Smooth Brush
From ZBrush Info
The smooth brush smooths details on a surface towards an 'average' level of that surface. This is simple enough, but:
The Smooth brush smooths a surface by averaging the displacement of vertices with the displacements of neighboring vertices. This means that the 'scale' over which smoothing takes effect depends almost entirely on the subdivision level of the model. (But see the reference for the Smooth slider for a slight exception.
Details of how to use this ability are presented below.
- Smoothing a very high-resolution model; the pores on the nose can easily be removed.
- 'Coarser' features, such as nose shape, are not affected.
- Increasing the intensity of the Smooth slider will will result in somewhat stronger smoothing, but only up to a point; ridges might be softened, but the overall shape will still not be affected.
Using Smooth in conjunction with ZBrush models sculpted at multiple levels of resolution (see Subdivision Modeling) allows you a tremendous amount of control of how your model is affected. You could, for example, choose to smooth down a mountain range, yet retain all of the fine detail that was sculpted in, such as creeks or rough terrain.
The image below shows this in action. The process is very simple:
- Set Tool:Geometry:SDiv to a level that gives a good representation of the features you want to affect, but doesn't show the finer details you want to leave unchanged.
- Smooth at that level of detail.
- Set Tool:Geometry:SDiv back to its highest value to view the result.
Smooth Controls
Smooth: This brush smooths the underlying surface, and its slider controls the 'direction' of the smoothing effect. If set to a positive number the brush will smooth the recesses of the form more strongly. If set to a negative number it will smooth the high points of the form more strongly. If set to 0, performs a full smooth. For example, set this to 100 to fill a valley containing mountains with silt; the tips of the peaks will be retained.
Z Intensity controls how fast the smooth effect is applied; at a high intensity, a single pass with the brush will smooth a surface by a large amount, while at lower values, multiple passes of the brush will be needed to achieve the same effect.
Use the smooth brush at different subdivision levels to smooth coarse or fine details.
Z Intensity controls how fast the smooth effect is applied; at a high intensity, a single pass with the brush will smooth a surface by a large amount, while at lower values, multiple passes of the brush will be needed to achieve the same effect.
Use the smooth brush at different subdivision levels to smooth coarse or fine details.
