Today Pilgway released 3D Coat 3.0 alpha 76 with the first look at it’s new interface. These screenshots were taken with the light version, but there is also a dark version similar to ZBrush. Colors are fully customizable as they have been in the past. All panels are dockable and reconfigurable. Across the top there are tabs that take you into each of the various “rooms” of the program.
Paint:
Sculpt:
Retopology:
UV mapping:
Voxels (Volumetric Sculpting):
nice. its looking good. i havent really used it too much for sculpting and painting. How is it? I love the retopo tools though. That’s really all i use it for.
Wow that voxel sculpting is sweet. Just been playing with it for the last hour or so. Reasonably intuitive to use too. I’m a big zbrush fan but this app may sway me with all its other features.
3d coat is amazing. My only gripe with it is that it made my laptop fans go crazy when I used it longer than 5 minutes. I have no idea why, doesnt happen with any other app. I am definitely buying it when I get a desktop.
The fan thing is probably because 3DC is written like a game, so it’s very dependent on the video card. It doesn’t do it on my laptop but other people have brought it up and I understand that’s the reason.
I was going to purchase mudbox but i’m going to go with this now, after toying with the demo and seeing the features, for the price i can’t go wrong.
Amazing piece of software.
I think we’re a pretty lucky bunch too have so many nice tool’s on offer, it amazes me 
It’s the right choice…
I have known Andrew for a year or two and over this time the speed and skill at which he personally develops 3DC and the level of two way communication between himself and his users, is worth way more than the asking price currently is.
The fact that 3DC has a bunch of tools that are class leading like Voxel sculpting with tools like Curves and Tube which are so useful, Cloth solver and the best retopo tools and decent UV set as well, Vector Displacement export etc, CUDA support, etc… Multiple ways to paint also make it 2nd to only Bodypaint in painting ability. The new UI and some polishing and 3DC 3.0 is the best value 2D/3D Sculpt/Paint/UV/Retopo tool around.
Mudbox’s simplicity and raw subdivision power still make it great at sculpting, and Zbrush’s quirkiness makes it a good all-arounder. But overall for my Workflow 3DC v3 has become the single tool and not just one of the tools very quickly.
Need to show it in the “dark” versions too! Maybe if I get a spare moment I’ll load up the new alpha and do it. Thanks for posting!
Yeah I would have since I think it’s the default, I just haven’t figured out how. In older versions there was button to let you choose when you first loaded it but they disappeared. I’ve had the light version (which I like better) ever since.
Wow my first impression of the UI is super “Clean” and user friendly.
Saving UV Map
One question, (and the only reason I haven’t jumped into 3DCoat yet) I unwrapped a simple model in 3DCoat months ago and there was no way to save the UV map so I could paint on it in Photoshop. Do you know if this has been fixed?
Manipulating UV Maps
Another concern was, when I unwrapped an cube some of the UV’s were hidden or overlapped and I wanted to select the “Points” and be able to move them like I can in Bodypaint. I also couldn’t rotate or scale the UV maps. I think this is essential to have these options. Do you know if any of these have been added?
Adding Details
Can you use alpha maps to paint on fine details like wrinkles on the models like in ZBrush and Mudbox?
Adding Details
Will there be the ability to build a model from scratch in 3DCoat like you can using ZSpheres in ZBrush or do you need to first create the geometry in another 3D app?
New UI
When will this version with the new UI be available as a demo of for purchase?
It’s great to see ZBrush and Mudbox having some competition. Keep up the great work Andrew!
Looking great. Seems like a pretty decent alternative to zbrush and mudbox. at a fraction of price…
Actually you don’t even have to save first, just got to Edit > Edit All Layers In External Editor. It will load Photoshop with the 2D maps for painting, then when you save in PS and go back to 3DC it will automatically update. You may have to point it to Photoshop.exe in the options first. This will actually work with any program that handles .PSD files.
Manipulating UV Maps
Another concern was, when I unwrapped an cube some of the UV’s were hidden or overlapped and I wanted to select the “Points” and be able to move them like I can in Bodypaint. I also couldn’t rotate or scale the UV maps. I think this is essential to have these options. Do you know if any of these have been added?
Hard to say about the hidden points without seeing it. As for rotating and scaling UVs true that has not been added yet, I’ve seen a few other people request it.
Adding Details
Can you use alpha maps to paint on fine details like wrinkles on the models like in ZBrush and Mudbox?
Yes though they’re referred to as Masks, not Alphas. It actually has more features than Mudbox, although I haven’t used the latest MB, it doesn’t run on my computer. I used a few of them on this old man model:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=43&t=751704
Adding Details
Will there be the ability to build a model from scratch in 3DCoat like you can using ZSpheres in ZBrush or do you need to first create the geometry in another 3D app?
Yes, voxels don’t require any base geometry, so you can pull a character out of a single sphere or just “paint” geometry onto empty space. Or if you like, the Curve tool can be used sort of like Z Spheres. This Satan model was started like that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66m7qZ_LWuM
New UI
When will this version with the new UI be available as a demo of for purchase?
It’s available as a trial right now, just go to the link in the first post and download. Of course it’s still in alpha testing so if you find a bug or have a feature request I’m sure Andrew would appreciate it on the forum.
It’s great to see ZBrush and Mudbox having some competition.
