This tutorial is currently under heavy edits! (A lot of english mistakes)
In this tutorial, you will discover how to use the displacement of Carrara, and some little tricks, to improve your render and much more! This step by step is only focused on Carrara, but also include a small Hexagon and Zbrush steps:
Hexagon was used to create the original character (you can watch the
speed modelling video here) and also, to prepare the topology before exporting it to Zbrush
Zbrush was used to create the displacement map. Currently, it's the only software which allow you to create in real time such displacement maps with such details!
Carrara was finally used to generate the render, from the low polygon to high resolution render.
But first of all, what is the displacement? This features allow you to change the aspect of the geometry of your object, from a 'displacement' map, which is a simple greyscale texture (most of time, in 16bits, it's more accurate), by "pushing" the vertices of your object. It's a little bit like the bump, but in opposition to the bump, it move your topology, while bump only change the lighting aspect of your model.
Carrara also includes a "Micro displacement" which can create an extra geometry (a micro triangulation), to generate the displacement, most of the time, on the render generation.
Feel free to search over the web about displacement and microdisplacement, a lot of websites describe it and show a lot of good samples and usages!
This tutorial is only based on a "Displacement" and not "Micro displacement". And now, it's time to show how it works!