Dear all,
We are excited to bring you the first alpha release of Sculptron.
As with all experimental builds, please do not use this for production purposes. We can't guarantee that scenes saved with this version will be compatible in future releases, and we anticipate there being several maintenance releases.
What is Sculptron?
Sculptron is a GPU based sculpt-animate application.
Sculptron primary target is to provide artists with a powerful sculpting tool conceived to work with 3D animation. It's not a replacement for ZBrush or any similar specialized sculpting applications you can use to edit static models. Sculptron introduces sculpting into your animation workflow.
Mesh Sculpt Animation
It's possible to import models (in OBJ format only right now) and start reshaping them. Each sculpted shape can be stored into a key-frame, and the resulting animation can be previewed in real time.
It's also possible to import an object as an animation frame, as long as it composed by the same number of polygons of the mesh already loaded in Sculptron.
Artists can create any number of animation layers and combine them to get complex displacement animation.
The final animation can be exported in MDD format (Alembic coming soon!).
Animation Cache Sculpting
Sculptron allows to import an animated cache for editing (in MDD format for now, Alembic will follow soon).
Being able to quickly edit an animation cache can be extremely useful when tweaking and improving animated mesh deformations is needed. Cloth dynamics imperfect collisions can be solved easily and deformation effects can be added to animated characters in a very artist friendly way.
This animation has been created in Sculptron after importing some meshes in OBJ format and their relative MDD caches:
Edited MDD Cache Animation Video
Sculptron provides a very simple and intuitive set of tools.
Procedural Textures are supported, which work in conjunction with the available brushes.
Mesh to Volume feature
A very peculiar feature in Sculptron is the possibility to convert any sculpted mesh/animation into an OpenVDB volume frame or sequence.
This allows artists to sculpt-animate volumes using polygons as reference, which then can be converted into SDFs or voxels in Sculptron.
Right now is only possible to use the mesh to define the domain shape, but in future releases it will be possible to edit absorption, scattering, emission and also custom volumetric channels directly in Sculptron.
The same procedural textures that can be used for mesh sculpting can also be used as SDF and Volumetric Noises to “displace” the volume and define the volume opacity.
Especially if you're a concept artist, creating clouds with the exact shape you need in no time is quite an exciting thing.
Mesh imported in Sculptron:
Mesh Converted into Volume:
Custom cloud volume shape created in Sculptron and imported in Octane via OpenVDB:
This is a torus shaped cloud created by importing in Sculptron a simple mesh and converting it to a volume with SDF noise applied:
The VDB rendered in Octane:
Shortcuts list:
Navigation
- Alt+ Left Mouse button drag = Rotate View
Alt+ Middle Mouse button drag = Pan View
Alt+ Right Mouse button drag = Zoom View
Alt+ Left Mouse button drag on a keyframe = duplicate keyframe
CTRL = invert brush function when available
SHIFT = Smooth Brush
f = Fit World
SHIFT+f = Fit Selected
Sculptron Features
- Sculpt-Animate any number of 3D meshes using several kind of brushes and procedural textures
Import OBJs for Sculpt-Animation
Import animated caches (MDD only for now, Alembic will follow) and sculpt-animate it
Use multiple animated sculpting layers per Object
Import Mesh as Frame
Convert the mesh in a SDF/VDB volume with additional Procedural Noise
Export any frame as OBJ
Export animation as MDD cache (Alembic will be available soon) and OpenVDB
Sculptron Future Features Roadmap (not in this order!):
- Local Space Deformations
Alembic Import Export with Camera support
Available Brushes are going to be expanded in both number and functionalities
Support for mesh sequence with different number of points/polygons (replacement animation)
Sculpting and Playback speed improvements
Multiple meshes merge for export as OpenVDB
Wrinkle Tool
Alpha Brushes
Polygon Masking
Interpolation Mode for Keyframes (Linear, Stepped, Bezier, Hermite)
Presets for Procedural Textures
Statistics (Number of Polygons)
Topological Grab
3D Perspective Reference
OpenSubdivision
Displacement Maps
Dynamic Meshes Sculpting
Item Transformations (Position/Rotation/Scale)
Animated Deformers with Animated Falloffs
Heat Maps
Compress/Stress calculation
Weight Map Painting
Bone Deformation
Graph Editor
Orthogonal Views
Volume Channels Painting
Known Issues
- Undo is limited to local keyframe sculpting editing right now
Symmetry can cause issue when Grab is used
Volumetric Noise shows a slice effect that is also exported in OpenVDB (SDF Noise works fine)
Some Windows need to be activated from the Preferences in order to show up
It's alpha software, expect some crashes!
Watch the Sculptron 1.0 Alpha Presentation Video:
Sculptron 1.0 Alpha Video
Download the free, limited time Alpha version of Sculptron:
Sculptron 1.0 Alpha Download
(Installer updated 2020-03-30)
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