38 chapter 2 ■ Sculpting in ZBrush
Standard vs. Infl ate Brush
The difference between the Standard
and Infl ate brushes lies in how
the faces are pulled out from the
sur face. The Standard brush pulls
all faces beneath the brush out or in
a single direction. The Infl ate brush
pulls faces out along the normal of
the face. The sur face normal is the
direction that points straight out
from any four points. The following
image illustrates this difference.The Brush Menu
ZBrush 4 introduces many new options under the Brush menu. Here you will fi nd some
familiar options as well as some new additions. In this section I will briefl y describe each
submenu.
C u r v e Curve controls the edit curve for the currently selected brush. We will use this
to create a custom brush later this chapter. There is no longer a smoothing curve option
because this curve becomes the smoothing curve when you press Shift. Changes made
while holding Shift will only affect the curve for the Smooth brush.
Depth The Depth menu allows you to control the depth into the surface that your
current brush is active. Imagine it as a control for how deep your tool is being pressed
into the clay.
Samples Samples control how often the brush samples the surface as it is in use. The
ZBrush brushes function by sampling the depth underneath the brush to determine how
to affect a rough surface or a surface that is curving toward or away from the viewer.
Changes to these values can impact the effect your brushes give. Stabilize Orientation,
for example, is useful when you’re using a brush on a rough textured surface. It helps
reduce the infl ating or artifacting that might occur when points intersect due to your
brush strokes.
Surface Surface allows you to add noise to the brush. This menu also has a curve to
exercise fi ne control over the noise options.
Modifi ers The Modifi ers submenu contains various modifi ers to the brush stroke. Tilt
gives the effect that the brush is tilted in space as it touches the surface. Auto Smooth
automatically smooths the surface after each stroke. The Trails option is a very useful
way to even out a brush stroke. It is similar to LazyMouse but without the signifi cant
delay to your stroke. Trails will create multiple copies of your stroke and average them
together. Try it on a sphere to get a feel for the effect.