Overview of Features
From ZBrush Info
ZBrush 4 includes many new features and major improvements, which will boost your creativity and unleash your imagination to create breathtaking art. Some of these improvements won’t be visible in the UI, but you’ll notice them as you sculpt.
ZBrush is continuously pushing the limits of what is possible in digital art. Version 4 builds upon what was already introduced with 3.5 in order to continue this trend through key workflow enhancements. These enhancements allow you to work faster and have a seamless workflow more than ever before. Some of the items below were first introduced in version 3.5 and are provided for the benefit of Mac upgraders, while others are new to ZBrush 4.
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ZBrush Projects
- Save all loaded tools, document size, light, material, timeline and render settings in one click.
- ZBrush 4 even includes sample projects to help you discover new features.
For more information see : ZBrush Projects
Best Preview Render
- Renders Shadows, Ambient Occlusion, Fibers, SSS and Transparency with advanced antialisasing.
- Multi-pass rendering with Shadow, Color, Ambient Occlusion, Mask and Depth as separate maps.
- Render for still images or animations.
For more information see : Best Preview Render
Project presentation
- Timeline for more than just simple turntables and animations.
- Keyframe managment: copy, move, etc.
- Audio support with color beats for manual animation synchronization.
- Fade in/out and cut keyframes for nice transitions.
- Ease in/out keyframes.
- MDD animation file format support for exporting and importing animation.
- Animation-capable layers, Tools, ZSpheres, background and more.
For more information see : Timeline
Concept creation
- Shadow Box for free-form creation.
- Move Elastic Brush to create stretch-free extrusions.
- Reproject improved for more finely tuned control of the results.
- Mannequin for quick scene setup.
- TransPose units to help you in proportions and sizes.
For more information see : ShadowBox
For more information see : Transpose
Hard Sculpting
- Clip brushes for slicing your models.
- By Radius and By Polygroups modes for the Clip brushes.
- Shadow Box to create original sculpting bases, combined with radial symmetry.
- New Strokes: Circle, Square, Curves.
For more information see : ShadowBox
Major brushes
- Match Maker, the perfect brush to deform your mesh to conform to other 3D models.
- Deco brushes, turn, spin - perfect for creative patterns!
- Clay Buildup will be your new Clay brush for the rough sculpting.
- Move Elastic, Move Topo, Move Parts: Stretch and deform with no constraints.
For more information see : New Brushes, Settings and Behaviors
Strokes
- Roll mode improved with the Roll distance.
- New lasso/marquee selection mode, circle by center, perfect circle, curve for masking and hiding.
- Marquee, Lasso and Circle strokes working with symmetry for hiding, masking and slicing.
For more information see : Stroke
Pipeline and Productivity
- GoZ with Autodesk Maya (2008, 2009, 2010, 2011), Autodesk 3DSMax (2009, 2010, 2011), Luxology modo 401 (Sp2 to sp5), Cinema 4D R11 and R11.5
- GoZ SDK for integrating GoZ in additional software packages.
- Xpose to explode all SubTools, making it easy to work on a hidden one or create stunning animated effects.
- SubTool Duplicate and Insert, List All + ABC, Merge All for more flexibility when working on complex models.
- Solo mode to quickly isolate the current SubTool without affecting the visibility settings in the SubTools list.
For more information see : GoZ
3D Painting and Materials
- PolyPaint Layers for more freedom in 3D painting.
- SpotLight to edit textures on the fly and then use them to paint by projection.
- Gradient transparency for antialiased transparency in PolyPainting.
- New shaders: Fast Overlay and Fresnel Overlay for more effects in your materials.
- New Fresnel and SSS settings for more realistic materials!
- New Blinn Specular added to the default shader for a better skin specular effect.
- Large number of blending modes between materials: Add, Subtract, difference, darken, etc.
Miscellaneous additions
- Topology auto masking to protect closed areas which are not directly connected.
- Elasticity settings to stretch your model without stretching the topology.
- Orientation settings: rotate your alphas while sculpting.
- Tile alphas for more creativity with brushes.
- Non-Square alphas are supported, avoiding distortions.
- Contact support for SubTools: deform multiple SubTools while maintaining your defined contact points between them!
- Relax Deformation: relax your topology without altering the shape.
- Inflate Balloon Deformation for a variation of the relax deformation.
- Deformations are now in real-time when moving the sliders, giving you live feedback.
- New File menu to manage all content.
Plugins (available from the Download Center)
- Decimation Master is now 64 bits.
- Original size is kept when exporting with 3D Print Exporter.
- Unwrap all SubTools at once with UVMaster.
- New Multi Map Exporter for fast and easy creation of many maps at once including: normal, displacement, ambient occlusion, etc.
- Various additions in SubTool Master and TransPose Master.
For more information see : SubTools
For more information see : 3D Layers
For more information see : Spotlight and Light Box
For more information see : Materials
