zBrush tablet navigation

# 1 07-06-2011 , 07:42 PM

EduSciVis-er
Join Date: Dec 2005

Location: Toronto

Posts: 3,374

Hey,
I decided to jump on the bandwagon and dl a trial of z. Only done a few basic tuts so far, but it seems interesting. I don't like mudbox all that much, but zbrush is far less intuitive. Anyway, my main question was about navigation using the tablet.
It seems to be that you must tap and drag outside any geo (i.e. blank space) in order to navigate. That seems to be a pretty dumb way to go about it... what if your geo fills or pretty much fills your screen... how are you to navigate?

I think I figured out that you can tumble while RMB clicking on the geo, but I'm wondering about tablet navigation. Any insights?
Thanks!
Also, I think it would be cool to have a non-maya question forum... posting in the members lounge for non-maya but still working in CG related questions is odd. And this is too great of a community to post on other forums user added image

-stwert

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# 2 07-06-2011 , 09:32 PM

Registered User
Join Date: Mar 2007

Posts: 1,055

Hi,

there is a safe zone indicated by a thin rectangular line around the workspace, if you click and drag inside this you will rotate the canvas, even if the model is beneath your cursor. Same goes for scaling and translating.

cheers

gubar

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# 3 07-06-2011 , 10:41 PM

Subscriber
Join Date: Jul 2008

Location: Chelmsford, Essex, UK

Posts: 1,162

The tablet navigation is wierd. But if and when you do get used to it, I guarantee at some point you'll switch from Z to Maya and start trying to navigate in Maya the same way you did in Z, without pushing the alt button, and be like...'doh'....

I didnt realise what Gubar said, that you could do it that way too...but also, aswell/instead of that....on the right side of the viewport there are scale, transform, and rotate icons, and if you click on any of them and drag then it does whichever youve chosen...thats what I always do when my model fills the screen, just click on the scale/zoom icon and drag out.

The whole, clicking on alt, and then letting go before you drag to zoom is wierd at first, but it does get easier.

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# 4 07-06-2011 , 10:46 PM

EduSciVis-er
Join Date: Dec 2005

Location: Toronto

Posts: 3,374

Thanks for the tips, guys. That's helpful. The other thing that feels really weird to me is the seemingly random pivot point that the tumbling seems to take on, it feels very lopsided and strange. I suppose it's just a matter of getting used to it.

I already have a hard enough time between PS and Maya, always hitting space at the wrong time, or hitting alt+MMB to track... doh!