First try at ZBrush (16/1/2013)

I was looking forward to trying ZBrush for the first time during this session as my art lecturer had explained to me all the creative opportunities ZBrush was providing to comic creators and other such mediums. However, I knew I should have realised that using a program for the first time was going to be difficult and therefore underestimated how much trouble it would be.

The program is like molding a virtual version of clay. You spread the shapes out as if you are pulling, pushing and rolling them. You can also put imprints on them to give them texture. The program is meant to be perfect for designing characters as it allows the user to create convincing character models and clothe them in different materials.

Therefore using a program that worked like clay was difficult as not only have I not used clay in years, but I am so used to 3dsMax's interface and its hot keys that trying to rotate and zoom in and out with the camera was a challenge on its own.

Luckily I was able to produce some resemblance to the monster that our lecturer wanted us to create using a Graphics Tablet that felt natural for the program. I feel that given the time and patience to play with the program and read over the hot key list that I will eventually become confident in the program as I did with 3dsMax many years ago.

You can see my first attempts at ZBrush below: