As some one who has used Tilt Brush I can say that this will be the way forward in the next few years for sculpting and to a degree art creation in general. It makes the overall creation of models effortless in terms of navigation of 3D Models.
Why I say this -
Navigation -
Imagine not having to use the keyboard to control your camera but just walking around the model you made. To Inspect your model you just move your head towards and around the model.
Instead of sculpting your model with a mouse or Tablet. You put on your HMD and just sculpt with your motion controllers.
If you want to inspect something small you just pick it up.
Keep in mind that the above methods of navigation do not require any training we have been doing these most of our lives if not our entire lives. Some times we do it and we do not realize it.
Blender would benefit so much from adding a VR mode with modeling capabilities.
This is a program for the Vive called VRTX and it is developing in a really good way imo.
I tried the beta and it just feels awesome. Thereâs quite some room for more features and other improvements and the UI is still changing a lot(which is cool to see âliveâ). But even now at that early stage itâs a ton of fun. I like that itâs more constructive than the more sculpturistic solutions out there. I think one of the best uses for a program like this is to block out geometry for a VR experience, the impression of the space is so immediate and everything can be changed and tweaked on the fly. Then export the object, import into Blender and do the finer stuff there. With time the tools will get better and better and it will be a super quick and inspiring way to work!
Oh, and just a thought about the exhaustion mentioned in this thread - weâve been painting big canvases with enormous and with tiny brushes, sculpting and hammering away and even doing overhead work for centuries. This here is really not that exhausting compared to these activities and probably more healthy than sitting and clicking the mouse all dayâŚ
Maybe⌠much too early to tell for sure.
In creative process, many still prefer (also more efficient) to use the analog approach via scanning or photogrammetry to digital. And as project is finished, at least a model is made. From visual artists POV, sketching on a piece of paper first, still is the way to go.
I also thought, a decade ago, that with tablets this techniques and skills will become obsolete, forgotten or at least very rare. Tho the opposite occurred. Nowadays a simple pencil sketch is often times more valuable & appreciated than a digital artwork. Go figure.
Another problem i see is user being detached from itâs working environment instead of being immersed with the collective, a team.
This also brings another question to mind.
How is, if at all, this covered by health insurance?
If an accident happen while using such apparatus in a professional environment, are employees & clients covered? Any known practice?
From observing elephants stumping in china shops, am just waiting for someone to get seriously hurt. Not to mention if a client or an employee gets seizures. It only takes the right moment and the right ingredients.
Itâs not harder once youâve rebuilt your atrophied arm muscles
Youâve just described the logical next step â brain control. In the meantime though we need to work on the VR UI for blender which will remain the same regardless of whether you are controlling the motions with your brain or your arms because the perspective will be exactly the same.
I had to register to reply to this thread, i found the reaction funny but itâs kind of sad actually
Iâm a blender user (since 10 year or something), i also own an oculus rift and the touch controllers.
Iâm sorry to say that VR is here to stay, itâs not a âtoyâ like theses horrible âNVidia 3D visionâ screen. (i had one âŚ)
Itâs backed by the gaming industry and other major industry like google, Facebook (they bought oculus for $2B), Sony, HTC, Samsung, âŚ
Autodesk is working on a VR Maya version.
So i have a few shocking news regarding to VR :
walking around and waving your arms isnât harder than being a an electrician, plumber, ⌠or a wood/metal/clay sculptor, oil painter, âŚ
You can use your VR while sat, thatâs what i do, i donât use it at room scale.
You can use your mouse and, with some practice, your keyboard. (itâs pointless for sculpting but useful for âtraditionalâ modeling)
Yes, you have to take a rest from time to time. Not because itâs exhausting (the oculus is really light) but itâs heating and kind of uncomfortable after some time.
Sculpting in VR is MUCH EASIER but itâs hard to explain.
I use Autodesk meshmixer to post-process my exported Mesh, the exported mesh are very messy at the current state of VR modeling software and blender canât handle the high poly count. If blender doesnât support VR in the future, thatâs fine by me, iâll buy a software that support it.
Now i have a few answer :
âbumping into stuffâ : Oculus have a system called âguardianâ (HTC vive have one too but i donât know the name). You define the limits of your âsafe spaceâ and your warned when youâre close to the limit, or it can be displayed in your helmet too.
âThis fake VR will come and goâ : lol (sorry)
âsicknessâ : itâs called âillusion of self-motionâ itâs a known problem with known workaround, with good practice you can have absolutely 0 sickness. The only universal instant sickness generator is low fps.
âhead trackingâ : itâs perfect, any imperfection would make you instantly sick.
âeye trackingâ : useless for modeling.
âwill come and go in 2 yearsâ : My FAVORITE ! Because the first oculus was released 3,5 years ago
EDIT : i donât want a belief debate, iâm sharing my knowledge and experience. If you donât want resource to be used for VR support in blender thatâs perfectly fine. To me, itâs so good that iâm ready to buy a proprietary software if i have to, so i donât really care.
Regardless of the merits of sculpting in VR, there have been almost no improvements to Blenderâs core sculpting, modeling and asset creation tools for years now. All the dev time is being pointlessly sucked up by rendering and vfx stuff. Other than those areas, development is completely dead.
Unless Facebook or Valve decide to donate a couple dozen sets to the BF to be handed out to developers like candy, I doubt anyone will pick up VR support of all things considering the money you have to shell out for an Oculus or Vive before you even start coding.
proper groups (as opposed to lists) / in-context instance editing
better manual retopology tools (this should really get a dedicated mode IMO, but just stuff like polystrips would be nice)
automatic retopology of some kind (all the cool sculpting apps have it these days)
cycles baker improvements: displacement and curvature baking, antialiasing, ridiculous memory use (this stuff effectively forces me to continue to rely on other bakers)
transpose brushes for sculpting
cursor snapping
making texture paint, weight paint and vertex paint work consistently
texture paint layers
texture compositing
geometry normal editing
better automatic uv packing
uv stacking
batch baking
Yes, I know thereâs addons for some of these, but every release some of them get broken for some inexplicable reason and so they canât be relied upon. Pretty much the only improvement on the horizon that will affect me is the new layer management, so at least thereâs that.
My thoughts are that the depth perception and benefit of having two 3d manipulators is no joke. That said, Medium is missing a lot of tools that Blender sculpt mode currently has. I think itâs still a toy but itâs only a tiny hop away from being a powerful tool.
I donât know. Iâm thinking that maya is only making the VR thing because they want to be hip or to say they were the first. VR is for gaming and immersion. Not for pin point accuracy.
Just look at the mouse. Itâs been here forever. People have tried to replace it but nothing comes close. Keyboards are still the same rectangle as it was 40 years ago. No replacement because precision and muscle memory. Donât fix what is not broken.
VR is awesome but not for daily work.
AR is awesome too but not for daily work. At least in AR you can see the models in real life and walk around and in the 3d object. And you can do it from anywhere because you only use the phone. If you bring VR googles then you can do the same thing but itâs worse because need VR googles with you, no one does that.
So this is a pretty funny visual, but really, youâve described the life of a physical sculptor. So sure, this wouldnât be for everyone, but certain artists would benefit.
I just tried out Medium. Itâs not too bad. Iâm not sure if they had it updated either, but since itâs built by oculus, Iâm guessing it has a better time updating than some of the games. I tried superhot this time, and it was really fun in VR. That lightsaber beat game also has a really good grasp of controls.
Medium wasnât too bad. The controls are fine, but you quickly hit walls with limited resolution in their software. The answer might be just go bigger. It doesnât mesh like Blender does. I think the entire thing is just meshed, itâs not adaptive. And the mesh isnât good enough for the paint you apply. It looked to be vertex painting, but Iâm guessing here.
If you took the controls from medium and put them into blender or similar package, youâd have a great product. Youâd also have quite a few artists in better shape. Youâll be standing up, and physically moving around.
I really hope to see this happen soon. I tried a few. Quill was also really nice. Imagine grease pencil in VR.
Google blocks might have afew uses, but itâs mostly garbage. But itâs free. So might as well check it out to see what uses it might have. The google sketching one, canât remember the name, wasnât great. It looks really cool, and they did a good job on the interface, but what you can create with it is kind of limiting. Iâm not sure how it exports. Everything is ribbon based it seemed.
Anyway, the software is getting there. The interfaces were all great. So theyâve got the interaction down, they just need to plug it into some decent software.
I have a better idea than VR sculpting. Hologram sculpting. There is a hologram that can respond to touch, and you can feel the hologram. Itâs many years away.
