- The artistically-driven nature of modern 3D sculpting allows for a fast workflow and stunning results, but the sculpted mesh is often messy, cluttered, tangled and unsuitable for animating or applying textures.
- The process of sculpting in tools like ZBrush, Mudbox or Blender results in high resolution models with many unnecessary polygons.
- While a 3D artist would build a mesh polygon-by-polygon (box modeling), digital sculpting is a more intuitive process that lends itself better to how artists think.
- The downside is that you have to create a lot of polygons to sculpt the curves you need. And too much detail will slow down even the most powerful computer. That’s where retopology comes in.
- The main use of retopology is to get a polygon mesh at a smaller file size that’s useable for animation. Complex meshes are difficult to animate.
- It is necessary to limit the polygon count of any 3D model when it’s used for animation.
- Through retopology, you recover a more efficient 3D surface that’s better for texturing and animating either for animated film or video games.
- The surface of a character would be approximated using the simplest forms possible. Later more details could be added, but the original mesh would be preserved for animation.
- The bottom line is that in this way you can preserve the details you get from high-resolution work, but still generate a model that runs smoothly with animation.
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