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Quad Remesher auto-retopology add-on released for Blender

66

Metin Seven writes:

The French software developer Exoside has released a Blender add-on version of their new Quad Remesher auto-retopology tool. Quad Remesher is based on the renowned ZRemesher in the ZBrush 3D sculpting suite, and comes from the same coder, Maxime Rouca.

A good mesh topology is beneficial to surface smoothness and editability, eases UV texturing and makes a mesh more suitable for rigging and animation.

Quad Remesher is capable of automatically retopologizing organic as well as hard-surface meshes, featuring only quadrangular polygons, ready for subdivision or for use as a base mesh for sculpting more details.

Quad Remesher offers a number of options to influence the result, such as preservation of areas that have materials assigned to them, auto-detecting sharp edges, and using vertex paint to indicate varying polygon density.

A typical workflow would be to use Quad Remesher to retopologize the major features of a mesh, then add Shrinkwrap and Subdivision modifiers or a Multiresolution modifier to increase detail derived from the preserved source mesh.

About the Author

Metin Seven

Dutch illustrator and 3D designer ( metinseven.nl ). Former Blender Technical Artist, news cartoonist, comic creator, TV show animator, magazine editor and 16-bit game developer.

66 Comments

    • Quad Remesher gives you top quality results. It's not just a remesher, it's an auto-retopologizer with smart placement of edge loops and singularities, resulting in meshes that are ready for proper UV mapping and rigging.

      I'd say: download the trial and compare the results to remeshers.

    • If you've ever had the pleasure of using ZBrush's ZRemesher, you'd know the quality is noticeably better than even Blender's upcoming Voxel Remesh system. It's nice to have the available option, if one desires. Much cleaner quad-based results that better keep the edge flow in mind.

  1. Folks, does a dev creating paid addons have to host them somewhere on github or is it up to them? What's Blender's policy on this matter?

    • The developer of a paid GPL addon is required to give the user who purchases it the source files. However, the addon file itself must be GPL, but if the addon is connected to another application, it's just a bridge between Blender and the other application used to send data, It's a different matter. For example, a renderer like Vray is not GPL, but it uses a GPL addon to connect Vray to Blender. Same for this retopology addon.

    • When the add-on incorporates and/or uses any of the Blender code (including script interfaces) - that add-on is licensed as GPL and the source must be made available in some form to those that download it. They do not need not make it available to the public, however, only those they distribute it to.

      There are "loopholes" to this though, one of which this add-on uses. The Blender add-on calls out to an executable, which is downloaded separately, and that executable doesn't use Blender code internally. As such, they only need to provide the source for their Blender-to-executable script (which IS the add-on download); not for the part doing the work (the executable).

  2. Is this really useful for animation? placing loops automatically around eyes mouth and all joints? If so im definetly in. Im not really enjoying topology by hand and for animation that is the only way to do it.

    • Quad Remesher definitely makes a mesh much more suitable for animation. If you're looking for the perfect topology with edge loops exactly where you want them, manual retopology will sometimes still be better.

      You can also combine both approaches: use Quad Remesher, then perform some manual fine-tuning if necessary.

  3. The most expensive perpetual pro license is only $109. I don't know about everyone else, but retopology takes me hours and is far less fun than sculpting. Even if you only made $7.00 an hour it would only take 15 hours of saved time to break even. Plus this isn't open software and people need to earn a living.

    • It's not that simple. The addon file itself must be GPL, but if the addon is connected to another application, it's just a bridge between Blender and the other application used to send data, It's a different matter. For example, a renderer like Vray is not GPL, but it uses a GPL addon to connect Vray to Blender. Same for this retopology addon.

  4. I am a little bit disappointed by the comments I have to say. There should be a $ in the title yes but:
    Why dont you read the whole buy page before complaining that its a subscription model the perpetual license is literally above the subscription license.
    And also this is a non trivial piece of software that is not mainly targeted at amateurs (even though there is a license for amateurs) so it will cost something and since its not trivial to solve such a thing it will cost a little bit more than a pack of materials. There is a lot of knowledge and brain power involved to develop such a software so please be considerate and don't complain on how pricey it is just because you want it.

    • Apologies if my earlier comments seemed like a complaint. No offense was intended.

      From my vantage point - there is no specific complaint about the apparent usefulness of this particular product. I don't care for subscription-based licensing in general, depending on its structure. I also fully understand the creator's need for payment for spending the time/resources to create the add-on. I get it.

      However, specifically regarding this product, the Indie version of this allows for no commercial use at all. There are instances where freelancers (who maintain other full-time careers) sell items on the side as well, who also wouldn't necessarily have as high a demand for this product . . . yet, are prohibited from benefiting from it should they choose to do so. At least not without a Pro or subscription-base license.

      Again - personally, I think this product looks fantastic but the bottom-line doesn't make sense for me to purchase the Indie license either. This because it excludes any commercial product I would create with it.

      The Substance Painter price/licensing structure works for me, for example, because they allow for a standalone license without restriction (other than company size).

      But hopefully all our comments will ultimately steer more people toward this product. Any buzz is good buzz, right? That way the creator can enjoy some of the free press. HA!! (And I DO NOT intend this as a passive-aggressive comment. I sincerely mean this.)

      At the end of the day, the benefit of purchasing this doesn't fit into my workflow. I'll do the work manually as I have done before. Again, not bashing this product. I think it looks really fantastic. But I choose to pass. I do wish them well.

      • well the formula on how many models you have to make before you earn money from this is: x = $109,9/w*t with w being your wage at your other career and t being the time benefit from this add-on
        so lets work this out. Lets say you make minimum wage and save 15 minutes when retopologizing a very conservative estimation. So after 60 models you literally start to make money from buying this addon. If you create one model a week it will take you one year and two months to start making money from this. lets say this is our highest expected time.
        Lets inspect a more avarage wage of $27.16 and lets say you save 30 minutes by using the add-on. In that case you will have earned money after about 8 models. Again lets say you make a model a week. Then after two months your investment will have paid off.
        That does not even account for the money you make from selling those models.
        Now I don't want to say you should buy the plugin off course not. I simply want to show that you need to calculate this through before saying that this does not make sense for you instead of claiming that people selling their products are prohibited from making money with it. For $50 more you are very much allowed to do so.

        • Rombout Versluijs on

          Well i guess you save money after perhaps 1 or 2 models already. Retopo is tedious labor so 15 or 30 minutes is almost impossible. Unless you mean very simple shapes, but you would not need it for that i guess

    • If only people were this considerate about the work that goes into Blender, maybe it would not have turned into a bare bone application that fits the old adage "it's free if you don't value your time", because if you do, Blender alone can't help you, you need hundreds of dollars of add-ons to get work done efficiently according to the sales pitch of 99% of the add-on, "buy this because Blender sucks at it". So think a little about the people who contributed to Blender's development and now see it become a paid-addon-dependent software.

      • I feel like that is simply not true, I work as a game developer and mostly use vanilla blender. 80% of the time we work very efficiently without the need for more sophisticated solutions. The other 20% are very niche applications of blender that are not really needed in non game development, however these are things the blender foundation cannot provide because there are many niches and every niche has its own specialized tools needed. Funnily enough the one thing disregarding blenders developers the most is your comment by branding blender as a paid-addon-dependent software just shortly after the developers completly reworked its entire structure making it an even more competitive modern software.
        In fact they managed to make several open movies with it without any "need" for paid addons, so it might just be that you are not broadening your horizons and learning what is possible with vanilla blender before reading an advertisement and deciding that you cant work without it anymore.

  5. Wish people didn’t complain so much. The perpetual license options really aren’t so bad. Big thanks to the creators for creating a great piece of software.

    • You haven't even tested it yet you call it a great piece of software... If i want to use it on a laptop and a desktop PC do i need 2 licenses? I ask since you seem to know so much about this add-on.

      • No. You do not need 2 license for that!
        With one license, the owner of this license can install, activate and use it on 2 machines (see EULA...).

  6. Question about licensing: If I want to use it at home and at work, do I have to buy two difference licenses, since it would be on 2 different computers, or could I get away with just 1 pro license?

  7. Rombout Versluijs on

    How can they say its baed on Zremesher? Does this mean it has simular code or outcome or is it just a gimic to attract possible users?

  8. What are the chances of getting the same features in the Blender version as the Maya version? Specifically, "use existing hard edges", which is notably absent from the Blender version, at least in the demo/trial version?

  9. Just downloaded the demo a few mins ago, zip installed OK and the remesh engine was installed as per the FAQ however when I try and remesh anything, even default cube It errors out:

    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "C:\Users\me\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.83\scripts\addons\quad_remesher\qr_operators.py", line 536, in modal
    doRemeshing_Finish(self, context)
    File "C:\Users\me\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.83\scripts\addons\quad_remesher\qr_operators.py", line 416, in doRemeshing_Finish
    import_mesh_fbx(theOp.retopoFilename)
    File "C:\Users\me\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.83\scripts\addons\quad_remesher\qr_operators.py", line 81, in import_mesh_fbx
    bpy.ops.import_scene.fbx(filepath=filepath)
    File "C:\Blender\blender-2.83-6fff73e3f001-windows64\2.83\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py", line 201, in __call__
    ret = op_call(self.idname_py(), None, kw)
    RuntimeError: Error: Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "C:\Blender\blender-2.83-6fff73e3f001-windows64\2.83\scripts\addons\io_scene_fbx\__init__.py", line 226, in execute
    return import_fbx.load(self, context, filepath=self.filepath, **keywords)
    TypeError: load() got an unexpected keyword argument 'hide_props_region'

    location: C:\Blender\blender-2.83-6fff73e3f001-windows64\2.83\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py:201
    location: :-1

    Any ideas?
    Thanks

  10. I bought quad remesher last week and it does remesh well, but once model is remeshed the computer struggles to do the smallest of thing, like selecting a few faces or vertexes and takes forever to make slight change in the mesh, also some functions simple dont work in blender after remeshing, like filling holes in the mesh just wont work. At this point i am not happy. There is no where on their website to make comments and asking for help is cumbersome to say the least.

  11. I've seen this work on many YT tutorials, so I went ahead and bought it. The installation went along fine but... it doesn't work. I get an error: remeshing failed! returned without progress file -0
    I'm running Blender 2.91.2 on a Mac OS 10.13.6
    I upgraded Blender to 3.4.1 and it doesn't work in there either.

    I've written several times and gotten no response.

    Does anyone have any ideas? There's nothing on their site.

  12. isn't that an issue with file rules in particular permissions? perhaps try to use a folder where you know you have permissions to read and write.
    I'm just guessing here, but I know osx can be very strict since a couple years

  13. I think it's a problem with the addon. I have another newer computer running Blender 4.0 and Mcc OS 12.5 and it installed and works fine. I will say the customer support is non existent, which is very disappointing.

  14. Dorian Vallejo on

    Thanks. Yes. I have that email and I have contacted them through their contact page. I have finally gotten a response (from the purchasing support email). So, now I will amend my previous complaint to say "extremely delayed" response. I hate to complain about anything. I considered just forgetting about it and chalking it up as a loss, but I'd really like to use the addon because I know how great it is.

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