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Introduction to 3D Studio Max

Lectures by Jeffrey Abouaf (Fall 2000)


Transcribed and Illustrated by Blue Bactol

How does this thing work?

3D Studio Max debuted around 1990 as a visualization tool for professionals in


architecture, construction and engineering (“AEC”) looking for a way to provide a 3D
visualization of their 2D CAD/CAM drawings. 3D shows an idea from all angles. Any
animation was restricted to moving lights and cameras. But this product could make
beautiful rendered images, and it ran on an Intel 386 PC -- by far the most cost-
effective solution available. This wasn’t lost on a few propeller-heads who realized
they could make 3D artwork for interactive video games and multimedia. 3D Studio
Max, introduced in 1996, marked a shift in emphasis from design visualization with
animating extensions to a full animation environment, developed for multi-threaded,
multi-processor machines running Windows NT.

Max consists of around 100 plug-in components organized around a core engine.
The product ships with a software developers kit 9SDK) to allow anyone (with C++
programming skills) to write new plug-ins, which integrate seamlessly in Max’s
interface. Max also includes its own scripting language (Maxscript), which allows
non-programmers to write their own extensions to Max, without knowing C++. This
extensibility enables Max to hold it’s own among the top players in professional 3D
animation, i.e. Alias’ Maya, Newtek’s Lightwave and Softimage’s XSI, which find
their predominant use in Film, broadcast, video games, simulation and visualization,
and in 3D on the web.

Max is fundamentally a polygonal modeling tool, although it also includes Patch and
NURBS modeling technologies. Why polys? Because they are the most efficient to
create in a computer: to locate a point in 3D, you need only three coordinates (X, Y,
Z); to draw a line, you need only locate two points and add an instruction to draw a
line between them; for a surface (a Face in Max) , you need locate only three points,
connect the dots in a triangle, and paint one side. To make four sided faces, called
polygons or quads in Max, put together two triangular faces.

In Max, you move, rotate, and scale objects in the 3D environment called World
Space. These manipulations are canned “Transforms” To model an object, you
sculpt it by manipulating its geometric components, called “sub-objects”, i.e. vertex,
edge, face, and poly, using the object’s own coordinate system, called “Local
Coordinates”. Moving, Rotating, or scaling these components at the Sub-Object level
are usually referred to as “sub-object modeling”, or sometimes as modeling using
“XForms”

The following exercises cover much of the lecture content, and were prepared for
use with Max 3.1. These features continue to be available in Max 5.x and 6.x, the
most recent versions.
Scaling a sphere on object level and sub-object level

1. Create a sphere in your front viewport


2. Right mouse click on it and ‘convert to editable mesh’.
3. Right mouse click and select properties. Look at the
dimensions of the sphere.
4. Click on the ‘select and uniform scale’ tool and scale the
sphere.
5. Right mouse click and select properties. Notice the
dimensions did not change. You scaled the object only with
respect to world space.
6. Click on the Modify panel. Click on Sub-Object mode – Element.
7. Click on the “Select and Uniform Scale” tool and scale the sphere.
8. Right mouse click and select properties. Notice the dimensions
have changed. You scaled the object with respect to object
geometry. In effect spinning out a cloud of points.

View – pivot exercise


The default coordinate system in MAX is referred to as ‘view’. ‘View’ coordinates will change
based on your view of the selected object. ‘View’ coordinate system will maintain your object
as ‘Y = up, X = right, Z = points toward you’ regardless of world space for your convenience.
‘Screen’ uses the active viewport screen as the coordinate system. ‘Parent’ uses the
coordinate system of the parent of the selected object. ‘World’ uses the world coordinate
system and is orthographic. ‘World’ is a literal coordinate representation of your selected
object based on world space. ‘ Local’ uses the coordinate system of the selected object and
will realign with respect to the selected objects local coordinates.

1. Change your view to local.


2. Create a box in your front view port. Length 50. Width
200, Height 50.
3. Using the select and rotate tool rotate the box on the Z-
axis in the front view port.
4. Draw a torus in the front view port. Radius 1: 20, Radius
2: 5.
5. Line the torus up to the box as shown.
6. With the torus selected change the view from Local to Pick
and select the box. Notice the torus axis changed to match
the axis of the box.
7. Click the time configuration button and change the Length
to 30
8. Click on the animate button. Change the active frame to
30 and move the torus to the tip of the box.
9. Change your view to local.
10. Using the select and rotate tool rotate the torus 2
revolutions.
11. Turn off the animate button and play the animation. Your
torus should roll up the ramp of the box.
Rotating (or scaling) two boxes around different pivot points.
1. Create a box in your front viewport.
2. Using the select and move tool hold down the shift key, select the
box, move the box to the right.
3. In the clone dialog that appears select ‘copy’.
4. Drag a marquee around both boxes to select them.
5. Click the ‘use selection center’ button.
6. Click on the rotate tool and rotate the boxes around their collective
geometric center.
7. Now click ‘use pivot point center’ and rotate the boxes around their
individual pivot points.
8. Click on ‘use transform coordinate center’ and rotate the boxes
around the current coordinate system.

‘Use Selection Center’

Clone Teapot (copy, instance, reference exercise)


1. Make a teapot in your perspective viewport.
2. Click on ‘Mirror Selected Objects’.
3. In the mirror dialog box click on the different axis selections to see
your teapot mirrored on different axis.
4. Type in offset number of 200 and choose ‘copy’.
5. Re-select your original teapot. ‘Mirror Selected
6. Open the material editor, select an unused material slot, click on the
diffuse channel and apply the bricks material. NOTE: be sure to
select the ‘Show Map in Viewport’ button. The copied clone does not
update with the material. Copies are completely independent.
7. Re-select the original teapot (Teapot01).
8. Go to the modify panel and apply a stretch modifier.
9. Turn on the animate button, change your current frame to 30, type
in a 2.O stretch.
10. Turn off animate button. Play your animation.
You should see your teapot animate and strech from frame 0-30.
11. Hold down the shift key while you select and move Teapot01.
12. In the Clone Options dialog choose to make one instance.
13. Re-select your original teapot (Teapot 01).
14. Go to the modify panel and apply a bend modifier.
15. Turn on the animate button, type in 60 for the current frame, and
type in a bend angle of 100.
16. Turn off the animate button. Play your animation.
17. The instance is updated with the ‘bend’. Instanced objects update
everything on each other except for transforms, object properties
and spacewarp bindings.
18. Hold down the shift key and select and move your original teapot
(Teapot 01)
19. In the Clone Options dialog choose to make one reference.
20. Select the reference.
21. Go to the modify panel and apply a ‘twist’ modifier to the reference.
22. Turn on the animate button, type in 80 for current frame, and type in a twist angle of
100.
23. Turn off the animate button. Play your animation.
24. The reference is a one-way instance. It updates with any changes made to the original
object, but modification made to a reference are not passed back to the original.

Using Autogrid to create objects of the face of a Pyramid


1. Create a pyramid in your front viewport.
2. Click on the cylinder button, and turn on Autogrid.
3. In the perspective viewport create your cylinders on any
face of the pyramid. Autogrid will place a grid on the face of
the object you are aligning to.

Creating a wineglass using spline and lathe

1. In the create panel choose shapes, and press the line button.
2. In your front viewport draw the profile of a wineglass.

Note: Click and drag to create. Right mouse click to stop creation
mode.

3. With line selected click on the modify button.


4. Click on subobject button to access the vertex, segment, and
spline levels of your wineglass profile. Here you can adjust the
shape of your line.

Note: Right mouse clicking on your object will give you a roll out
that gives you the options for modify mode, sub-object.

5. Now that you are happy with the wineglass profile go to modify
and add a lathe modifier.
6. Go the lathe subobject - axis and select and move the axis to lathe around the correct
axis. Or you can select in the lathe parameters select align – max. Look at the different
effect you get when you lathe around the X, Y, and Z axis.
7. Go to the line in your modifier stack.
8. Select the line, hold down the shift key and move the line
making one copy.
9. Delete the inside verticies making your wineglass open on the
inside.
10. Leave subobject mode and go back to the lathe in your
modifier stack. Notice you cannot see the normals on the inside
of your second wineglass.
11. Open the material editor and select an empty slot. Change the shader basic parameters
to 2 sided.
12. Assign the material to your second wineglass.
Notice you can now see the interior of the second wineglass even though it does not have
the extra geometry.

Modeling a head using the displacement material

1. Create a sphere in the top viewport. Radius 50, Segments 100.


2. Click on your perspective viewport label and turn off Show Grid.
3. Click on the modify panel, click ‘More’, click ‘Displace’.
4. Go to the Utilities panel, Asset Manager, and browse to your program files/3d MAX
3.1 directory/maps/creatures/displace.tif.
5. Return to the modify panel and drag displace.tif from the Asset Manager to the
image bitmap button labeled ‘None’.
6. Change the map to spherical. The amber sphere is your mapping gizmo.
7. Turn on luminence center. This will constrain
the projection to the general size of the ball, if
it remains unchecked it will project flat and be
to large for the sphere.
8. Change displacement strength to 30. Notice
how your geometry changes as you adjust the
displacement strength.
9. In the modify panel apply a stretch modifier.
10. Choose the Z axis and change the stretch
strength to .4
Making your displaced head chew

1. Zoom in on the mouth area in the left viewport.


2. In the modify panel apply a Mesh Select modifier.
3. Go to Sub-Object mode – polygon.
4. Select the entire mouth area.

Note: Alt click to subtract from selection, Ctrl click to


add to selection. Use the space bar to lock and unlock
the selection.

5. Apply a ffd 4-4-4 modifier.


6. Select the Sub Object mode Control Points.
7. Turn on Display Latice, and Deform only in
volume.
8. Define the volume affected by going to Sub Object
– Set Volume.
9. After setting volume go back to Sub Object – Control Points.
10. Change time configuration to Length of 30.
11. Starting at frame 0 turn on the animate button.
12. At frame 10 select and move the latice control points to the
beginning of a chewing motion. This will set a key frame at
frame 10.
13. At frame 20 move the latice control points to continue the chewing. This will set a key
frame at frame 20.
14. At frame 30 move the latice control points to complete the chewing. This will set a key
frame at frame 30.
15. Turn off the annimate button and Notice the keys you have created in the timeline.
16. Press the play button and view your annimation.

Apply a wave space warp to your chewing displaced head

1. Zoom out of your top view port.


2. In the Create pannel click on the Space warps button.
3. Create a wave space warp in the top viewport. First click creates the size second
click defines the amplitude.
4. Make Amplitude 1 and 2 a value of 10.
5. Select the head.
6. In the modify panel apply a Mesh Select modifier.
7. Go to Sub Object – Vertex.
8. In the left viewport select the brain area of your head.
9. Click the bind to space warp button and click first the Wave, then drag curser over
and release on the head when the cursor changes.
11. Click on the animate button and drag the time slider to the far right and move
the space warp to the other side of the head.
12. Press the play button and view the annimation.
Modeling a box into an airplane

Full tutorial located in 3D Studio Max R3 Tutorials book that ships with program Page 139, and
3D Studio Max R3 .1 Online Tutorials ‘Creating a Low-Polygon Spaceship’.

1. Create a box in the top viewport.


2. In the parameters roll out give it a length of 200, a width of 100, and
a height of 50.
3. Give it length segments of 3, width segments of 3, and height
segments of 3.
4. Go to the modify panel, click on the ‘edit stack’ button and convert to
an editable mesh. Or right mouse click on the box and convert to an
editable mesh.
5. Right mouse click on the viewport label, check show ‘edged faces’
6. Right mouse click on the viewport label, click on ‘configure’, on the
‘rendering method’ tab check ‘shade selected faces’.
7. Click the ‘sub object’ button. Select polygon.

8. Begin by selecting the middle polygons.

9. Do a non-uniform scale on the X axis.

10. Extrude the selection.

11. Using the select and move tool, select and scale tool, extrude, and
bevel tools begin to pull the box into the shape of an airplane.
12. Use your face, polygon, and vertex sub-object selections where
nessesary.

Note: Be aware of the ‘ignore backfacing’ check box


which allows you to turn on and off selection of
back facing mesh. Use F2 to toggle visibility of your
selection set. Use alt to subtract from your
selection, and ctrl to add to your selection.

13. In the modify panel apply a Mesh Smooth


modifier. In the parameters turn on Display
Control Mesh.
14. In the modifier stack browse down to Editable
Mesh and click on Show End Result.
15. Continue to refine the shape of the plane.
Editable Mesh Modeling
Modeling a box into a hand.

1. Create a box in your top viewport. Length: 200,


Width: 200, Height: 50. Length Segs: 3, Width
Segs: 7, Height Segs: 1.
2. Right mouse click on the Perspective viewport label
and turn on edged faces.
3. Right mouse click on the box and click Convert to
Editable Mesh.
4. Click on Sub Object, select Polygon.
5. Select every other face where the fingers should
appear.
Note: CTRL click will add to your selection, ALT click
will subtract from your selection, space bar will lock
your selection, F2 will shade the selection.
6. Scale the faces up to simulate the top knuckle.
7. Extrude the faces for the first finger segment.
8. At each knuckle scale, taper, and extrude to create
the shape of the fingers.
9. Create the thumb in the same way.

Be aware of the Ignore Backfacing check box


while making your selection.

10. To refine your mesh in Sub Object level, select edge.


11. Use the cut tool to create the finger ridges.
12. Working in the edge and vertex levels of the sub
object mode move, scale, and rotate your edges and
vertex selections to model the hand.
13. Go out of the Sub-Object level by clicking the ‘Sub-
Object’ button.
14. In the Modifiers roll out, click ‘More’ and apply a
‘MeshSmooth’ Modifier.
15. Change the Subdivision from 1 to 2. This will show
you the smoothed result of your polygonal mesh.
Try the three different types of Smoothing; Classic,
NURMS, and Quad Output.
16. In Display/Weighting check Display control mesh.
17. Go back down the modifier stack to Editable Mesh.
18. Click on the Show End Result button.

You can now continue modeling the hand and see the
result of the MeshSmooth as you go.
Lofting a circle and star along a line

1. In the Create panel click the ‘Shapes’ button.


2. Create a Circle in the top viewport Radius 25
3. Create a star in the top viewport radius 1: 30, Radius 2: 10
4. Create a line in the front viewport drawing from top to bottom.
5. Click on the Create Geometry button. Select Compound Objects – Loft.
6. Make sure the path is selected. Click on Get Shape.
7. In path parameters type in 25
8. Select the circle.
9. In skin parameters turn off the display skin display to see spline shape.

Note: A little yellow X shows the location along the path of your circle.

10. In path parameters type in 75.


11. Click the get shape button and select the star.
12. In path parameters type in 100
13. Click the get shape button and select
the circle.
14. Now if you look at your loft you will
see the circle has blended from the
star and back to the circle.

Animate the shapes in the loft

15. Select the star shape.


16. Turn on the animate button.
17. Drag the time slider to the end.
18. Change radius 1 of the star to 10,
radius 2 of the star to 20.
19. View the annimation.
20. Select the circle shape.
21. Turn on the animate button.
22. Drag the time slider to the end.
23. Change the radius of the circle to 40.

Make a loft with a donut.

24. Select the loft.


25. In the Display panel click on Hide selected.
26. In the Create panel click the ‘Shapes’ button.
27. Create a donut in the top viewport. Radius 1 value of
10, Radius 2 value of 20.
28. Select the line.
29. Click on the Create Geometry button. Select
Compound Objects – Loft.
30. Click on Get Shape.
31. Select the donut.

Notice the negative space in the loft.

Animate a star within the negative space

32. Delete the loft.


33. In the Create panel select shapes – circle.
34. Draw a circle around the star.
35. Select the star.
36. In the modify panel add an Edit Spline modifier.
37. In the geometry roll out click on the attach button.
38. Select the circle to attach it to the star.

Note: The object that gets attached will loose it’s


animation. Be sure to attach circle to star instead of
star to circle.

39. Select the line.


40. Click on the Create Geometry button. Select
Compound Objects – Loft.
41. Click on Get Shape.
42. Select the star shape.
43. View the animation and see star animate within the loft.

Make the star animation occur in positive space

44. In the Create panel select shapes – star.


45. Draw a star around the star/circle object.
46. Select the star/circle object
47. In the modify panel go to the edit spline modifier.
48. In the geometry roll out click on the attach button.
49. Select the new star to attach it to the star/circle object.
50. View the animation on the loft. The star is now in positive.
Note: Layers will continue to alternate from positive to negative with the
outside layer allways containing the geometry.

Creating a Boolean Column

1. Turn on 3D Snap toggle grid points.


2. Right mouse click on 3D Snap Toggle button.
3. Turn on Snap to Origin.
4. Go to Create geometry standard primitives.
5. Create cylinder with a height of 150 radius of 40.
6. Turn off 3D Snap Toggle.
7. Create another cylinder on the edge of cylinder 01 height 200 radius 6
8. Turn 3D Snap back on.
9. With second cylinder selected click on the heirarchy panel – Pivot.
10. Select Affect Pivot Only.
11. Move pivot to the center of Cylinder 01.
12. With Cylinder 02 sellected click on the Array tool.
13. In Rotate Totals Z enter a value of 360.
14. Array dimensions 1D, count of 12.
15. Select Cylinder 02.
16. Right mouse click and click Convert to Editable
Mesh.
17. In the Modify panel click on Attach List.
18. Select Cylinder 03 – Cylinder 13 from Attach List.

Click on your Select By Name button and notice your


select by name list now only conains two objects.

19. Select Cylinder 01.


20. In the Create panel, Compound Objects click the
Boolean button.
21. Click on the Pick Operand B button and select
Cylinder 02.

Vol. Select with FFD 4x4x4 Exercise Wax dripping down a candle

1. Create a Cylinder in your top viewport. Radius: 10,


Height: 50, Cap: 5, Sides: 2
2. Go to the modify panel. Click More. Apply a Vol.Select
modifier.
3. Click Sub Object of your Vol Select. Select Gizmo.
4. Click Non uniform scale. Scale along height and width
reducing the size of the gizmo.
5. Using Select and move, move the gizmo to the top of the
cylinder.
6. Change Stack selection level to Vertex.
7. Turn on Soft selection. Falloff: 6.
8. Click the animate button. Drag the time slider to the end.
9. Drag the gizmo to the bottom of your cylinder.
10. Turn off the animate button. Press play, and you should see the gizmo travel down the
cylinder.
Apply second modifier without leaving the Sub
Object level of the Vol. Select.
11. Click the More button. Apply the FFD4x4x4.
12. Click the Sub Object button. Select Control points.
13. Using Select and Move, grab the control points, pull them out, and model the wax that will
drip down the candle.
14. Play your animation. Should look like candle wax dripping down the side of a candle.

Soft Selection, Flex Exercise

1. Create a sphere with a radius of 50. Segments: 50.


2. Click on base to pivot to align the sphere to your grid.
3. Right click on the sphere and select ‘Convert to editable mesh’.
4. Click on Sub Object Vertex.
5. Check Ignore Backfacing.
6. In top viewport select the top vertex.
7. Lock the selection with your spacebar.
8. Click on ‘use soft selection’. Make the falloff 90.
9. Move the vertex up and down.
10. Play with the pinch and bubble settings
11. Without leaving the Sub Object mode go to More and apply a Flex modifier.
12. Parameters of Flex: 5, Strength: 3, Sway: 10.
13. Turn on the animate button. Drag the time slider to the end and move the ball to the
right.
14. Turn off the animate button. Play your animation.

Soft Selection Paint exercise (using free plugin ssl paint)

1. Make a plane,
2. Paint a selection on the surface of the plane
3. Apply a wave space warp
4. amp1 3 amp2 3
5. wave length 3
6. move warp clost to plane
7. bind to space warp bind warp to pland
8. turn on the animate button and animate the phase to 3
9. play animation
10. copy the space warp
11. rotate the space warp
12. bind new warp to the plane
13. and animate the new warp with decay of 1
play the animation

Scatter

1. create simple box


2. create a teapot segments 8 radius 15
3. place material on teapot … metal rust
4. rcollapse box to editable mesh
5. put invisible material on box
6. right click on teapot and
7. teapot selected
8. create geometry compound objects scatter
9. pick distribution object box
10. use selected faces onlu
11. display - proxy (explane the lowwer display thingie)
12. distribute ausing area
13. duplicate 300
14. transform random rotation of 316 deg
15. render the scene and see the level of detail displayed
16. zoom in and see the detail that exists within the screen
volume scatter is useful, and hair is very doable with scatter

Using the Scatter Modifier to simulate hair

1. Create a sphere.. hemisphere for a head


2. Open the material editor and apply a wood material to the head
3. apply a blur to the material and tile the material
4. Create a cone. radius 1 =025 radius2 0 height …
5. apply a bend modifier bend angle of 90
6. sub object center adjust angle
7. hair now bends
8. texture on both
9. Move pivot point.. hierarchy panel affect pivot only and move the pivot to the base
10. apply the material to the cone too
11. create compound object pick distribution object of the head
12. select proxy
13. base scale of 33 duplicates 1500
render and check out your hair

Multi-Sub Object Material


Apply mat id #1 to entire object
Make selection and assign id#1
Make selection and assign to id#2
Make selection and assign to id#3

Check your selection set


Make a multisub object material
Apply colors to the 3 material channels
Put to object and check your material selection

If your selection is not correct you can go back and select the
faces and reassign a material id to the individual selection
Once you are happy with the application of the materials to
your object you can go in and apply materials in each channel.

1. Create a sphere in your front viewport


2. Change the specula level to 100, change the Glossiness to
50
3. make two sided
4. Click on the utilities panel asset manager. Browse to your
maps directory. Open the Brick folder and get the
Brkrun_b.jpg
5. drag into your bump channel in the maps rollour
6. change the tiling in the coordinates rollout to U offset.2,
tiling 2.o
7. Copy the map into the Glossiness chanel of the maps
8. Go back to your asset manager. Open the Concrete folder and find the STUCCO8.jpg
9. Drag the stucco into your diffuse level.
10. rerender
11. Drag the stucco into your Anistropy
12. rerender
13. Copy the entire material to another slot
14.

Get rid of the sphere and create a cube.


1. Sellect the cube and assign the material to it.
2. tile the bubble on both up and down
3. Copy the material to a new slot
4. click in diffuse and make another composite
5. make a mask out of the forth chanel
6. asset browser, organics folder get leaf.jpg into map chanell
7. get leafa.gif (the alpha into the mask channell
8. turn on the tile , offset by .3 (you wanna band the leaf around the cube

get wacky, make a displacement out of the bump


9.

1. Create a plane in your top viewport of length: 1500


Width: 1500
2. Click on Zoom Extents all.
3. Create a sphere in your top viewport Radius: 100
Check base to Pivot.
4. Create a Target Spot light in your front viewport
pointing toward the sphere.
5. In the
6.
7. Name and Color roll-out change the name to
Spot01.key.
8. Create a second Target Spot pointed directy at the sphere from the left.
9. In the Name and Color roll-out name it Spot02.fill .
10. name spot 2 spot 2 fill
11. in parameters make the multiplier 0.5
12. sellect spot 1 and mname spor01 key
13. change the multiplier to 1.5
14. Select key light. In Shadow parameters turn Object Shadows ON and select Ray
Traced Shadows.
15. Open your material editor.
16. Select the first slot.
17. Go to maps roll-out click on diffuse color chanel and sellect the checker map
18. Change Checker tiling to 10 by 10
19. Make color #1 medium grey
20. select the ground plane and click the put material to scene
21. Open your asset manager and browse to maps WICKERBW.TIF (note: this map is
from the MAX 2.5 directory)
22. Select the second slot in mat
23. change specular to 0
24. change glossiness to 0
25. Go to maps level and drag the wickerbw.tif to the opacity chanel
26. click on the wickerbw.tiff button
27. and change tiling to 6. by 6.
28. go to top level and check two sided
29. render.
30. Go to the opacity chanel go to bitmap parameters and look at mono channel output.
31. Notice it is reading rgb change channel output to alpha in both mono and rgb chanels
32. render should be completely flat weave should be gon
33. drag from opacity chanel to diffuse as a copy .
34. go to bump level open the bitmap parameters and change the monochannel output to
rgb in both the mono and rgb channel output.
35. Now change the bump amount from 30 to 500
36. now you should have nice bump but it looks like rubber.
37. open your asset manager and open the maps , wood folder and get OLDWOOD.JPG
38. drag oldwood.jpg to the difuse color chanel.
39. Put material to spere. Render and you should see wicker ball.
40. Go to top level. change specular level to 50 and glossiness to 40 rerender should look
like there is glass in the windows
41. Copy the opacity map to the specular level.
42. Now get the key spot and change the raytraced shadow to a shadow map and notice
the problem that occurs with shadow maps. Raytraced shadow should be used to
display transparency.

Particle Bubbles using facing particles

1. In the create panel click on the geometry button and in the drop down field select
particle systems.
2. Click on the Spray button and create a spray in your top viewport. Emitter Width:
100, Length: 100. Render Count: 1500. Drop Size: 5.
3. Open your material editor.
4. select and open slot.
5. Make advanced transparency amt: 95
6. self illumination 50 color bright yellow/blue desaturate the color.
7. specular level 5
8. assign to particle system
9. in render coun=t make it 1500 drop size to 5
10. emitor size 100 x 100
11. render and it should look like rain.
12. regular opacity should be 50
13. particles should be tetrahedron.
14. Click on the Render Scene button
15. Click on the Render
16. avi use the compression indio vidio 4.5
17. click ok and look at your rain.
Making Bubbles
18. Turn on Angle Snap. Rotate the Spray so that it points up.
19. In the Modify panel change the Width to 6, and Length to 6.
20. Change the viewport count to 500, and Render count to 2500.
21. Change the drop size to 2 change tetrahedron to facing change the self illumination to
100 and make drop size to 8 render coundt to 300 viewport could to 300
22. Hide the particle system
23. Create a sphere in the top viewport. Radius 100 base to pivot
24. zoom in
25. Change the render to 480 by 480 (throw in the render crop)
26. Right click on the front viwport labal and configure viewport lighting to two lights.
27. Material editor turn on checker board behind bubble.
28. 20 self ill
29. 2 sided
30. 100 advanced transparency
31. drag diffuse color to filter color make diffuse color desaturated blure
32. specular 110 glossy 60
33. assign to sphere
34. render front view port
35. that’s the bubble
36. regular opacity change blinn to anisotropic from 50 to 80 change glossiness to 70
change opacity to 50
37. render again save tga to the max images directory
38. Bubble.tga save and say 32 bit image file, no alpha chanel on any other.
39. Hide the sphere.
40. Select a NEW slot in the Material Editor
41. Unhide by name and unhide the spry
42. Make gray
43. specular highlights to 0 glossyness to 0
44. Asset Manager and find the bubble image saved.
45. Drag into the diffuse channel.
46. Change sphere to cube.
47. Copy the bubble from diffuse channel to the opacity channel as a copy.
48. In mono channel in bitmap parameters make the Mono channel output Alpha in both.
49. In diffuse channel the mono info should be RGB
50. Drag onto particle system.
51. render
52. do edit hold
53. Make another particle system
54. Create a SuperSpray in your top viewport.
55. Click on the Modify Panel
56. change spread to 15
57. second spread to 90
58. change percentage of particles to 100 so you can see all.
59. In Particle generation put in variation of 20.00
60. Emit stop at 80
61. Life to 60
62. In the top viewport create a Plane. Width: Length. Pull the plane below 00 axis
63. Create spacewarp Gravity in the top viewport
64. Create a second spacewarp Udeflector (Universal Deflector)
65. sellect the superspray bind from particle system to spacewarp
66. this is important WHY
67. Stack should have super spray double line and binding
68. increase speed to 20
69. select the u devflector and pick object particle system
70. assign the bubble material to the
71. particle type Facing
72. render
73. particle size 5 fade to 0
74. check face map
75. Grow for 20

Change gravity to spherical


display until 200 emit stop 180

--------------------------------
create a box L 50, w 100, h 100

open material editor - open asset manager


click on diffuse channel sellect bitmap - browse to space folder fx3_panels_9f.jpg
show 3 --- 1. drag and drop onto material slot - showing bitmap
2. drag and drop onto the diffuse channel
3. drag and drop from asset browser directly onto the box

Creating a Composite Map


Place the material with the diffuse bitmap of fx3_panels_9f.jpg
place the fx3_panels_bump1.bmp in the bump chanel
add one target spot and test render
turn the bump up to 100 and test render

Copy material into another slot and work on the original


click on the diffuse color to view material at the diffuse level
click on the bitmap button and sellect composite
keep original map as submap
set number of maps to 2
go to asset manager and browse to find a file with an alpha channel
(tga, or tiff will do)
get bubble.tga. Check the alpha by click ing on the black and white button
drag on to map number 2

change the material slot to a cube to see


place the whole material onto the geometry

open the map navigator to view your composited materials layers

(tile to 1.7, and uncheck tile to fix the proportion of the bubble
(now use offset in (u) to change location of bubble on the cube

------------------------------------------------------------------
if you do not have an image with an alpha channel
copy origingal material and redu
go to diffuce level and get compostie
make number 2
click on map number 2 sellect mask

now view the layers of your material in your map navigator


map number one - leafgreen.jpg
mask - leafo.gif

------------------------------------------
copy same over but place the same leafgreen.jpg into the mask channel
and adjust somthing to brng out the

------------------------------------------------
view composite material
creating composite material (three ways) ( - one more time - all the above-)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------
Creating a composite map 1

For this exercise you will need the bubble.tga image created in class.
----------------------------------------------
Setting the Scene
1. Create a box. Length 100, Width 75, Height 50
place spotlight in front of the box
get the material editor and in a clean slot
go to asset manager - browse to 3dmax/maps/space/fx3_panels_9f.jpg
click on diffuse color and change to grey
copy the color to the ambient and drag the ambient value to about 20 (this will prevent any
color bleed)
now change the glossyness and speculal down
drag and drop the fx3_pannels ito the diffuse color
get fx3_panels bump 1 into the bump channel and change value to 75
put material to box
click on the diffuse channel and (show map in viewport
render the perspective view to see your work
-------------------------------------------------------
do an edit hold to play safe
copy the material to two more slots

-----------------------------------------------------------------(1)
go to the diffuse bitmap level and change the type bitmap to composite
keep the old map as a submap
set number of maps to 2
open asset manager and drag and drop bubble.tge to map number 2
change view of material slot to cube
put material to scene - and render a test
you should see the bubble render distorted - lets fix it

click on map 2 which is the bubble - show in viewport to see the map
tile the map to about 1.7 to fix the bubbles proportion and uncheck the tiling

click the render last button to view


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------(2)
same map
composite with no alpha - use a mask instead
now you have only the map in 1
go to map 2 and get a mask map
look at the map levels in your map browser
for map 1 in the mask level browse to /maps/organics/Lafgreen.jpg
for the mask place leafo.gif
put to object - render scene and to see your work
now if you see the leaf distortes change the tileing to 1.7
(you must also change the mask to prevent mask bleed)
go to sibling (mask) and change it's tiling to 1.7 also
render again -
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------(3)
if you have no alpha at all
drag and copy above map to new slot
using map navigator and go to mask level
copy the leafgreen.jpg to the mask level
go to the output rollout and enable color map
turn on rgb, turn off red and blue
adjust the points of the green channel until you can view your map
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Creating a Blend Material
1. Create a Teapot
2. Select an empty slot in the material editor
3. Click on the Standard button and browse for a Blend material
4. Open your asset browser and get the /bricks_yellow material
5. Drag bricks_yellow in to material 1
6.

create a teapot
open material editor
get a blend material ( similar to mix - for map)
browse to library - get bricks_yellow
Place in the material 1
browe and get fabric blue carpet
place in material 2
change the mix amount to 50
render perspective to view your work
go to mask channel brouse to maps/lights/chaustic
render perspective to view your work

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Creating a Material with multiple procedural materials
choose an empty slot
type - browse for perlin marble
put to object and render
tile 3,6, 3
raise the specular level
and the glossy
change to anisotropic
change lighting to two lights
withing pearlin - on color map1 go get a dent material
change the color of your dent
render last
change dent to gradient
change the colors to suit you and rerender
go to bump level and get a cellular material
change the size to 5

Create a target spotlight and adjust to light the teapot


create an omni above the teapot
rerender to view your work
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Top and Bottom Material


Drag the material we just made to the top material
drag the blend material to the bottom
test render
adjust the blend to 40
adjust eh position of the blend to 70
test render to view your work
Try animating the position of the blend overtime
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Using Multi-Sub-Object material

Open your plane.max


go to the editable mesh level in your modifier stack
using your polygon sellection - assign material ids to all your plane
1 - window of the cockpit
2 - body of the plane
3 - wings
4 - wing finn

Open your material editor


get a multi/sub object material
set number to 4 to corespond to your planes sub object selection
change the colors of the 4 materials to dramaticly different colors
apply to object
Now you can inspect your material id's on the plane to
see if they are correct
If you have miss labled a face simply select it and re
assign it to the id number you prefer

Cameras and lighting

3 Point Lighting on a Teapot


1. In your top viewport create a ground plane of 600
by 600
2. Create a material for the graound plane by selecting
an empty slot in the material editor.
3. Click on the diffuse button and select a checkered
map.
4. Tile 10 by 10. Change the white checker to grey.
5. Create a teapot in your perspective viewport.
6. Create a material for your teapot by selecting an
empty slot in the material editor.
7. Browse the material library for Metal_Rust material.
8. Copy the material to the specular channel.
9. Create a target spotlight. Multiplier of 1.2. Turn on shadows.
10. Elevate the spotlight and point target at teapot.
Right mouse click on your left viewport label - go to view and select spot1 to see the spotlights
view.
This will be your ‘key light’
11. Create a second spotlight and point at teapot. Multiplier of .3.
This will be your ‘fill light’
12. Create an omni in the front viewport. Multiplier of .3
13. Move omni a bit above and behind the teapot.
This will be your ‘background light’
: ) Render your scene to view your work.

Add a projector map to the key light


Open your asset browser and find the Abalone map.
Maps/organics/misc./abalone.jpg
Drag and drop the map into an empty slot in the
material editor.
Sellect the key light.
Drag and drop the Abalone map to the spotlight
parameters – projector map button – in the modify
panel.

Add some lens effects.


1. Select your omni.
2. In the modify panel go to atmospherics and effects.
3. Click the Add button. Choose lens effects.
4. Highlight lens effects and click the setup button.
5. Add star, ??? and glow.
6. Turn on the interactive toggle to see
update.

Adding a Camera

Create a camera in your top viewport.


Elevate it slightly above the teapot pointing
the target at the teapot.
Right mouse click on the viewport lable – go
to view – select camera to see the scene
through your cameras view.
In the Parameters click on ‘show
environmental range’ to see where your
environmental effects will aperar, ‘show
horizon’ to see where max thinks your horizon
is, and ‘clipping planes – clip manually’.
Ajust the near and far clip to view it’s effect
on your view of the geometry.

Animate the camera


Create a circle spline around the teapot.
Select your camera. In the motion panel –
assign controller rollout, sellect position and
asign a path controller.
Click the pick path button and select the circle
path.
Play your animation.

Take the controller off your camera


For more flexibility try the following.
Create a dummy object.
In motion panel –assign controller rollout, select position and asign a path controller.
Click the pick path button and select the circle path.
Link the camera to the dummy.
Play the animation.

Environmental Fog
1. Delete path and dummy
2. Copy the teapot making 10 copies into the horizon
3. Modify your plane making it 2000 by 2000
4. Click on rendering environment, add fog.
5. Do a test render.
6. Change the fog color and render again.
7. Change the far amount and render again.
8. Browse your material library for noise.
9. Drag and drop the noise to an empty slot in your material editor.
10. Drag and drop the noise to the fog
11. Ack change the two colors of the noise
12. Now get a mix and place the noise in the first chanel and gradient map in the second
channel. Change the mix amount to 50 place it on your fog and re render.

Layered Fog
1. change the fog type from standard to layered
2. render
3. change the top to 50 and the density to 25
4. turn on the animate button, drag the time slider to 20 and make the phase 50
5. render frames 1-50 and watch your fog animate

Volume fog
First turn off the fog by de-checking the ‘active’ checkbox.
1. create sphere gizmo atmospheric apparatus helper object
2. click and drag to create it in you r top view port
3. Go to rendering environment and add volume for.
4. Click on pick gizmo and sellect the sphere gizmo.
5. Do a test render.
6. Increase size to 50
7. Uniformity to .5
8. Density to 5.0
9. Test render
10. Try adding the previous fog into the scene as well.

Animating a Camera along a path


1. Create a teapot in the top veiwport radius; 50 segments 8
2. Create a circle line in your top viewport radius of 350
3. in front viewport lift the circle to top of the teapot
4. Create a target camera. Click and drag to point the target at your
teapot.
5. place target at the teapot lid
6.

7. Creat a dummy object.


8. apply the path controller to the dummy
9. pick path .. pick the path
10. link the teapot to the dummy
11. now you can move the teapot around, but it still moves along the trajectory of the path.
12. check the follow box in the path options
13. play the animation
14. check the bank box in the path parameters
15. play the animation
16. grab camera and place inside the dummy
17. link the camera to the dummmy
18. now if you type ‘C’ you will see your cameras view
19. click on the Trajectories button in your motion panel
20. go to sub object level and click convert.
21. Go to modify panel sub object mode
22. now you can edit the verticies
23. put psition list controller on the camera
24. click on available and add a noise position controller
25. now you see the camera move along the path(path controller
26. but it’s all bumpy (noise
27. Right mouse click on the Noise Position to edit the parameters of
the noise.

Making Atmosphere with Fog

1. Make a teapot in your top viewport


2. Hold down the shift key and move the teapot. Clone it 5 times, choose instance.
3. Place metal rust material on the teapot.
4. Create two omni lights in your top viewport. Multiplier of .5
5. Place one on either end of the teapots.
6. Create a target spot light in your front viewport. Multiplier of 1.5
7. Adjust the falloff to include all teapots.
8. Turn on ‘cast shadows’ and change shadow map to raytraced.
9. Create a target camera in your front viewport.
10. Adjust the camera view to include all teapots
11. Position it to look down the row of teapots
12. create a ground plane in your top viewport
13. put a checkered material on the ground plane
14. go to rendering environment atmosphere, add FOG
15. be sure to check the exponential box if you are going to use facing particles with
masking.
16.
17. apply gradient bitmap an empty material slot
18. adjust the colors to be ….. drag the gradient to the use map environment color map slot

FACE COMING OUT OF THE FOG

Making Atmosphere with Layered Fog

1. Delete the gradient map from the Environment color map channel by clicking on the
button and selecting no ne.
2. Change the for background Type to Layered.
3. Select camera, go to the modify panel and click on show horizon
4. Look at where the black line appears in viewport
5. Turn on horizon noise change angle from 5 to 10 to adjust the falloff
6. Render a frame and view the horizon noise.
7. change density of layered top to 80, change density to 25
Volume fog

1. Turn off all other fogs by selecting them and deselecting the Active check box.
2. Add a Volume Fog.
3. Click the Move Up button to move the Volume Fog to the top.
4. Click on your create panel. Helper objects. Atmospheric Apparatus and create a BoxGizmo
in the top viewport. Length: 800, Width: 1000, Height 800.
5. In Volume Fog Parameters click on pick gizmo and select the box gizmo.
6. Render a frame.
7. Change density to 2, uniformity to .25, size to 100.
8. Render a frame.
9. Continue to adjust the parameters.
10. Try this with the SphereGizmo, and CylGizmo.

Simple Camera Matching

1. Create a teapot in your top viewport Radius of 20.


2. Copy the teapot 5 times by holding down the shift key.
3. Create a target camera in your top viewport that points at your teapots.
4. Type ‘C’ to see your cameras view.
5. create a target spot in the front viewport and adjust so that it includes all teapots
6. Spot light parameters falloff to 80, multiplier to 1.5
7. create an omni fill light in the front viewport. set value to .25
8. Move omni light so that it is even with the spotlight in the front viewport.
9. Spotlight shadows must be turned on.
10. Apply material to teapot. Click on get material metal … chrome.
11. Select all teapots and apply material to all.
1. Go to empty slot in material editor
2. Lake Dusk.jpg in the map.
3. Open your material editor and click on an empty slot.
4. Open your asset browser and find Lakedusk.jpg in Maps/Background of your 3D Studio
max 3.1 directory.
5. Drag and drop the LakeDusk.jpg from the asset browser to an empty slot in the material
editor. Note that this map cannot go to geometry. change the Bitmap Coordinates to
Environ.
6. Change the mapping to Screen.
7. Click on Views, Viewport background, check Use Environment Background.
8. Click on rendering environment.
9. Drag and drop the Lakedusk.jpg map from the material editor to the environment map
button .
10. Right mouse click on your viewport label and show grid.
11. Adjust your view of the grid so that the teapots line up with the lake.
12. Create a box in your top viewport as the ground pland.
13. Apply a matte shaddow material to the box.
14. Matte/Shadow basic parameters. turn off opake alpha and under shaddow turn on receive
shadows, and affect alpha.
15. Render one frame, look at your alpha channel.
16. Select the target spotlight. click on edit clone.
17. Nmae spotlight #2 spot shadow. click on the exclude button select shadow casting include
all.
18. Rerender the scene and watch your shadows get darker.
19. Now rightmouse to get the eyedropper tool in the frame buffer and drag a shadow color
from an actual shadow in your scene to the shadow color chanel in the matte shadow
basic parameters to change the shadow color.
20. in the spot light shadow parameters in the modify panel change the density to 10

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