sculptris

[bigsofty]

Now this is seriously cool, I can't believe its free! 

http://www.sculptris.com

A lot of fun.

[D2O]

Nice Tool, thanks for info.

[Scott_AW]

That looks amazing!

[Wampus]

I love this app. Its sooooo easy to use. Even a non-artist like me can create interesting stuff with it.

As an example I used Sculptris to quickly create some critters for an upcoming puzzle game I'm working on:-



Ocean, post-processing for GLB would be a challenge. The polygon count is huge even for simple sculptures. I suppose in theory you could import the files into Blender, reduce the complexity and export to something like AC3D for final post-processing before getting them in your GLBasic apps. Personally I'd rather just use things like Sculptris to generate 2D sprites or nice title screens.

[Scott_AW]

It would be better suited to create pre-rendered graphics with that.  One draw back is that the more you do, the slow it becomes.  Otherwise its pretty amazing, really makes you feel like your working with clay.

[erico]

best read the instructions there guys... keep the detail tap on minimun (press space) and you will not add extra poligons to the geometry, this way you can control the subdivisions, there are other ways to control it too. Be sure to read the docs and check around their forum, don't forget doctor petter has other alwesome tools on animation and sound, be sure to check his stuff

[doimus]

People, check Sculptris' author homepage at http://drpetter.se. I've been following his work for quite some time - he is an absolute genius! His retro games and audio programs are a must have! And all is free!

With Sculptris he is entering in a league with big players, but in his simple, retro-inspired no-frills style. Five out of five stars! 

[Ian Price]

I didn't realise this was by the same guy that did sfxr - I've used that for ages for my in-game sfx. Genius.

Ragaril - love the look of your puzzle game

[Wampus]

Well, I just discovered SFXR. Very useful proggy. DrPetter is awesome.

Ian, thanks. I'm actually changing the look to "cute" seaside creatures and changing the background to a cartoon-ish beach rock pool. I've been told it has to be cute or it might stress people out!

[bigsofty]

Another title by Dr. Petters is "Musagi", wonderful little composition tool that has a lot of advanced commercial features (VSTI support for example), again, all free.

A unique programmer with a great attitude towards freeware! 

Cheers,


Ian

[Scott_AW]

I'm already in love with this program, I'll be using for creating organic decor for my current project.

So far I've made a boulder, tree skeleton, stalagmite and a flower.

Although a general amount of quality is lost in reducing them to voxels, I'm using it mostly to get basic shapes.  Coloring and alterations done later.

This is kind of like a designer's dream.

[bigsofty]

What application do you use to reduce them to voxels Scott?

Cheers,


Ian

[Scott_AW]

Well Ken created a utility for his voxel stuff called poly2vox.  However that converts 3ds files, but theres plenty of programs to covert them, personally I use Anim8tor for the conversion, it handles the models pretty well.

Poly2vox can be set to different resolutions of voxels, maxing out at 255x255x255.

You can find it here -> http://www.advsys.net/ken/download.htm

Heres a sample of a quick goblin head I whipped up(almost literally) and converted at the highest resolution.





A useful tool for Sculptris would be a polygon reducer, although I've had success with keeping poly counts low.

[bigsofty]

Ah I see, that's a good link.

On the forums, a lot of Sculptris users are using Blender as their main secondary app for touching up and converting their models.

Cheers,


Ian

[Hatonastick]

Only just discovered this one myself, and on a different forum no less.  One of the most brilliant programs I've ever seen.  It's like painting with clay.

BTW Tomas Pettersson is moving to California (if he hasn't already) to work for Pixologic, the guys who make ZBrush.  So it might not be free for long I suspect.  Still, I hope Tomas does well out of it.