 subdivisions will be enough, for the cube since it starts off with four faces vs the few thousand on the level 0 of the head
you need at least 8.
2. If geometry gets awkwardly spaced (long rectangle , or any shape not close to a quad)
while sculpting lower levels and using some brushes like bulge at large strength etc the higher levels at that point will not have enough resolution for the knife tool as that area is essentially low res compared to other areas.
Solution smooth your lower levels of the stretching polys and get them as close to geometry around them as in quad shaped and the artifacts will dissappear.
3. using heavy strength on lowres with some brushes will cause artifacting on highres , use a strength thats just right for the particular level, lower levels lower strength ( this is esp true of knife tool) . look at how the sharp lines in level 8 have softened in level 6 , if i dig into level six , the lines will not look clean in level 8, leave sharp stuff for highest levels.
in settings put the steady stroke on , i use the value 1, it makes the path smoother.
make sure you have wireframe turned on when troubleshooting polyspacing ( right click outside model in viewport and toggle wireframe on)
img 1 how it should be at level 8
img 2 artifact caused at level 6 will not be strong at level 8 but it wont be very good either.
img 3 at lower level 3 the poly is too far stretched compared to surrounding polys leading to the artifact on higher levels.
As I understand it some of my problems are because of the displaced mesh or wire frame caused by pushing or pulling on the form. There seems to be limits of this, and as compared to traditional scupture you can't really "add" clay and keep a mesh. Seems like if I could meld a sphere to a plane to a tube it would work better to create- say an elephant than to strech, blulgeor foam a section to make ears and trunk. Do I understand this? I also hate to write about this process and state that an artist would need to create the form in another program and then bring it in.
It is surprising what you can sculpt out of a sphere or cube in quite a short amount of time though. This little guy started as a sphere and is only around a million polys, so you could do a lot more with 40-50 million polys in mudbox2009.
The only thing you have to remember is that you can't put a hole in the mesh, but any solid object is doable, which means almost any creature or head could be created from a sphere. It's certainly more difficult to work this way though and you have to think a lot about where you're going to pull the polys from to get the shapes you want. Starting with a basic mesh such as the head or body that come with the program makes things go more smoothly and predictably.
However, it is a lot of fun to just start with a sphere and just see where it goes, like I did with this guy.
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