Hello everyone-
ZBrush Core newbie here. Actually I'm a sculpting newbie as well. I just got ZBrush Core and I'm trying to learn it with hopes of moving up to ZBrush if it's something I enjoy. Anyway, this is one of my first sculpts and I'm trying to capture a likeness of Alex (Malcolm McDowell) from A Clockwork Orange. It's definitely a WIP. The likeness isn't that great since I'm just referencing photos off the web as I work.

However, there are some pretty big gaps in my knowledge of the program and the sculpt process itself, so I have a couple of questions...

I simply extracted the hair from the top of his scalp and moved it around. Is there a better, more realistic way of handling this? I see lots of great work here with really realistic hair. Much thinner strands and such. Can this even be done with the limited Brush set offered in Core? Is this something that is done in Keyshot?

I still need to add his fake eyelash around his right eye. Those who know the movie will know what I'm talking about. Should that be extracted from a mask? I tried that and couldn't seem to get tight, tapered lines that resembled an eyelash. It didn't quite look right. Any suggestions?

I'm at about 2 million active points on this mesh right now. Did I go too high to quick? I still need to create his bowlers hat and I'm afraid that it might be difficult to move a hat (and hair) around with that many points.

Any suggestions on how to handle realistic skin textures. Are these done using Alpha channels on brushes?

And finally...Without having Key Shot, what are my options for rendering realistic figures. I primarily want to use my work in my illustrations / digital paintings. Can Blender provide a good level of realism?

Like I said, I still have lots of gaps in my knowledge, so I'll take any advice anyone wants to throw my way.

Other than that, does anyone see anything that I'm doing wrong or incorrectly? I want to make sure that I'm getting into good habits as I'm learning the ropes.

I'm enjoying everyone's work here. Very inspiring!