ZBrush Sculptie: How Do I Find and Correct Overlapping Polygons?

In ZBrush I'm sculpting a relatively simple floating island shape. Using the smooth brush, I'm correcting where polygons are overlapping, though more crop up as I use various brushes. I'm not always sure where these problems lurk. Somewhere I saw a technique for highlighting overlaps. Anyone have an idea?

I'm importing the obj file into Photoshop CS4 Extended for texturing. Of course, I see the overlaps there, too.

Appreciate help so I can avoid an endless search on where I saw that tip!

Underneath the rotation tools in the side bar you'll see FRAME which will highlight the mesh for you. Once you have overlapping polys your main tool to unfold them will be the smooth tool. If you drop down to a lower resolution level you'll be able to undo the damage faster but at the same time will trade off some of the definition in your mesh. It becomes a juggling act between flipping through division levels and smoothing to get everything back in order. Normally overlapping polys are created in Zbrush by using tools with the zintensity turned up too high...zoom in and work areas a bit slower keeping an eye on edges which create the overlap. If one begins, hit the shift key in the tool your in and smooth it out and try achieving your sculpt with less intensity, going over it again if you have to.

Thanks, Casper. Yes, the Z Intensity is too high. I'll be more careful as I sculpt. I've been using the Shift key as you describe to quickly use the Smooth brush.

Under the sidebar Rotate tool is PolyF, which must be the Frame tool you mention. It colors the whole shape with a tint and outlines the polygon edges. (I'm using ZBrush 3.5, not sure if there have been any tool changes from previous versions.)

Right now I'm shaping a 32x33 Sphere3D, so not working with higher or lower resolutions. Since I can load the obj file into Photoshop, I'm going to try creating the texture there instead of in ZBrush. Though I might return to ZBrush and divide the island a few times to work on a texture there. Not too good at any of this right now!

Lots of fun, though.

With some patience, you can unfold these problem areas with the move and/or snakehook tool, just turn on the frame view and get in close, hiding the part of the mesh you aren't working on to make it easier to see.

Thanks, Siddean. I'll use SnakeHook/Move brushes to ferret out those overlaps. And zooming in: yeah, I've been rushing, and will stop with the caffeine and work more patiently!

I'm using a Sphere3D to make this floating island shape. I've experimented with having the poles at top/bottom and at the sides. Not sure how to make the island area, where you'd walk, flat as possible. Starting with deformations and masks, I shape a rough approximation, then use brushes and Move/Scale/Rotate.

Working on a poles top/bottom version now, and the deformation created lots of itsy overlaps at the bottom pole. Grrr. I'm wondering if Sphere3D isn't the best ZBrush primitive to start with, though it seems like it ought to be.

Any tips will be appreciated.

Experimenting with the ZBrush primitive Sphereinder3D, which might be a better shape to start with.

Oh, for those Photoshop CS4 Extended folks, I dragged a stone texture onto the 3D window and was noticing how merging down washed out the resolution. Using transform, I shrunk the stone texture, then cloned and painted on those tricky areas where the polygons are more stretched, used unsharp mask, then merged down. Much better looking texture. At least, in PS!

Update: The top of the Sphereinder looks ghastly and distorted when textured, no matter how I condense the texture. The polygons on the top (where you'd walk) radiate out from the center pole and defy nice texturing. At least so far.

Updated Update: I think I remember Shiny Life tutorials advising to move the poles where they aren't so prominent. Seems like this is what I should do, and probably the Sphereinder3D isn't the best primitive. I had better results with the Sphere3D, rotating it so the poles were on the sides.

One of the shinylife videos explains that the spherinder is not a suitable primitive to start with in terms of making Sculpties.