Fluid Mask - ZBrush 2019 Plugin (Win x64)
Fluid Mask.
Fluid Mask is a plugin that adds some functions for masking creation to Pixologic's ZBrush. The fundamental characteristic of these new functions is the use of Precomputed Distance Fields for fluid simulation and local thickness calculation.
Features:
Fluid Mask runs a fluid simulation and projects the resulting 3D wet-map to the target mesh to produce the vertex mask.
Fluid Mesh runs a fluid simulation, creates a 3D mesh and adds it as a new SubTool.
Distance Map Functions generate a mask based on distances to a reference mesh.
Incandescence generates a mask based on the local thickness of the mesh.
System Requirements and Performance.
Distance Field calculation can be a slow process in old computers, specially when dealing with a lot of polygons and high precision. The more cores your computer has the faster this process will run.
Once the Distance Field is calculated it gets saved to the Hard Drive. This way it can be reused multiple times and in multiple sessions saving time. The rest of the processes aren't that demanding in terms of CPU power.
Fluid Mesh and Fluid Mask require up to 8GB of RAM for the higher voxel resolutions. The program will still work but, if RAM is exhausted and the computer starts using virtual memory, it can be slow, freeze your system for a while and even crash. So proceed with caution and don't go over 1200 resolution if your machine doesn't have a lot of RAM. If you have more than 8GB of RAM there should be nothing to worry about.
The main point here is to emphasize the fact that this Plugin can be quite demanding for your system.
Installation.
Plugins in ZBrush don't need to be permanently installed in order to use them. Simply unzip FluidMask.zip to your preferred folder and run the plugin from that location.
Most likely ZBrush will be the app associated with the ZSC file extension so loading the plugin should be as simple as clicking on the ZSC file. If ZBrush isn't open yet this action will launch ZBrush with the plugin loaded in the Plugin subpalette and ready to use for the session. You can also load scripts directly from the ZScript Sub Palette.
To install the plugin so it's loaded every time ZBrush launches just move the FluidMask.zsc file and the FluidData folder to "Your Installation Folder" \ ZBrush 2019 \ ZStartup \ ZPlugs64 \ .
Fluid Mask needs Microsoft VC++ redistributables. Chances are they are already installed in your PC but, if they are not, just unzip the included file VC++Redistributables.zip and run vc_redist.x64 to install the packages.
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ZBrush 2023 Compatibility
- Issue Fixed: The plugin previously faced crashes with ZBrush 2023 due to modifications in the GoZ file format.
- I've updated the plugin to address this, ensuring our software now seamlessly interacts with ZBrush 2023 without crashes.
- For those on ZBrush 2023, please download and install the "FluidMaskZB23" zipped file available in the download section. This version is optimized for the latest changes in ZBrush 2023.