Hey hey guys,
i am currently working on this model (see picture) which is an extraction from Zbrush and i am trying to make it again in Maya with a much lower polycount , now my question is whats the best/quickest way to get this job done?

cheers

http://shadowship.blogspot.com/

http://vimeo.com/22422170

a whoosh and twinkle is better than a sizzle and splat

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Could I ask why you want it to be lower poly? Usually this kinda stuff would be handled with transparency.

couldn’t you use displacement/normal maps for that though?

Lee Dunham | Character TD
ldunham.blogspot.com

thought I’d weigh in on this one -
Several years ago I did a model of an arterial stent - very intricate and very specific pattern of positive and negative space.  I ran in to the same issues you do.

My solution was a very simple NURBS cylinder with a transparency map with a bump map - the bump map I blurred a little in Photoshop which gave me nice soft edges around the holes.  I actually used the original mechanical drawing that the pharma company gave me to create the maps. 

I also used the same maps for specularity for obvious reasons. 

The other thing I did was to duplicate the cylinder and leave the two models in the same place. I made them both single sided, with one of them reversed; I used separate lighting for both the inside and the outside.  I’ve uploaded one of the test images for you to see. 

so I don’t want to steer you away from your original question, but the poly count is definitely an issue, and this is a solution that worked extremely well for me in this situation.  Good luck!

Here’s another idea - we’ve been experimenting with software called “3D Coat” which allows you to do exactly what you want - you essentially trace over a high poly model with quads that you can place interactively.  I think the software has a free trial download and it’s not so expensive.  Topogun also does a similar thing.

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i would do it like halfstone. best joice in my opinion.

organic modeling in maya is not that hard (you cannot compare this to mudbox or zbrush!) maybe some packages have specialized a little bit more on that but for me it was never necessary to learn modo f.e.

retopo in maya is another story...but on the other hand even if i use topogun a lot it will not be fun retopo a model like this in whatever package exept the autoretopo of 3dcoat will do it. if u want to stay in maya use the “make life” function so u can “draw” your polys on the highres mesh.

thanks guys..

below is the original mesh redone with zspheres however you cant create closed meshes with this method so i have brought it into maya and i have to spend a considerable amount of time connecting the ends together , unless theres a quicker way?

http://shadowship.blogspot.com/

http://vimeo.com/22422170

a whoosh and twinkle is better than a sizzle and splat

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well i just thought i would post a wip of the mesh i have been working on (as above) doing loads and loads of “bridgeing” took ages by the way, just wish there was a quicker way..!!

http://shadowship.blogspot.com/

http://vimeo.com/22422170

a whoosh and twinkle is better than a sizzle and splat

	Attachment

To answer the original question, you can use the “Make Object Live” feature to use poly modeling tools that are contrained to the surface.

This essentially allows to you move verts, extrude new faces, etc on the surface of another object.

My favourite tool for retopology is 3D-Coat

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