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Using Zbrush on Linux

ZBrush Usage Questions
#82

I am still quite new to linux myself and I am trying several distros to find the one which suits me best. Today I tried Pop!OS 21.04 and at the beginning I had your same issue, but I managed to solve it quite easily.

First I installed the latest development release of Wine. Then Lutris. In lutris, I installed Zbrush with the default settings, choosing Wine as the runner.
During the installation, I accepted all the additional installations required.
I started Zbrush and I saw I had your issue. I closed it, I choose “configure” from the Lutris menu, and installed the lutris runner. I closed and restarted lutris, I again clicked “configure” for Zbrush, then changed the runner from Wine to Lutris. Started Zbrush and the issue was solved, but my stylus was acting weird. So I closed Zbrush, reverted back the runner and finally everything works correctly.

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#83

@Z_Z Have you tried the overrides THINKIT suggested in the post #9? As well as vcomp140 (native, builtin). This fixed it for me. Hope it helps :slight_smile:

Also, for anyone having issues with pen pressure, try to use “Windowed (virtual desktop)” option if you’re using Lutris (it’s in Configure if you right-click on a game). I believe the same option is in winecfg under Graphics → Emulate a virtual desktop although I have not tried it.

#84

Here is my current procedure. It is simple, fast and works for me. I hope it will work for you also.

System: Dual Xeon, Nvidia 2080, lots of RAM.

OS:

  1. Clean install of Debian 11 (now stable!)
  2. Chose KDE plasma.
  3. installed Timeshift using “/Applications/System/Discover”.
    Did an initial system backup (not user) to a separate drive with rsync mode. It was fast to.

Installing Wine 6.0.1 (stable)
Then I followed the guide on Debian - WineHQ Wiki for Debian 11 (Bullseye). See below steps.

Like this:

  1. logged in as root in terminal (su [enter])
 dpkg --add-architecture i386
  1. wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/winehq.key
  2. sudo apt-key add winehq.key
  3. nano /etc/apt/sources.list
    Appended lines to file:
 # wine
 deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/debian/ bullseye main
  1. sudo apt update

sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-stable

Observed no missing dependencies for installation!

Opened a new terminal window for user
1.

winecfg

  1. chose install for all questions
  2. accepted winecfg with no other changes for now
  3. Copied Zbrush_2021.7_Installer.exe to “/home/[user]/.wine/drive_c/"
  4. Terminal:

cd .wine/drive_c/

  1. check wine in terminal

wine –version
wine64 –version

Observed result: wine-6.0.1
7.

wine64 ./Zbrush_2021.7_Installer.exe

Default installation
The installation experience looked good.
Chose “launch Zbrush”
Waited
8. Activated Zbrush using web.
9. Observed the “lines issue”. Lightbox show items but has a “clearing issue”.
10.

winecfg

Opened tab Libraries and added:
vcomp140 (native,builtin)
Terminal:

wine64 ‘/home/shared/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Pixologic/ZBrush 2021/ZBrush.exe’

  1. Observed: No “lines issue” and no “clearing issue”.
    Such a simple procedure and such a relief!
    Wacom pressure works (but with the same issue as before if pressing hard)
    There could be other issues, but my main concern are these.
    Thanks Debian, Wine and Pixologic!

If I can not recreate your problem, it is near impossible for me to help you out. My best way to help you is to simply write down what works.

#85

I made a video out of all I’ve gathered on this forum thread, please see if it’s correct and mentions everything that’s needed :slight_smile: How To Use ZBrush on Linux [2021] - YouTube

#86

@Zigglywo so good you made a video.

Regarding the Wacom pressure issue with Wine Zbrush I have some additional information.

First, I’ve tried many ways to (properly) remove the issue, however my attempts failed. I guess there is something wrong with how Linux currently by default interpret the Wacom pressure. It could also be something in Wine related with Wacom.

With the below configuration that solves the issue in Wine ZBrush, I did a comparison test with Wine Photoshop CS5 (trial). My Wacom lines did not update when pressing, causing only straight lines. The Surface pen did update but without any pressure. This show that when using Wine a tablets functions seem to be somehow app specific. When using Linux with Wine, just because it works in one app does not mean it works in another.

At the same time when using ZBrush the pressure issue is removed with both the Surface tablet and with Wacom when using Turbovnc with the below argument.

wine-zbrush-wacom

As mentioned I am currently using a VNC connection to my workstation. To start the vncserver I use the following command:
/opt/TurboVNC/bin/vncserver -localhost -virtualtablet :1

The argument “virtualtablet” will modify how the tablet functions. Now, when running ZBrush I get the result as in the attached image.
The first two strokes will have the issue present (1-2), but soon it will be gone (3-5).

However, I guess this does not “solve” much for you if you use a Wacom, a proper solution might be increased features in the Wacom configuration tools available for Linux. For example one attempt could be to try and map the pressure to something else than 0-2047, for example half or double.

#87

Thank you very much!!! This is a great help! I am thinking of switching to Linux but I need to be sure zbrush works perfectly as I am professional and this is essential.

#88

Hello everyone, again! I’m happy to say I found how to make DecimationMaster work. Just go to Preferences → Decimation Master and check “Use DLL”. That’s it :slight_smile:

#89

Ok, my short advice is:

  1. Use multiple storage disks for dual boot (keep things simple)
  2. Install Linux last
  3. Backup your system when it works and keep making backups with history
  • timeshift for Linux system (not user files)
  1. Keep your user files where you can access them from both systems

If you follow the above guidelines you should be safe as you try, learn and eventually become a power user

#90

Hello, i have managed to install Zbrush on Rocky linux (cent os derivative) with lutris and latest wine version, and it works fully, i didn’t notice any broken features. My xp pen tablet works great as well.

However, i have one major problem. The time to open is ridiculous, ~5-7 minutes. When i was on windows zbrush would open in seconds.

Does anyone know how to fix it?

#91

Hi @Romanovixh. It take about 20 seconds on my config with ZBrush 2021.7 (RAID with four SSD:s optimized for performance, but not remarkably fast - not even PCIE). Obviously you have a problem. Sorry, I have no idea what exact setup you have and can not solve your issue.

However, the latest version 2022.0.2 does not launch at all. I have not tried to figure out what is wrong.

You will need to identify why your reading time is slow or maybe stopped. Try running through a console if possible and read any error messages or warnings. I do not think it take 5-7 minutes to read ZBrush. It sounds like it is waiting for something until finally giving up. Not sure at all. Probably you will find out eventually.

Or just keep waiting for someone else who has the same issue and a solution.

Maybe do a performace test of your reading speed from the partition or network device you have your home directory in. This is the default place for Wine.

#92

For the sake of installing ZBrush on GNU/Linux machines in a simple and quick manner, I created a git repository holding Lutris installation script(s) for the current, and possibly also future versions of the program.

It will, more or less, automate the installation process. More, because most of the Wine-related stuff will be dealt with automatically. Less, because I didn’t find a way to run ZBrush installer in a silent mode, so it will, at a certain point, require user interaction. Typical for Windows software. If you know a way to circumvent this and run the installer in a silent mode, then please do let me know. Preferably in GitHub issues section, as I’m not a frequent patron of these forums.

Happy sculpting.

2 Likes
#93

I recently installed zbrush on fedora and i am getting this wierd issue with my wacom tab that when i try to sculpt it scupt to other place to.
As i am new to this community it does not allow me to upload so i am sharing reddit post of my issue.

#94

Hi @satyam_mishra. After checking your video I can recall seeing a similar issue myself, but that was really long ago (probably more than a year). It did not happen as frequent as for you, however I noticed while sculpting that suddenly the pointer would “jump” to another position and there will be a straight line from the initial position to the new point. This happened rarely, but in your case it seem to happen with every stroke.

The good news is that there is a solution. I do not have that issue at all.

The bad part is that first, I do not have any specific quide for how to get rid of the issue. As you wrote yourself the issue did not happen with Ubuntu. Neither does it (seem to) happen with Debian11. I think it happened with CentOS 7 (similar to Fedora) and I know it was possible to get rid of it, but sorry I do not remember what the cause or the solution could be.

If I ever could remember a solution I would share that, and unfortunately I can not find any notes about this issue. My advice is to play around with changing whatever you can think of and try to see if there is a change. You can especially adjust the window (for example full screen, not full screen etc). Good luck!

#95

.@THINKIT , Thank you for the reply , I have tried many thing but it did not work. So I am currently using it in windows VM.

When you remember the solution pls tell as VM feels a lot slower.

#96

@satyam_mishra Out of curiosity, when you are using the vm do you do a “passthrough” of your wacom tablet to it? If not, you probably should try it out.

It will be very hard to give you a description of how to solve the issue, because for this kind of support you first would need to recreate the issue and then test what works.

For now I just have a few memories. One thing I was thinking of is that I have a vague memory that with CentOS7 I was not supposed to install everything with ZBrush. It could have been some “fix visual C++” or similar that comes with ZBrush.

I am sure there was something that was not supposed to be installed because then it was not possible to fix things, and maybe it was that issue, but as mentioned this is really crappy free community support because it is not done the right way.

However, if you want to try you probably will need to remove and reinstall your entire Wine (or maybe try with prefix). Then install Zbrush (only) but avoid those additional packages (vcredist.exe and everything after the initial installation). See if there is any difference.

As a side note, I have been troubleshooting VNC-setups a lot in the past and this could be related with that. I have no idea at the moment.

#97

@thinkit, I did passthrough my wacom so everything is fine in vm except some lag which maybe due to my less core available in vm.

The solution you gave is time consuming so I’ll try this when I am free. Anyways thanks for the help. I’ll reply once I am done trying this.

#98

@satyam_mishra Just keep in mind it is simply a suggestion and not yet a solution. Another question would be why you want or need Fedora?

Edit: I found out that I could run RenderMan without RedHat and so I went with Debian11 eventually, and everything works better. This is just my experience. For sure I have tried a bunch of different distros, just so you know. In my setup I need renderman, houdini, zbrush, backups, turbovnc, wacom, wine, virtualgl, surface-kernel, stability and a few more things. It just works sweet with Debian11 and if it is not broken, I’m not trying to fix it.

#99

@thinkit , I wanted a distro with bleeding-edge but was not ready for arch based distro as I saw on Reddit people complaining about how it can frequently break. So I got a suggestion to use fedora. Also as many softwares distribute rpm packages so thought to give it a try.

Except zbrush it runs fine. So not a very big issue but I use zbrush so was expecting to get it running in wine with much more performance loss compare to VM

#100

@satyam_mishra

Ok, when people are suggesting things it seems to me that sometimes their advice is based on their own need or personal experience based on that need and not some absolute truth or universal solution for all. For RPM i think there is RedHat, Fedora, Centos and Rocky (and maybe SUSE?). I think I used “alien” to convert RPM to .deb and it worked with RenderMan.

At this moment I just fired up ZBrush to check how the Wacom is behaving. There is one issue still with Wine-ZBrush-TurboVNC, and that is if I maximize the ZBrush window to full screen the wacom pressure is not working in that mode. However with full size window it works properly. Also, with dual screens added to vnc the tablet mapping get confused (because the two screens do not have exactly the same proportions). It is possible to fix with scripting that maps the tablet and also set both screens to the exact same resolution. At this time I mostly use Houdini and only occasionally ZBrush, but is seem to still work as expected if I disable one screen (when running through a network).!

Now I troubleshoot Houdini kinefx rigging and not Wine-ZBrush, so it is nice when other people keep this interest updated.

#101

@thinkit Ok I know what you mean by that I was using Ubuntu before and there everything was working fine expect for the crappy distro itself. So I turned to Reddit for suggestion and as I said I wanted something bleeding edge with less headache as I play games occasionally.

And I’ll say that if I do not have to use zbrush and photoshop fedora gave me least trouble. As while installing nvidia driver in Ubuntu it was the biggest problem. I had to waste my entire day just to update. Because of which I stopped updating my nvidia driver. In fedora it is just a click in software center and it does all the work.