Hey, folks. Several ages ago, probably around the sunset of Windows Vista and into the start of the heyday that would herald the presence of Windows 7, Pixologic hired on the developer of this piece of software called Sculptris.
Sculptris was this natural feeling virtual sculpting program, allowing users to get used to working in 3D and sculpting figures and heads this way.
After they hired the dev, the software basically was left to stagnate and receive no further development whilst the company went on to push their own product, ZBrush. The last update Sculptris would receive would be nine years in our past, somewhere in 2011.
Here we are, in 2020, and I received this email from Pixologic, telling me that ZBrushCoreMini is now freely available to folks. This software feels like it is the spiritual successor of Sculptris from nearly a decade past, and has been fairly stable to work with in the hour I've tried using it thus far.
It might benefit more from being worked with a drawing tablet of some sort, as the controls don't feel quite as intuitive as I remember in Sculptris, but, it is quite nice to have something designed for the age of the 64-bit operating system, capable of really using the hardware that I can throw at it.
For the past few years, Pixologic has added Sculptris Pro to ZBrush. It's however not quite the same as Sculptris. One thing that suggests it's not using the old Sculptris code, is the lack of full symmetry. Where Sculptris woks in full symmetry and keep its symmetry, wile working with symmetry on in ZBrush, Sculptris Pro doesn't hold its symmetry, and lose any symmetry you may have had before using it.
One thing I felt the old Sculptris lacked was a form of merging polys from left to right as done in a Dynamesh. If you cross polys in Sculptris, they fold into each other, and can make a mess. There is little to no way to fix it after, other than smoothing it back away form touching each side again.
ZBrush has that issue even with Sculptris Pro on, unless you use Dynamesh to fix it. The downside to Dynamesh is, you can lose much of your detail and topology poly flow when you Dynamesh. So that is best used to crate a base form, before creating any fine details or topology poly flow.
ZRemesher is a good way to regain a fairly good workable poly flow again, after a rather destructive Dynamesh or Sculptris Pro sculpt. Not so good for an animated skin however. Hand worked topology is slow work, but best for making an animatable skin with.
Seeing I have ZBrush already, and is updated for free every update, I have no need for ZBruchCoreMini. But is cool to know it's been made a available to those who don't yet have the full blown ZBrush to play with. ^.^
And yes, I can confirm as many others who have a pen interface can, 3D sculpting, even in Blender, 3D Coat, Sculptris, ZBrush, or other, is best with a pen than mouse.
I remember it. And still have it. Much as I remember XNormal and Bitmap 2 Material. For the past f
