SOFTWARE: BLENDER
HOW DO I USE VDM BRUSHES IN BLENDER?
Kirsty Breen, Fremantle
Paul Hatton replies
VDMs make adding details to your sculpts an absolute breeze
Before I answer this question, let’s make sure we’re all on the same page with what VDMs even are. The acronym stands for Vector Displacement Maps and is a feature that’s been part of ZBrush and Mudbox for a while, but has now found its way into Blender’s sculpting tools as of version 3.5. So before you start, make sure you’re using version 3.5 or later. It simply won’t work in any earlier versions.
Now you know what VDM stands for, you’d think we’d be ready to take a look at what they actually are, but we need to cover a different type of map first: the alpha mask. Alpha masks are black and white image files that increase or decrease the height of areas on a mesh along the normal of the face. These can take the form of traditional textures such as a brickpattern texture on a building, but they can also be applied to sculpting brushes to transform the mesh.