Hi,
Nice picture Jim,
I'm glad Blender is getting a little attention. You're getting the grips of it?

About its sculpting abilities, Blender is useable with multi resolution
sculpting in official versions, but for clay like, on the fly, subdivision, then
Test builds must be used. You can get some here (spot Fasthary builds, and there
are PTex experiments too):
http://www.graphicall.org/builds/

About Sculptris, It has been bought by Pyxologic the makers of ZBrush. So in the
long run, it won't evolve so much as a free application.

You are right about the difference you noticed between standard Blender modeling
and its sculpting tools, they first look almost completely different
philosophies.
But in fact, once you get too the workflow (I suggest you start with Blender
2.49 to get better tutorials) and find your panels around, it's actually really
cool to have the choice whether to bake details or not, because you don't have
to switch app. (and baking can look a little clumsy in the old interface).
Also Since Povray won't be able to use your normal maps yet, baking won't be of
much use.


So the best workflow for now is to model as much as you can with polygon tools,
getting the masses right, then switch to sculpting, subdividing as much as your
machine will take (save first) with multires,  use textured brushes for fine
details only like skin pores, etc. (procedurals can be used for brushes)...

Have fun

P.S: One of the Blender advances that I'most eager to see happen is Bmesh, and
the sooner the better, to make sure it's compatible with the rest (e.g.sculpting
tools)

Post a reply to this message