3d max

Tutorials
AUTODESK®
39
DS MAX®
Materials & Mapping
Autodesk® 3ds Max® 9
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In these tutorials, you’ll learn how to use 3ds Max
for creatingmaterials andmaps and applying them
to your models and scenes. You’ll also learn about
some of the tools in 3ds Max for using materials
and maps.
Features Covered in This Section
Among the 3ds Max features covered in these
tutorials are the following:
• Using the 3ds Max Material Editor to create,
edit and assign materials.
• An introduction to Shaders.
• How mapping coordinates work, and how to
manipulate them using 3dsMax modifiers.
• Using Displacement Mapping along with
surface properties.
• Manipulating transparency and raytrace
propeties.
• Common techniques for creating materials for
architectural realism.
Files for This Section
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Introduction to Materials
and Mapping
Materials are like paint. With materials, you make
apples red and oranges orange. You put the shine
in chrome and the polish on glass. By applying
maps, you can add images, patterns, and even
surface texture to objects. Materials are what make
your scenes look real.
Mapping is a method of projecting pictorial
information (materials) onto surfaces. It is a lot
like wrapping a present with wrapping paper,
except the pattern is projected mathematically,
with modifiers, rather than being taped to the
surface.
Materials and Mapping
556 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
This tutorial introduces the Material Editor, the
master design studio for materials and maps. In
the following lessons, you will learn how to assign
materials to objects, how to create basic materials,
and how to create several kinds of advanced
materials.
Skill level: Basic to intermediate
Time to complete: 90 minutes
Features Covered in This Tutorial
In these lessons you will learn:
• Accessing materials from material libraries,
scene objects, and other MAX files.
• Assigning materials to scene objects.
• Creating basic materials, including wireframe,
2-sided, and self-illuminated.
• Using ambient color and light with materials.
• Creating additive and subtractive transparency.
• Using texture, opacity and bump mapping.
• Creating and adjusting mapping coordinates.
• Creating multi/sub-object materials using drag
and drop.
• Creating a raytrace material.
• Usingdisplacementmapping.
• Creating stars using noise.
• Using Shellac material to create realistic human
skin.
Tutorial Files
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\intro_to_materials directory. Before
starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials folder
from the disc to your local program installation.
Accessing Materials
Examples of different materials
Whenyouworkwith 3dsMax, you accessmaterials
from three different places: from the Material
Editor, from scenes, or from an external collection
of predesigned materials called amaterial library.
The next exercise shows you howto loadmaterials
from a material library into theMaterial Editor.
The files for this lesson can be found in the
\tutorials\intro_to_materials folder.
Load a material library:
1. Start or reset 3ds Max.
If you receive the dialog asking if you really
want to reset the program, answer Yes.
2. Openintro_materials.max.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Rescale The File
Objects To The System Unit Scale.
3. Press the M key on your keyboard to open the
Material Editor.
The sample slot in the upper-left corner has
a white border around it, indicating that it is
active.
Accessing Materials 557
4. Right-click the active sample slot. From
the right-clickmenu, choose 5 x 3 Sample
Windows. The sample palette redraws to
display 15 slots.
5. On the Material Editor toolbar, click Get
Material.
TheMaterial/Map Browser appears.
6. In the Material/Map Browser > Browse From
group, choose Mtl Library (Mtl stand for
“Material.”)
7. In the File group, clickOpen.
The default Material Library, 3dsmax.mat, is
displayed. A number of others might be listed
as well.
8. In the Open Material Library dialog, navigate
to the \tutorials\intro_to_materials directory
and choose stillife.mat.
The names of the materials appear in a list.
9. On the Material/Map Browser toolbar,
click View List+Icons.
A thumbnail of eachmaterial appears next to
its name.
558 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Transfer materials to the Material Editor:
1. On the Material/Map Browser, click the
material named orange.
A larger thumbnail of the Orange material
appears in the preview window.
2. Drag the thumbnail from the Browser to the
active sample slot in the Material Editor. You
can drag it from either the preview window or
the list of materials.
The material appears in the sample slot. The
name orange appears in the drop-down list just
below the palette.
3. Click the next sample slot to the right. The slot
becomes active.
4. On the Material/Map Browser, double-click
shiny apple. Theshiny apple material appears
in the second sample slot.
5. Scroll the Material/Map Browser to the bottom
of the list, if necessary.
6. Drag thewood countertop material from the
list to the third sample slot.
The third sample slot activates, displaying the
wood countertop material.
Get materials from a MAX file:
You can just as easily get materials from MAX
scene files as from material libraries. The
procedure is nearly the same.
1. Activate the sample slot to the right of thewood
countertop material.
2. On the Material/Map Browser, check that
Browse From is still set toMaterial Library.
3. ChooseOpen fromthe File group.
4. Pull down the Files Of Type list and choose 3ds
Max (.max,.chr) instead of .mat.
5. Navigate to the \tutorials\still_life folder, and
then open Still_life_animated.max.
6. Double-click the material named leaf.
Assigning Materials to Objects 559
The leaf material is transferred from the MAX
file to the Material Editor.
Get materials from objects in the scene:
There is a material already at work in this scene,
but it is not in the Material Editor. It is applied to
all the objects in the scene, so that they look like
they are allmade of the same substance. You can
transfer thematerial fromthe scene to theMaterial
Editor using the eyedropper cursor to sample the
material.
1. Activate the fifth sample slot in the top row of
materials.
2. In theMaterial Editor, click PickMaterial
From Object. The button is located next to
the material name, below the top row of icons
(under the sample slots).
3. Use the eyedropper to click any object in the
viewport.
Thematerial,beige putty, appears in the sample
slot. Because the material is currently assigned
to objects in the scene and in the Material
Editor, the corners of the sample slot display
triangles. In 3ds Max parlance, this is called a
"hot" material.
Note: If the triangular corners are hollow, this
indicates thematerial is assigned to the scene. If
the corners are solid, it means an object that has
been assigned the material is currently selected.
For practice:
1. Transfer the rest of the materials from the
material library into the Material Editor.
Arrange them in a way thatmakes sense to you.
2. To copy and move a material, drag the sample
to a new slot.
3. To remove a material from a sample, click
Reset Map/Mtl To Default Settings.
4. To view more sample slots, use the scroll bars at
the right and bottom of the sample palette, or
change the right-click settings to 6 X 4 Sample
Windows.
Note: While the sample palette can show you 24
samples at any one time, there is no limit to the
number of materials a scene can contain. Once
you assign a material to an object, you can reset
that sample in the palette and a new material
created without affecting the original material.
5. Pan the sample palette by dragging in
between the slots.
6. To examine a material up close, double-click
the sample slot, or right-click the slot and
choose Magnify.
7. Save your file as mymaterials1.max.
Assigning Materials to Objects
In this lesson, you will learn two ways to assign
materials to objects.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Set up the lesson:
• Openintro_materials2.max.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Rescale The File
Objects To The System Unit Scale.
Assign a material to a selected object:
Making your selection before assigning a material
to it ensures that the material goes exactly where
you want it to go. Use this approach for mapping
complex scenes, or when you want to assign
materials to sub-object selections.
560 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
1. On the keyboard, press H to display the Select
Objects dialog. Highlight Orange and click
Select.
2. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
3. Click the sample slot that contains the orange
material.
4. Click Assign Material to Selection. The
object turns orange in the Camera01 viewport.
Assign a material using drag and drop:
Drag and drop is the most direct way to assign
materials to objects. Use this approach when the
objects you want to map are clearly visible in the
scene.
1. In theMaterial Editor, find the sample slot that
contains the shiny apple material.
2. Drag the sample onto the apple; a tooltip lets
you know when the cursor is over the right
object. The apple turns red.
See the results:
1. Activate the Camera01 viewport by
right-clicking in it.
2. On the toolbar, click Quick Render. The
view from the camera renders line by line in a
separate window.
For practice:
• Assign materials to the rest of the objects in
the scene. Use the tooltips to see the name of
each object, or choose objects by name from
the Select Object dialog. When you are done,
render the scene to see how it looks.
Creating Basic Materials 561
Creating Basic Materials
In this lesson, you create variations on the Standard
material type by changing basic parameters such
as color, glossiness, transparency, and shader type.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Set the diffuse and specular color:
The Blinn shader has basic settings for color,
glossiness, self-illumination and transparency.
1. Open intro_materials2.max.
Note: If you see the FileUnits:Mismatch dialog,
choose the option Rescale The File Objects To
The System Unit Scale.
2. Press M to open the Material Editor. If
necessary, set the display to 5 x 3 Sample
Windows; press X repeatedly until the sample
spheres are largest.
3. Scroll down to the third row and click the center
sample sphere; the material’s name includes the
string “Default”.
4. Rename this material using the editable name
field above the rollouts. Call it myorange
material.
5. From the Material Editor, drag myorange
material ontotheOrange object in the viewport.
The orange in the viewport turns gray.
6. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click
the Diffuse color swatch to display the Color
Selector. Change the Diffuse color to dark
orange. Then close the Color Selector.
Both the Diffuse color and Ambient color
change to dark orange, because the colors are
locked together. In the viewport, the Orange
object’s color changes to dark orange.
7. In the Specular Highlight group, experiment
with the Specular Level parameter by dragging
the spinner up and down while observing the
sample sphere. Then set the Specular Level to
100.
A highlight appears on the orange. The
highlight gets stronger as you increase the
Specular Level.
562 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
8. Experiment with the Glossiness parameter
by dragging its spinner up and down while
observing the sample sphere. Then set the
Glossiness to 40.
As Glossiness increases, the highlight gets
smaller and more focused. This is how you
control the shininess of an object.
9. Click the Specular color swatch and change the
Specular color to a bright lemon yellow.
The highlight takes on a yellow tinge.
Use wire and 2-sided:
You can use theWire material option to make an
object render in wireframe.
1. On the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, turn
on Wire.
The surface of the orange displays inwireframe,
rather than as shaded faces.
2. Open the Extended Parameters rollout. In the
Wire group, change the Size to 2.5.
Understanding Ambient Color and Light 563
3. Render the scene. The orange renders
with a thicker wire.
Tip: To depict an object turning to wireframe,
animate the wire thickness.
4. In the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, turn on
2-Sided. Now you can see the object’s back side
through the front wires.
5. Turn off 2-Sided andWire. The object turns
solid again.
Add self-illumination:
Self-illumination makes an object look as though
it’s lit from within. Use Self-Illumination to save
rendering overhead when you want to create lights
that do not need to illuminate surfaces, such as
running lights along the perimeter of a spaceship.
1. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, set
Self-Illumination of myorange material
material to 100 percent.
The dark areas of the orange brighten,making
the orange look incandescent.
Note: If you see a black color swatch instead of
the spinner, turn off Color.
2. Right-click the Self-Illumination spinner to
reset the value to 0.
3. Save your file as myorange.max.
Understanding Ambient Color and
Light
Ambient light is used to simulate indirect light,
such as the atmospheric light that permeates
outdoor scenes. It may also be used to simulate
radiosity, which is the color that bounces off
brightly colored objects.
Ambient color controls the color of objects in areas
of shadow, whenever ambient light is present.
Generally, you do not see any effect when you
change the ambient color of a material, because
ambient lighting is turned off by default.
To see the effect of ambient color in a scene, you
must create an ambient light source. You can either
create lights that are set to Ambient Only in order
to create a localized effect, or use the Environment
dialog to affect an entire scene.
564 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Set up the lesson:
• Continue from the previous lesson.
Adjust the ambient light and color:
1. In the Material Editor, choose the beige putty
material in the upper-right material sample.
2. Change the Ambient color of the beige putty
material to a bright shade of purple.
The color of the scene does not change.
3. Choose Rendering > Environment. The
Environment dialog appears.
4. Click the Ambient color swatch. In the Color
Selector, change the Ambient color to amedium
shade of gray. Then close the Color Selector
and the Environment dialog.
The materials brighten in direct proportion to
the brightness of the Ambient color. The beige
putty objects in the scene turn purple.
5. Activate the slot containingmyorange material.
6. Click the lock button to the left of the Ambient
and Diffuse colors to unlock them. Then
change the Ambient color from orange to a
bright green.
Watch the viewport and notice the orange turns bright
green.
Creating Transparency
The Opacity parameter controls the transparency
of a material. The default setting is 100 percent
opaque. An Opacity value of 0 creates total
transparency.
Set transparency:
1. Choose File > Reset.
Do not save your changes.
2. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
3. Click the Background button to the right
of the sample spheres. A multicolored checker
pattern appears in the active sample slot behind
the sample sphere.
Creating Transparency 565
4. Double-click the sample material to open it in a
separate window. Resize the window if you like.
5. In the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout change
the Diffuse color to green. The Ambient color
changes as well.
6. Set the Opacity value of the material to 50.
The sample sphere becomes semi-transparent.
Opacity controls transparency.
7. Set the Specular Level to 100 and the Glossiness
to 80. Two small highlights appear on opposite
sides of the sample sphere.
8. On the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, turn
on 2-Sided. Two more highlights appear on
the sample sphere. These represent highlights
inside the sphere.
566 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
9. Open the Extended Parameters rollout.
10.Change the Falloff setting from In to Out.
11.In the Advanced Transparency group, set the
Falloff Amt to 100.
The sphere becomes more transparent towards
the edges.
12.Change the Falloff setting from Out to In.
The opacity falls off towards the center of the
sphere, revealing a nearly transparent center.
13.Change the Filter color to bright yellow.
The sample sphere takes on a ghostly look.
14.Change the Type to Subtractive, thenAdditive.
The areas of opacity turn dark like smoke, then
light like clouds.
Mapping and Mapping Coordinates 567
Mapping and Mapping
Coordinates
Adding images and textures to a material is one
of the most important techniques for creating
realistic effects. In this lesson, you learn how to
add texture maps and bump maps to a material.
You also learn how to position amap on the
surface of an object by adjusting the mapping
coordinates of the material.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Make a texture map:
Suppose you want to make a realistic orange in
your scene. Themost direct way is to use a realistic
image as the texture map in the diffuse component
of a material. In other words, you replace the
overall color with an overall texture. Here are the
basic steps:
1. Buy an orange and photograph it.
2. Crop a portion of the photograph.
3. Digitize the cropped portion with a scanner or
digital camera.
4. Load this image into your computer.
5. Apply the image as a diffuse map.
A cropped photograph of a real orange peel
Add a texture map to a material:
The digitized bitmap you are going to use is
already being used by the orange material in the
first sample slot. You can therefore browse for the
bitmap from the Material Editor.
1. Openintro_materials3.max.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Rescale The File
Objects To The System Unit Scale.
2. Press M to open the Material Editor. Set the
display to 5 x 3 Sample Windows, if it isn’t
already.
3. Click an empty material, such as the one in
the center of the third row of sample spheres.
Rename it myorangematerial.
4. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the
map selector button to the right of the Diffuse
color swatch to display the Material/Map
Browser.
5. In the Browse From group, choose Material
(Mtl) Editor.
6. Click View Small Icons.
568 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
All the images that are currently loaded appear
as small thumbnails.
7. Click View Large Icons.
The thumbnails appear larger.
8. Click the image labeledDiffuse Color: Orange
(orangetex.jpg) and click OK. On the Instance
Or Copy dialog, choose Copy and click OK
again.
The Material/Map Browser closes and the
orange texture map appears in the material
sample, but not in the viewport.
9. To display the texturemap in the viewport,
click the ShowMap InViewport on theMaterial
Editor toolbar.
The orange texture map appears in the
viewport.
Note on Mapping Coordinates and Viewport
Visibility
The orangemap shows in the viewport because the
orange object has mapping coordinates applied to
it. Like other parametric objects in 3ds Max, the
sphere of the orange generated its ownmapping
coordinates when created. This is not necessarily
the case with editable meshes andmany other
types of geometry.
If the object in the scene didn’t have mapping
coordinates, the map wouldn’t appear in the
viewport, even if ShowMap In Viewport is on. In
that case, you can add a UVWMapmodifier to the
object to make the texture display.
If the texture map still doesn’t display, you can
move the gizmo of the UVW Map modifier, and
experiment with the Offset, Tiling, and Angle
parameters in the Coordinates rollout. This will be
covered later in the tutorial.
Add a bump map:
The texture on the orange looks all right, but a real
orange peel has a pitted surface. You can simulate
this and add realism by using bump mapping.
This won’t show up in the viewport, but is visible
when you render.
1. Select the orange in the viewport.
2. Click themyorangematerial sample sphere you
worked with in the previous section.
3. Click Go To Parent to access thematerial
level.
4. Scroll down and open theMaps rollout.
5. Drag the orangetex.jpg map fromDiffuse Color
to Bump. Choose Copy and click OK.
6. Set the Bump Amount to 100.
There is no change in the viewport.
To really see the effect, you’ll need to render the
scene. It would also be a good idea to zoom in
and see what’s happening to the orange.
7. Activate the Front viewport. Select the orange,
if it isn’t already selected.
8. In the viewport navigation controls, use Arc
Rotate Selected to rotate around the orange and
get a good view (the viewport will switch to
User type). Zoomso the orange fills upmost
of the viewport.
9. Render the Front viewport.
Mapping and Mapping Coordinates 569
10.Drag the orange material in the first sample slot
from the Material Editor to the Orange object
in the viewport.
Nothing will change in the viewport, but this
will let you use the experimental material for
other purposes later in this exercise.
11.Press F so the viewport returns to Front view.
Use mapping coordinates and tiling:
In this procedure, you use the concrete wall behind
the objects to learn about mapping and tiling.
1. From the Material Editor, drag the concrete
material (second row, fourth sphere) onto the
wall object (named L-Ext01).
The concrete shows up in the camera viewport
because the parametric object has generated
its ownmapping coordinates. But the concrete
doesn’t look quite right on the wall.
2. Select the wall object (L-Ext01), and then
from the Modifiers menu > UV Coordinates
submenu choose UVWMap.
The concrete changes appearance in the
viewport.
3. Right-click in the Camera01 viewport to
activate it.
4. In the Modify panel, scroll down to the
Alignment group.
5. Change the Alignment from Z to Y to X.
Choose the one that looks correct; probably Y.
570 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
6. In the Modifier Stack, expand the UVW
Mapping entry to see the Gizmo. Click the
Gizmo entry to highlight it.
7. On theMain toolbar, turn on Select And
Move. In the viewport, and drag the gizmo for
the mapping modifier to move the map.
The concrete bitmap shifts behind the objects.
To control placement of texture maps:
• Move the UVWMapping gizmo.
• Change the map’s Offset values.
To control tiling of texture maps:
• Change themap’s Tiling values.
• Change the UVW Mapping modifier’s Tile
values.
Create wallpaper with a tile pattern:
1. On theModify panel, click Gizmo again to turn
off sub-object selection.
2. In the Material Editor, choose the concrete
material.
3. Change the name of the material to
background.
4. On the Maps rollout, click the concgren.jpg
map.
The rollouts change to the level of this map.
5. On the Bitmap Parameters rollout, select the
Bitmap button, which contains the path to the
concgren.jpg map. You’ll replace this map with
a tile pattern to create some wallpaper.
6. On the Select Bitmap Image File dialog, change
the Files of Type to Targa Image File and choose
pat0039.tga.
7. Turn on Show Map in Viewport.
A diamond pattern appears on the wall.
8. On the Coordinates rollout, set U Tiling and
V Tiling to 4.
9. Change the U tiling by clicking the spinner
until the tiling value is approximately 5.7.
This makes the pattern proportions more even.
Mapping and Mapping Coordinates 571
On some systems, the diamond pattern might
be skewed in the Camera viewport. To correct
this, right-click the Camera01 viewport label
and choose Texture Correction.
10.See what happens when you add blurring
and then render. Also try working with Blur
Offset. Try setting the Coordinate rollout Blur
parameter to 1.5 and Blur Offset to 0.1. When
you’re finished experimenting with Blur, return
the Blur setting to 1.0.
Use opacity mapping to make a leaf:
You can use the leaf objects in the scene to
experience a unique type of mapping. The leaf is
created with a simple box mapped with a texture
map and an opacity map.
The texture is a photo of a leaf.
The opacity map is a mask of white and black. The
black becomes transparent when rendered.
1. On the toolbar,
open the Named Selection Sets list and choose
the set named leavesandbase.
2. Right-click in the active viewport and choose
Hide Unselected.
The leaves and the base are now the only objects
visible.
3. Hold down Ctrl and select the base.
This deselects the plank base.
572 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The objects are really just thin boxes that have
Bend and Twist modifiers applied to them.
They don’t look anything like leaves right now.
4. Drag the leaf material from theMaterial Editor
onto the leaves in the scene.
5. When the Assign Material dialog appears,
choose Assign to Selection and click OK.
The leaf material is applied to all four leaves.
View the rendered leaves:
In this procedure, you zoom in without affecting
your existing camera view.
• RendertheCamera01viewport.
The boxes seem to have been replaced by
realistic leaves, and the opacity map and the
shadow-casting spotlights combine to cast
reasonable-looking shadows.
Use mapping coordinates:
Besides letting you see maps in the viewport,
mapping coordinates give you control of how a
texture is applied to the object. In this procedure,
you’ll add aUVWMap modifier to the bottle label.
In the next procedure, you crop the texture.
Simple mapping is often solved by adding planar
mapping coordinates and then working with the
gizmo for adjustment. Let’s see how this works on
the label of the bottle.
1. Right-click in the active viewport, and choose
Unhide All. All the objects in the scene
reappear.
Mapping and Mapping Coordinates 573
2. Select the orange, right-click, and choose Hide
Selection in theDisplay quadrant.
3. Press H and select label01.
4. Right-click in the Front viewport to activate
it, without affecting the selection of the label.
Then press G to turn off the grid.
5. Open theModify panel and add a UVW
Map modifier to the label.
6. Region Zoom into the Front viewport so
you have a better view of label01.
7. Change the Front viewport display to Smooth
+ Highlights.
8. In the Parameters rollout > Alignment group,
turn on Region Fit and draw a box slightly
smaller than the label.
Region Fit lets you draw the gizmo to the size
you want.
9. In theMaterial Editor, click the label material.
10. Use AssignMaterial To Selection to apply
the material onto the label.
11.Save the scene as mymaterials3.max.
Crop the texture:
The Gluggo texture map doesn’t really fit the label
properly, so you’ll fix it by using the cropping
features of the Material Editor.
1. In the Material Editor > Maps rollout, click the
Diffuse map button labeledgluggo.jpg.
2. In the Bitmap Parameters > Cropping/
Placement group, be sure Crop is chosen. Click
View Image.
A Specify Cropping/Placement window is
displayed showing the label bitmap.
3. Crop the Gluggo label by dragging the handles
on the corners and sides of the selection region.
Crop so the dark edge at the top is outside the
selection region. Close the window.
574 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
4. Turn on Apply, if it isn’t on already.
The dark edge no longer appears on the label in
the viewport. Adjust the length and width of
themodifier so that the map fits the label better.
Add a sticker on the label:
• Assume a scenario in which the Gluggo brand
has been purchased by Gulpco. It’s your job to
redo the image with the new Gluggo-Gulpco
label. In the following procedures, you’ll put a
Gulpco sticker onto the label to add the new
company name. As you do this, you’ll learn
aboutmultiple channels andUVWcoordinates.
Set up the mapping modifier:
1. Press H and select label01, if it’s not already
selected.
2. Right-click in the active viewport and choose
Hide Unselected.
Everything disappears except for the label.
3. In the Front viewport, zoom in on the label.
4. Go to theModify Panel and check the modifier
stack.
The label already has aUVWMappingmodifier
applied to it.
5. Right-click the UVWMapping modifier and
choose Rename.
6. Rename the UVW Mapping modifier to
Gluggo label.
7. Scroll down to the Channel group and change
the map channel to 3.
The label changes orientation in the viewport.
Set up the label material:
1. In theMaterial Editor, click the label material if
it’s not already active.
2. Click the map button next to the Diffuse color
swatch to open the Bitmap map rollouts, if
necessary.
3. In the Coordinates rollout, change the Map
Channel for the label map to 3.
Now the label map will use the mapping from
the Gluggo label modifier, because they both
use the same map channel.
Select faces:
Here, you’ll select the faces where the Gulpco
sticker will go.
1. In the Front viewport, change the display to
Edged Faces (press F4 ).
2. In the modifier stack, click EditableMesh.
Mapping and Mapping Coordinates 575
3. Turn on Polygon selection.
4. Select the three rows of faces in the middle of
the label.
The label middle faces selected
5. Scroll down to the Surface Properties rollout >
Material group and change Set ID to 2 for these
faces.
6. Exit the Polygon sub-object level.
This is an important step. If you don’t turn off
Polygon selection, what follows will not work
as expected.
7. With the Editable Mesh still selected, add a
second UVWMap modifier.
The new UVW Mapping modifier is inserted
in the stack between the Gluggo label modifier
and the Editable Mesh . It will supply the
mapping coordinates for the Gulpco sticker.
8. Right-click the new UVW Mapping modifier
and rename it Sticker.
9. Scroll down to the Channel group and setMap
Channel to 2.
Convert to a multi/sub-object material:
You’ll use the original label as a base for the new
label.
1. On the Material Editor toolbar, click Go
To Parent.
2. Choose the material label and click the
Standard button.
3. In the Material/Map browser,make sure the
Browse From group is set to New.
4. Double-click the Multi/Sub-Object entry. In
the ReplaceMaterial dialog, make sure Keep
Old Material As Sub-material is chosen, and
then click OK.
5. In the Multi/Sub-Object Basic Parameters
rollout, click Set Number. Change Number Of
Materials to 2 and click OK.
6. In the Name field next to the label material,
type Gluggo.
7. In the Name field next to the secondmaterial,
type Gulpco.
Add a map to the second sub-material:
1. Click the second material.
2. Click the map button to the right of the Diffuse
color swatch.
3. On the Material/Map Browser dialog, make
sure Browse From is set to New, and then
double-click the Bitmap list entry. The Select
Bitmap Image File dialog opens.
4. Navigate to the tutorials\intro_to_materials
directory and choose gulpco.jpg.
5. On the Coordinates rollout, set the Map
Channel to 2.
6. Click Show Map In Viewport. The second
map appears in the viewport, layered on top
of the first.
576 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
7. Adjust the Offset and Tiling settings for the
Gulpco map until it’s centered on the bottle.
8. Repeat the process for the Gluggo material so
that the map is centered behind the Gulpco
label.
9. Save your work again as mymaterials3.max.
Creating Multi/Sub-Object
Materials
When you want to apply two or more materials
to an object, you use a Multi/Sub-object material.
This is a material type can contain up to 1,000
different materials, each identified by a unique
number called a material ID. By assigning different
material IDs to discrete selections of faces, you
control where each material will appear when the
parentMulti/Sub-Object material is applied to the
object.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
In this exercise, you’ll create the material
automatically by dragging and dropping onto
sub-object selections.
Create Multi/Sub-object materials using drag and
drop:
1. Openintro_materials4.max.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Rescale The File
Objects To The System Unit Scale.
2. Right-click the Camera viewport label
and change the viewport display mode to
Wireframe.
The viewport now displays all the geometry in
wireframe.
3. On the menu bar, choose Views > Shade
Selected.
4. Select the bottle in the viewport.
The bottle alone is shaded. At the top of the
Modify panel, the object namebottle with label
Creating Multi/Sub-Object Materials 577
is displayed in boldface to indicate that this is a
group.
5. On the menu bar, choose Group>Open.
The grouping is temporarily suspended so
you can manipulate the members of the group
individually.
6. Press H and select the label01 by name from
the selection list.
The label becomes shaded.
7. Right-click in the viewport and choose Hide
Selection.
The label is hidden from view. Now you can
work just with the bottle.
8. Select the bottle again.
The name of the object isbottlewithcork.
Assign material IDs:
In order to assignmaterial IDnumbers to different
parts of an object youmust first make a sub-object
selection of faces or polygons. Since the bottle
is already an Editable Poly object, sub-object
selection tools are available in theModify panel.
1. On the Modify panel, access the Polygon
sub-object level by clicking the Polygon
selection icon.
2. Right-click the Camera viewport label, and
turn on Edged Faces (or press F4 ).
3. In the Camera viewport, select the polygons
used for the cork by dragging a region around
the top of the cork and down to (but not
including) the top of the glass.
The selected polygons turn red in the viewport.
If the selected polygons don’t turn red,
right-click the Camera viewport label
and choose Configure. In the Viewport
Configuration dialog > RenderingMethod tab
> RenderingOptions group, turn on Shade
Selected Faces.
4. In theMaterial Editor, click an unused material
and name it cork.
5. From theMaterial Editor, drag cork to the cork
on the bottle.
6. On the menu bar, choose Edit > Select Invert.
578 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Everything except the cork is now selected for
the glass.
7. Drag the green bottle material from the
Material editor to the selection set of faces.
The bottle turns bright green.
8. Turn off Polygon selection.
Add the new material to the Material Editor:
3ds Max has automatically created a new
Multi/Sub-Object material in the scene. However,
if you want to work on the material, you will need
to load it into the Material Editor.
1. In the Material Editor, click an unused sample
slot.
2. Click Pick Material From Object.
3. Click the cork with the eyedropper cursor.
The multi/sub-object material is transferred
to the Material Editor. Both materials are
displayed on the same sphere.
4. Name this material mybottle.
5. On the Multi/Sub-Object Material Parameter
rollout, click the material cork.
The Material Editor moves to the level of that
material and displays its parameters. The
sample sphere displays only the single material
now.
6. Expand the Maps rollout and click the None
label next to the Bump map component.
7. Change Browse From to New, if it isn’t already
set.
8. On theMaterials/Map Browser, pick Dent.
9. Name the bump component of this material
bumpy dents.
10.On the Dent Parameters rollout, set Size to 22
and Strength to 5.
11.Set Color #1 to a pale brown and Color #2 to a
medium brown.
Using Raytrace Materials and Maps 579
12. Click the Go To Parent button.
13.Drag the bumpy dents map from the Bump
component to the Diffuse Color component
and choose Copy.
14.Click the new Dent map to go to the Dent
Parameters level of the Diffuse Color and name
this map cork dents.
15.Set one of the viewports to Front and zoom in
on the cork.
16.Render to see what the dents look like on the
cork.
17. If you like, change the colors in the cork dents
map in the Diffuse component and render
again.
18.Save your file as mybottlematerials.max.
Using Raytrace Materials and
Maps
Raytrace materials are perfect for reflective
materials like shiny metal and glass.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Set up the lesson:
1. Continue from the previous exercise or load
bottlematerials.max.
2. Change the Camera viewport back to Smooth
+ Highlights.
3. Turn off Views > Shade Selected, if it’s currently
turned on.
Make green glass using a raytrace material:
1. Open theMaterial Editor and access the green
bottle material within the multi/sub-object
material.
2. Change the material type fromStandard to
Raytrace.
The bottle changes to a gray color in the
viewport.
3. In theMaterial Editor, make the Diffuse color a
rich forest green.
The bottle changes to a green color in the
viewport.
4. Click the Transparency color swatch. Change
the color to light gray by settingValue to 119.
5. Set the Reflect color swatch to a darker gray:
Value=100. Close the Color Selector dialog.
6. Drag the wood countertop material to the
counter (base) object.
7. Render the Camera01 viewport.
The bottle shows the reflections of adjacent
objects.
580 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Raytrace reflections in the scene:
There are several ways to make objects appear
reflective. You choose a method of creating
reflection based on the main source of an object’s
color and the quality you want to achieve. For
objects that derive their color primarily by
reflection, such as polished metal or glass, you will
probably want to use a raytrace material. If an
object has a strong local color or texture as part of
its material, you might add a reflection map to the
Reflection map component instead.
1. Press H and choose [knife]. The knife and its
handle are grouped together.
2. Choose Group > Open.
3. Select the knife blade in the viewport.
4. From the Material Editor, drag the knife blade
material to the knife blade (Line02).
This is another Raytrace material. It’s a lot like
the Raytrace green glass material except that it’s
not transparent.
5. Drag the knife handle material to the knife
handle.
6. Click the wood countertop material. On the
Maps rollout, click the None button of the
Reflection map component.
7. In the Material\Map Browser, double-click the
Raytrace map type. In this case you’re adding a
raytrace only to the Reflection component.
8. Name the Reflection component counter
reflection.
9. Click Go to Parent. On the Maps rollout,
set the Reflection amount to 44 and the
Diffuse Color amount to 90. Thiswill keep the
reflection from overpowering the wood texture.
10.Render the Camera01 viewport, and examine
the reflections in the knife blade and
countertop.
11.Save your file as mymaterials4.max.
Texturing the Chessboard 581
Texturing the Chessboard
InModeling a Chess Set (page 28), you learned
how to create the pieces for a chess set. Chess
pieces want to live on a chessboard. In this
tutorial, you’ll construct a chessboard that has a
wood-grained, checkerboard pattern. You’ll also
add shininess and reflection to the chessboard.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Set up the lesson:
• Loadthefiletut_knight.max.
Create the chessboard:
1. On the Create panel, click the
Geometry button. Make sure Standard
Primitives is chosen in the drop-down list.
2. Click the Box button.
3. If 2D Snap is on, turn it off.
4. In the Top viewport, drag to set the initial
length and width of the box, then release the
mouse and drag downward to set an initial
height. Click to finish.
Don’t worry about the initial dimensions: you
will change them soon.
5. Rename the box chessboard.
6. In the box’s Parameters rollout, set the Length
andWidth to both equal 32cm, and set Height
equal to –1cm.
Tip: Because the board is bigger than the chess
pieces, you might need to zoom viewports and
move either object before you can comfortably
see both of them together.
7. Use the Move tool to position the box at the
world origin: 0,0,0.
Create the squares:
1. Activate the Perspective viewport and
click the Zoom Extents button.
2. Click the Field Of View button and zoom
in so the chessboard fills the viewport.
3. On the toolbar, open theMaterial Editor
by clicking the Material Editor button or use
the M keyboard shortcut.
4. Click the first sample sphere and click the map
button just to the right of the Diffuse color
swatch.
The Material/Map Browser appears.
5. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Checker.
3ds Max has a built-in checker pattern, which
makes your work easier. The active sample slot
now shows a sphere with the checker pattern.
6. In the Material Editor, click Assign
Material To Selection, and then click ShowMap
In Viewport.
This lets you see the map in shaded viewports.
(The viewport display of maps is only an
approximate.)
582 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The default checker pattern is two by two,
but a chessboard needs eight squares in each
direction.
Note: If the checker pattern looks slightly
skewed, right-click the Perspective viewport
label and turn on Texture Correction.
7. On the Coordinates rollout, set both the U and
V Tiling values to 4.0.
Now the board has the right number of squares.
If you render the Perspective viewport, you see
that the checker pattern is more refined than
the shaded viewport shows.
Note: Because the chessboard is made out of
a box, the checker pattern is also applied to
the sides. Since the chessboard is so thin, the
pattern on the sides isn’t obvious.
Give the checker pattern a wood texture:
1. Open the Utilities panel and click Asset
Browser.
The Asset Browser appears. Click OK to the
copyright advisory it displays.
2. The Asset Browser is a large dialog. Move and
resize it so you can see both it and theMaterial
Editor.
3. Use the navigation tree at the left of
the Asset Browser window to locate the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
4. In the Material Editor, make sure the Checker
map’s Checker Parameters rollout is visible.
5. In the Asset Browser, locate the fileOak1.tga.
Drag theOak1.tga thumbnail to the Color #1
map button on theChecker Parameters rollout.
Then drag theWalnut3.tga thumbnail to the
Color #2 map button.
6. Close the Asset Browser.
Now if you render the chessboard, it has a
contrasting wood pattern.
7. Save the scene as mychessboard.max.
Using Displacement Mapping with Surface Properties 583
Add polish to the chessboard:
1. In the Material Editor, click the Go To
Parent button.
2. Open the Maps rollout.
3. Click the map button for the Reflection map
component.
The Material/Map Browser opens.
4. Double-click the Flat Mirror map.
5. Render the scene.
The pieces are reflected in the chessboard, but
the wood grain is washed out.
6. Click the Go To Parent button and, on the
Maps rollout, change the Reflection Amount
to 30.
The wood grain is not as washed out as before
but still looks faded.
7. On the Maps rollout, click the Checker map in
the Diffuse Color component.
8. In the Checker Parameters rollout, click the
Color #1 map and open the Output rollout.
9. Set the Output Amount to 1.5.
10. Click the Go Forward To Sibling button
and make the same change to the Output
Amount of the Color #2 map.
11. Render the scene.
The wood grain looks much warmer and more
realistic.
12. Save the scene as mychessboard01.max.
Using Displacement Mapping with
Surface Properties
In this lesson, you make a moon with a detailed
surface using displacement mapping combined
with Surface properties.
• Bitmaps for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Create a moon:
1. Reset 3ds Max.
584 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
2. In the Perspective viewport, create a sphere that
fills the viewport.
3. On the Create panel, set the Radius to 100.
Name the sphere Earth’s Moon.
4. Click Zoom Extents All to zoom out in all
four viewports.
Set up lights and cameras:
1. Activate the Perspective viewport, if necessary,
and then press Ctrl+C . This creates aTarget
camera, matches the camera to the Perspective
viewport, and switches the viewport to the
camera view.
2. Click Zoom Extents All. In the Top
viewport, you see the camera is facing the
moon at about a 45 degree angle.
Note: Your spheremight be a different color
than the one shown here.
3. On the Create panel, open the Lights
sub-panel and click Omni.
4. In the Top viewport, create an omni light by
clicking at the bottom of the viewport. Name
this light main light.
5. On theModify panel, turn on Shadows and set
Multiplier to 1.2.
6. In the Top viewport, create another omni light
by clicking near the top left of the viewport.
Name this light fill light.
7. On theModify panel, turn on Shadows and set
Multiplier to 1.5. Then change the color of the
fill light to orange. This adds some warmth to
the image.
8. Right-click in the Camera viewport to activate
it. Then press F9 to render the scene.
Using Displacement Mapping with Surface Properties 585
In the rendered image, the highlights on the
moon appear very bright, and the edges of
the moon need more detail. You will fix both
problems using mapping.
Map the moon:
1. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
2. Click a material sample slot. Name the material
Earth’s Moon.
3. Choose the Oren-Nayar-Blinn shader from the
drop-down list on the Shader Basic Parameters
rollout. The highlights of the material darken,
giving the sample sphere a softer look.
Comparing the Blinn (l) and Oren-Nayar-Blinn (r) shaders
4. Click the Diffusemap button; it’s the blank gray
button to the right of the Diffuse color swatch.
In the Material/Map Browser, choose Bitmap
and click OK.
5. Use the Select Bitmap Image File dialog to open
moon.jpg. The moon map appears on the
sample sphere.
6. Click Show Map In Viewport, and then
drag the material onto the sphere.
7. Press F9 to do a test render.
8. In theMaterial Editor, click Go To Parent.
9. Drag from the Diffuse map button to the
Diffuse Level map button, in the Advanced
Diffuse group. Choose Instance and click OK.
10.Press F9 to see the result.
The dark areas of the map look even darker.
Displace the surface with a map:
Displacement mapping uses an image or algorithm
to alter the geometry of an object. Unlike bump
mapping, it actually changes the mesh, so you
can see the texture on the edges of an object.
Ordinarily this isn’t visible until you render,
although you can see it in the viewports with
586 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
the Disp Approx modifier. This modifier is not
covered in this tutorial.
1. Open the Maps rollout. Pull down the bottom
edge of the Material Editor so that you can see
the entire rollout, if necessary.
2. Drag themoon.jpg map from the Diffuse Level
map component to the Displacement map
component. Choose Copy and click OK.
The button next to Displacement is now labeled
"Map#2 (Moon.jpg)."
3. Set Displacement amount to -20.
4. Select the sphere. Right-click the sphere and
choose Convert To Editable Poly.
5. On the Modify panel, scroll down to the
Subdivision Displacement rollout and open it.
6. In the Subdivision Displacement rollout, turn
on Subdivision Displacement and click Low.
This prevents the surface mesh from becoming
too complex.
7. Press F9 to render. The surface of the moon
appears bumpy.
8. OnMaterial Editor >Maps rollout, increase the
Displacement amount to –50.
9. Press F9 to render. The surface of the moon
appears even bumpier.
Displacing the surface of the moon
Control the areas of displacement:
This procedure shows you how to control the
surface displacement so that it accentuates the
areas of moderate displacement.
1. On the Maps rollout of the Material Editor,
click the Displacement map button labeled
"Map#2 (moon.jpg)."
2. On the Bitmap Parameters rollout, click View
Image. The close grayscale values that you
see in themap limit the amount of surface
variation.
Using Displacement Mapping with Surface Properties 587
3. Close the viewer window and scroll down to
the Output rollout.
4. Open the Output rollout and turn on Enable
ColorMap. Scroll to the bottom so you can see
both the graph and the gradient bar.
5. Drag the point on the right downward so the
line is horizontal.
The gradient bar and the sample slot turn black.
6. Click Add Point. Then click to add two
points to the curve at about one-third intervals
along its length.
7. ClickMove. Select the two points that you
just created and move them upward to form a
trapezoidal graph.
8. Press F9 . The bumpiness increases across the
middle values of the map.
The moon with mountains
9. Click Go to Parent. Change the
Displacement to 20 and press F9 . You now
have a moon with craters.
588 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Craters on the moon
10.Save your file as mymoon.max.
Adding Stars to the Sky
Vincent van Gogh is not the only one who gets
to have fun painting the night sky. In this lesson
you’ll create your own starry night using a Noise
map in the environment background.
• The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Apply a Noise material:
1. Openmoon.max.
2. Press 8 on the keyboard to open the
Environment dialog.
3. Click the EnvironmentMap button.
4. In the Material/Map Browser, choose Noise
and then OK. The Noise map appears in the
Environment map component.
5. Open the Material Editor.
6. Drag the Noise map from the Environment
dialog to an unused sample sphere. Choose
Instance and click OK.
The sample sphere disappears and is replaced
with the Noise map. The map is displayed as a
square, since this is a map, not a material.
7. Scroll down to the Noise Parameters rollout
and set the Noise Size to 0.2.
8. In the Noise Threshold settings, set the low
threshold to 0.6 and the high threshold to 0.7.
This narrows the range between white and black
so the noise will display as dots or pinpoints.
9. Activate the Camera viewport and press F9
render the scene. Hundreds of stars appear in
the sky.
Stars created with Noise material
10.Reduce the number of stars by increasing the
low threshold to 0.65. Then tone down the
brightness of the stars by changing the white
Noise color to pale gray.
Adding Stars to the Sky 589
11.Render the scene again. The stars fade into the
background.
After adjusting the Noise material
Create a nebula field:
To add drama, create a nebula field bymapping the
black areas of the Noise material with a Gradient
Ramp.
1. On the Noise Parameters rollout, click the
Color #1 map button.
2. Choose Gradient Ramp from theMaterialMap
Browser and then OK.
3. TheMaterial Editor moves down a level in the
material tree. The sample sphere is replaced
by a grayscale gradient. Scroll to the Gradient
Ramp Parameters rollout. The Gradient ramp
has three flags: one on the right, one in the
middle, and one on the left.
4. Double-click the flag on the right to display the
color selector. Change the color to black.
5. Without closing the color selector, click the
middle flag and change it to blue. Then close
the color selector.
6. In the Noise group, set Amount to 1.0. Choose
the Fractal option and set Size to 9.0.
7. Render the scene. Adiffuse blue nebula appears
in the sky.
Add a streak to the nebula field:
1. Click twice near the center of the gradient, on
either side of the middle flag. Two more flags
appear. (If you make too many flags, right-click
a flag and chooseDelete.)
2. Double-click the middle flag and change its
color to a lighter blue.
590 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
3. Set the Noise Levels parameter to 6 to add more
details to the streak.
4. Render the scene.
Nebula background with a streak
5. Experiment with the gradient color, type and
noise parameters until you master the effect.
6. Save your work asmymoonandstars.max.
Create a starry sky with a large sphere:
Another way tomake stars is to create a large
sphere, invert its normals, and then apply a
starfield bitmap to it.
1. Using the keyboard entry method, create a
very large sphere with a radius of about 1200.
(If you’re not familiar with this method, open
the Create panel and click Sphere. Open the
Keyboard Entry rollout and set Radius to 1200.
Then click Create.)
2. Name the sphere skydome.
3. Open the Modifier panel. From the Modifier
drop-down list, choose Object SpaceModifiers
> Normal.
4. In the Parameters rollout, turn on FlipNormals,
if it is not already on.
5. Open the Material Editor and click an unused
sample slot. Name the material starry sky.
6. Click the Diffuse map button. In the
Material/Map Browser, choose Bitmap and
click OK.
7. In the Select Bitmap Image File dialog, choose
stars10.jpg and clickOK. This is a large and
detailed map, so it may take a moment to load.
Note: You’ll find this bitmap in the
tutorials/space folder.
8. Turn on Show Map In Viewport.
9. Click Go to Parent. On the Blinn Basic
Parameters rollout, set Self-Illumination to 100.
10.Drag the material onto the skydome object
and press F9 to render the scene. The stars
from the map appear in the sky, replacing the
environment background map.
Brighten the stars:
1. Open the Maps rollout and click the Diffuse
Color map.
2. Open the Output rollout and set RGB Level
to 2.0. To filter out the dimmer stars, set the
Output Amount to 1.2.
3. Press F9 to render the scene.
Creating a Skin Material 591
Save your work:
• Save your work as mymoonandstars2.max.
Creating a Skin Material
Human skin is difficult to simulate in computer
graphics because it reflects light from a short
distance beneath the surface, rather than directly
at the surface. In this lesson, you’ll learn how to
use the Shellac material to create a material that
closely resembles skin.
The files for this lesson can be found in the
tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.
Set up the lesson:
• Openthescenefileskin_material_start.max.
Create the skin material:
1. Open theMaterial Editor, and then click
the third sample slot on the top row.
This material is already applied to the head.
2. Click the Standard button, just above the
rollouts, and then in theMaterial/Map Browser,
double-click Shellac.
Shellac is a special material that superimposes
one material over another so that you can see
through the upper material to the lower one.
This capability is well suited to simulating
human skin.
3. On the Replace Material dialog that displays,
click OK to keep the old material as a
sub-material.
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4. Name the material Skin.
Choose amap for the base skin material:
1. On the Shellac Basic Parameters rollout, click
the Base Material button.
2. Click the Show Map In Viewport button
to turn it on.
3. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click
the map button to the right of the Diffuse color
swatch.
4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Bitmap.
5. In the file selector dialog, choose the file
skin_tile.jpg.
6. Click Open.
Adjust the shading for the base skin material:
1. Click Go To Parent, and change the
Material’s shading type to Oren-Nayar-Blinn.
2. In the Oren-Nayar-Blinn Basic Parameters
rollout > Specular Highlights group, set
Specular Level to 27 and the Glossiness to 11.
Apply bump mapping for the skin texture:
1. Expand the Maps rollout, and then drag the
Diffuse Color map button (labeled with the
map number and the file nameskin_tile.jpg) to
the Bump map button.
On the Copy (Instance) Map dialog, choose
Copy (if necessary), and then click OK.
2. Click the Bump map button to open the
parameters for the copied bitmap.
Set the tiling for bump mapping:
At the default tiling setting, the bump map is a
bit coarse; increasing the Tiling values gives the
bumpiness a finer grain.
• IntheCoordinates rollout, enter 4.0 for both
U and V Tiling values.
Creating a Skin Material 593
Adjust the amount of bump mapping:
1. Expand the Output rollout, and set the Bump
Amount to 1.86.
2. ClickGo to Parent.
3. In theMaps rollout, change the Bump Amount
setting to 70.
Set up the Shellac material:
1. Click Go To Parent again, and in the
Shellac Basic Parameters rollout, click the
Shellac Material button.
2. Change the shading type to Anisotropic.
3. Click the map button to the right of the Diffuse
color swatch.
4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Bitmap.
5. Use the Select Bitmap Image File dialog to open
the file skin_tile.jpg.
Set the tiling for the Shellacmaterial map:
• OntheCoordinatesrollout,enter4.0 for both
U and V Tiling values.
Adjust the specular highlights for the Shellac
material:
1. Click Go To Parent, and then click the
Specular color swatch.
2. In the Color Selector, change the color to a light
skin tone: Red: 250, Green: 224, Blue: 195, and
click Close.
3. In the Specular Highlight group, set Specular
Level to 131, Glossiness to 34, andAnisotropy
to 40.
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4. Click Go To Parent, and set Shellac Color
Blend to 24.
This gives the Shellac Material component a
small but significant role in the look of the
composite material.
5. Save the scene as skin_material.max
6. Render the Camera01 viewport to see the result.
You’ve created a realistic-looking skin material.
Try changing the parameters and components and
re-rendering to see how they affect the material. In
particular, try changing the Shellac Color Blend
setting to blend different amounts of the Shellac
Material component into the overall material.
Summary
3ds Max offers a wealth of options for applying
textures to objects. You use theMaterial Editor for
creating and modifying materials, applying maps,
and even adjusting mapping. Once a material is
ready, you can apply it to an object by dragging and
dropping it from theMaterial Editor to the object
in the viewport. The Material Editor provides a
number of different shaders for achieving such
effects as metal and translucency. The UVWMap
modifier lets you determine how materials and
maps wrap around an object. One of the most
useful material types is Multi/Sub-Object, which
lets you easily combine different materials on a
single object. Another way is to use a map such
as Checker, which gives you the option to apply
two different maps in place of the black and white
checks. You can add modeling detail to your
objects with displacement mapping. The Shellac
material is useful for simulating human skin, as
well as other materials.
This tutorial provided a starting point for learning
about materials, but the ultimate possibilities
with 3ds Max materials are limited only by your
imagination. The time you spend practicing and
experimenting with the procedures you learned
here will be rewarded by a greater proficiency with
the available tools, and the ability to get the effects
you seek with ease and speed.
Materials for Interior Scenes
One of the most useful 3ds Max features for
architectural models is its ability to fashion
complex and subtle materials. The 3ds Max
Material Editor provides you with ultimate control
over the materials you create.
Materials of One Color: Applying Standard Materials 595
This tutorial focuses on material techniques that
lend themselves to interior scenes. Outdoor scenes
can use similar materials.
Skill Level: Beginner to Intermediate
Time to complete: 45 minutes
Features Covered in This Tutorial
After completing this tutorial, you should be able
to:
• Use the Material Editor to create and assign
materials.
• Createasimple“one-color”material.
• Use a map in a material.
• Create amulti/sub-objectmaterial for assigning
multiple materials to a single object.
• Create a Blend material that includes a
procedural map.
• Create and apply an Architectural material.
• Use the Asset Browser to find textures.
• Use the UVWMap modifier.
Files for This Tutorial
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials\designviz
directory. Before starting the tutorials, copy
the \tutorials folder from the disc to your local
program installation.
Materials of One Color: Applying
Standard Materials
In this lesson, you create simple, “one-color”
materials and apply them to objects in the scene.
Specifically, you create the materials for a pair of
chairs and an end table.
Material Components: Colors and Other
Controls
In general, we think of simple standard materials
(with no maps) as being of “one color”. In
fact, an 3ds Max material consists of a number
of component controls, and among these are a
number of color components. The default Blinn
shader, for example, uses three color components:
ambient, diffuse, and specular. Ambient is the
color of the material in shadow, and specular is the
color of highlights if the material is shiny. Diffuse,
the color of thematerial under diffuse light, is what
we usually think of as “the” color of a material.
In the lessons of this tutorial, you work with the
diffuse color component exclusively.
Materials have other non-color components, such
as highlight and opacity controls. In these lessons,
you adjust some highlights and map amounts,
but don’t otherwise work with numeric material
components.
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Set up the scene:
• Onthemenubar,chooseFile>Open.Locate
chairs.max in the \tutorials\designviz folder,
and click Open.
If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch dialog,
choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit Scale.
This will change your system unit, so be sure
to reset your systemunit after completing this
tutorial.
To reset your system unit, go to the Customize
menu and choose Units Setup > System Unit
Setup > System Unit Scale > Inches.
If the geometry is not visible in the
viewport, click the Zoom Extents All button
twice to correct the display.
This scene contains only the chairs and the end
table. At present, they are simply a dull gray.
You will make the seats and the table top a glossy
black leather, and the wood a flat brown.
Create a black leather material:
1. On the toolbar, clickMaterial Editor.
TheMaterial Editor is displayed. This is a large
dialog for designing and applying materials.
At the top of the dialog are sample slots that
display material previews.
Sample slots show previews of materials on small
sample objects such as spheres.
Below and to the right of the sample slots are
various buttons and other controls. Below these
tools are rollouts that are specific to a particular
material type.
2. Make sure the first sample slot is active. If
active, it has a heavy white border.
3. In the Material Editor, go to the Blinn Basic
Parameters rollout.
4. Click the gray color swatch labeled Diffuse.
A Color Selector appears.
5. In the Color Selector, change the diffuse color
to black. The easiest way to do this is to drag
theWhiteness slider all the way to the top. The
RGB and HSV fields should both show 0,0,0.
Materials of One Color: Applying Standard Materials 597
6. In the Color Selector, click Close.
By default, the diffuse component is locked to
the ambient component, so both the Diffuse
and Ambient color swatches now appear black.
The material is very dark, as you can see in its
sample slot. To look like leather, it needs to be
shiny, too. To do this, you increase the intensity
and size of the highlight.
7. In the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout > Specular
Highlights group, set the Specular Level to 79.
As the highlight graph shows, there is now a
large highlight. Increasing the value of Specular
Level increases the height of the highlight curve.
The effect is also apparent in the sample slot.
8. In the Specular Highlights group, set the
Glossiness to 54.
The highlight graph shows that the highlight
curve has become much narrower.
Increasing the value of Glossiness narrows the
highlight curve. In general, small but intense
highlights give the effect of shiny materials, as
you can see in the sample slot.
This is the effect intended for the leather
upholstery, so give this material a name.
9. In the material name field, below the sample
slots, highlight the default name of 1 Default
(the number can vary), and enter Black
Leather.
Apply the black leather material to the upholstered
parts of the chairs:
1. In a viewport, click to select the
upholstered parts of the chairs and table.
598 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
In the wireframe viewports, these parts are
blue.
The name Leather Parts should
appear in the Name And Color rollout on the
Create panel. If you go to the Modify panel, it
should also appear in the object name field at
the top of the panel.
2. In theMaterial Editor, make sure the Black
Leather material’s sample slot is still active, and
then click Assign Material To Selection.
In viewports, the upholstered areas now appear
dark and the Black Leather sample slot has
solid, white triangles at each corner indicating
that the material is applied to the selected
object(s) in the scene.
Create a simple wood material:
For this model, which is a small part of a much
larger scene, the wood can be a simple brown
color. Future exercises will show how to create
more realistic wood textures.
1. In theMaterial Editor, click the second sample
slot to make it active.
2. In the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the
Diffuse color swatch.
3. In the Color Selector, assign the hue, saturation,
value (HSV) fields these values, respectively:
25, 129, 146.
The red, green, blue (RGB) spinners update to
show 146, 116, 72.
4. Close the Color Selector.
The Diffuse and Ambient color swatches now
show a medium brown.
5. In the Specular Highlights group, set the
Specular Level to 15. Leave the Glossiness at
the default value of 10.
Broad, shallow highlights give a material a
matte appearance, as intended for the wood
parts.
6. In the material name field, enterWood 1.
Apply the wood material to the wooden parts of the
chairs, and the table:
1. In a viewport, click to select the leg of a
chair or table.
In the wireframe viewports, this is the orange
part of the model.
If you go to theModify panel, the name
Wood Parts should appear in the object name
field at the top of the panel.
2. In the Material Editor, make sure the
Wood1material’s sample slot is still active, and
then click AssignMaterial To Selection.
In viewports, the wooden areas now appear
brown.
Render the scene to see more of the effect:
1. Right-click the Perspective viewport to make
sure it’s active.
2. On themain toolbar, click Quick Render.
The materials appear in the rendering. They
are simple, but adequate as details of an
architectural scene.
Adding Complexity: Applying Mapped Materials 599
One problem with this rendering is that certain
faces don’t appear; specifically, the front of the
end table and one side of the chair on the right.
One way to fix this would be to go into the scene
and flip the face normals of the nonrendering
geometry, but there is a fix available in the
Material Editor itself.
3. For theWood 1 material, go to the Shader Basic
Parameter rollout and turn on 2-Sided. Then
click the Black Leather sample slot to activate
it, and turn on 2-Sided for the leather material
as well.
Turning on 2-sided is one way to make sure all
of an object’s geometry renders in a scene. Be
aware that this can increase rendering time,
especially in complex scenes.
4. Click Quick Render again.
This time, all of the furniture geometry renders.
Save your work:
• Save the scene as chairs_with_materials.max.
Adding Complexity: Applying
Mapped Materials
You can create more complex materials quite
easily, by assigning a map to the diffuse color. A
map applied to the diffuse color component is
often described as a texture map. For example, the
bookshelves used in the library model have two
textures: wood grain for the shelves, and books
for the shelves’ contents.
In this lesson, you create the mapped materials
and apply them to a bookshelf model.
Set up the scene:
• Onthemenubar,chooseFile>Open.Locate
bookshelf.max in the \tutorials\designviz
folder, and click Open.
If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch dialog,
choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit Scale.
This will change your system unit, so be sure
to reset your systemunit after completing this
tutorial.
To reset your system unit, go to the Customize
menu and choose Units Setup > System Unit
Setup > System Unit Scale > Inches.
If the geometry is not visible in the
viewport, click the Zoom Extents All button
twice to correct the display.
This scene contains the bookshelf model, but
with no textures applied.
Setting Texture Coordinates Preferences:
1. FromtheCustomizemenu, choose Preferences.
600 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
2. In the General tab, under the Texture
Coordinates group, make sure the Use
Real-World Texture Coordinates option is
turned off.
3. Click OK to exit the Preferences dialog.
Create the wood material:
1. On the toolbar, clickMaterial Editor.
2. In theMaterial Editor, click the first sample slot
to make it active (if it isn’t already).
3. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the
blank map button to the right of the Diffuse
color swatch.
TheMaterial/Map Browser dialog is displayed.
The map button is the gray square to the right of the
diffuse color swatch.
If amap has been assigned, it shows the letter ‘M.’
4. In the Material/Map Browser, locate Bitmap in
the list, and double-click it.
A Select Bitmap Image File dialog appears.
Most of the controls in this dialog are standard
Windows file controls.
5. In the same directory as thebookshelf.max file,
choose the bitmap file namedwood02.jpg, and
then click Open.
In the Material Editor, the sample slot updates
to show that the diffuse color of the material
is now an image of the map file you chose.
Also, the rollouts area of the dialog now shows
controls for the map, rather than the parent
material.
Adding Complexity: Applying Mapped Materials 601
Mapped wood material in sample slot
6. Click the Go To Parent button to get back
to the top level of your new material.
7. In the material name field, enterWood 2.
By default, the material name is a generic name,
01 – Default. Giving your materials more
descriptive names will help you manage them
more efficiently in the future.
Apply the wood to the bookshelves:
1. On the toolbar, click Select By Name. In
the Select ByName dialog that appears, choose
Shelves in the list, and then click Select.
2. In the Material Editor, make sure the
Wood 2 sample slot is still active, and then click
Assign Material To Selection.
The material is now applied to the shelves,
and would appear in a rendering. However, it
doesn’t yet appear in shaded viewports.
Incidentally, when you apply the material, the
sample slot shows solid, angled tabs at the
corners. This is an indication in the Material
Editor that the material in the slot is a material
used in the scene.
Solid corner tabs of a sample slot indicate that the
material is used in the scene.
3. In the Material Editor, click to turn on
Show Map In Viewport.
Now the shaded Perspective viewport shows
that the shelves have a wood grain.
Tip: If you turn on ShowMap InViewport, but
nothing changes in shaded viewports, this is
probably because objects with the material do
not have mapping coordinates. In this case,
you need to apply a UVWMapmodifier. This
modifier is used in later lessons of this tutorial.
Create the book material:
1. In theMaterial Editor, click the second sample
slot to make it active.
2. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the
blank map button to the right of the Diffuse
color swatch.
The map button is the gray square to the right of the
diffuse color swatch.
602 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
3. In the Material/Map Browser, locate Bitmap in
the list, and double-click it. The Select Bitmap
Image File is displayed. In the same directory as
the bookshelf.max file, choose the bitmap file
namedbooks1.jpg, and then click Open.
Although it is somewhat hard to see on the
sphere in the sample slot, the texture for this
material is a scanned image of books on a
bookshelf.
4. Click the Go To Parent button to get back
to the top level of the material.
5. In the material name field, enter Books.
Apply the book material to the shelves:
1. On the toolbar, click Select By Name. In
the Select ByName dialog that appears, choose
Books in the list, and then click Select.
2. In the Material Editor, make sure the
Books sample slot is still active, and then click
Assign Material To Selection.
3. In the Material Editor, click to turn on
Show Map In Viewport.
Now the shaded Perspective viewport shows
the shelves with books on them.
With just two image files, you have given the
model a convincing amount of detail, especially
if the model is meant, like the bookshelf, to be a
detail in a larger scene. Texture-mapped materials
are a convenient way to add textures and images
to your scene. (You can also use a map as a scene
background image.)
Save your work:
• Save the scene as bookshelf_with_maps.max.
Applying Multiple Materials to
One Object
The result of this lessonmay appear to be similar to
that inMaterials of One Color: Applying Standard
Materials (page 595). This lesson, however, shows
how to combine the leather and wood parts of
the chairs into a single mesh, while retaining the
material assignments.
Multi/Sub-Object Material
The trick to having multiple materials assigned
to a single object is to use a multi/sub-object
material. A multi/sub-object material is simply a
container for other materials. As its name implies,
it works at the sub-object level, assigning different
sub-materials to different sub-objects of the
model. (A variety of object types have sub-object
levels, especially the surface models: editable
mesh, editable poly, editable patch, and NURBS.)
Assigning sub-materials is a two-part process:
• Assign Face sub-objects a material ID value.
• Matchmaterialscontainedinthe
multi/sub-object material to the ID
values on the faces.
You can do these steps in either order.
Applying Multiple Materials to One Object 603
Figure mapped using amulti/sub-object material
Lower right: Different sub-objects have different material
IDs.
Upper right: Multi/sub-object rollout maps the IDs to
different sub-materials.
Set up the scene:
You can use a prepared file, or the file you worked
on before. Do one of the following:
•
• ChooseFile>Open. Locate
chairs_assigned.max in the
\tutorials\designviz folder, and click
Open.
If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Adopt The File’s
Unit Scale. This will change your system
unit, so be sure to reset your systemunit after
completing this tutorial.
To reset your system unit, go to the
Customize menu and choose Units Setup
> SystemUnit Setup > SystemUnit Scale >
Inches.
If the geometry is not visible in the
viewport, click the Zoom Extents All button
twice to correct the display.
• Choose File > Open. Locate the file you
created (chairs_with_materials.max), and
click Open.
The chairs have materials assigned, but
Leather Parts andWood Parts are still two
separate mesh objects.
Wireframe views show that the leather and wooden
parts of the chairs are two separate meshes.
Plan and assign material ID’s:
When you work with sub-objectmaterials, the first
thing to do is to plan how tomap thematerial ID
numbers. The values on the geometry must match
the values in the material, and vice versa. This is
not a task for the 3D software, but for a design
document, even if it’s only a scrap of paper.
For this model, the wood parts will retain the
default material ID of 1, and the leather parts will
have a new material ID of 2.
1. Select the Leather Parts mesh.
2. Go to the Modify panel. The
modifier stack display is the window below the
object name and the drop-down Modifier List.
This is where you choose a sub-object level.
Click the plus icon next to the name Editable
Mesh to see the mesh’s sub-object levels.
604 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Top: After clicking the plus icon, the stack shows
sub-object levels.
Bottom: The sub-object levels in the stack display.
3. Faces are the smallest renderable portions of a
mesh. Click Face in the hierarchy.
The stack with the Face sub-object level selected.
4. Choose Edit > Select All.
This selects all the faces in the Leather Parts
object. By default, sub-object selections display
in red.
5. On the Modify panel, go to the Surface
Properties rollout. (This is the last rollout on
the Modify panel.) In the Material group,
increase the Set ID value from 1 to 2.
6. In the modifier stack display, click Editable
Mesh again to return to the top, object level.
Combine the two meshes:
1. In a viewport, select the Wood Parts
mesh.
The wood parts have material ID 1, so it makes
sense to make them the basis of the combined
mesh.
2. Go to the Modify panel. On the Edit
Geometry rollout, click to turn on Attach.
Then, in a viewport, click the Leather Parts
mesh to attach it.
AnAttachOptions dialog is displayed.
Applying Multiple Materials to One Object 605
3. In the Attach Options dialog, choose Do Not
Modify Mat IDs Or Material, and then click
OK.
This option leaves the material IDs on faces
unchanged.
Tip: After attaching the parts of your model,
be sure to turn off the Attach button. If you
don’t do this and want to make other object
selections, you will inadvertently attach objects
you don’t want attached.
4. In the object name field at the top of theModify
panel, type Chair Group.
Create the multi/sub-object material:
1. On the toolbar, clickMaterial Editor.
2. In the Material Editor, click the third, unused
sample slot to make it active.
3. To the right of the material name field is the
Material Type button. At present, its label says
“Standard.” Click this button.
TheMaterial/Map Browser is displayed.
4. In the Material/Map Browser list, double-click
Multi/Sub-Object.
A ReplaceMaterial dialog is displayed.
5. Choose Discard Old Material, and then click
OK.
TheMulti/Sub-Object Basic Parameters rollout
is displayed in the Material Editor.
6. By default, the multi/sub-object material
contains 10 sub-materials. The chair group
model needs only two. On the rollout, click
Set Number. In the Set Number Of Materials
dialog that is displayed, reduce the Number Of
Materials value to 2, and then click OK.
7. Drag the sample slot that contains the Black
Leather material to the Multi/Sub-Object Basic
Parameters rollout, and release the mouse
when you are over the button for the second
sub-material. This button is in the column
labeled Sub-Material.
8. In the Instance (Copy) Material dialog that is
displayed, leave Instance chosen, and click OK.
The new sub-material corresponds toMaterial
ID 2.
Controls in the Multi/Sub-Object Basic Parameters
rollout after dragging the Black Leather material to the
second sub-material’s button.
9. Drag the sample slot that contains theWood
1 material to the Multi/Sub-Object Basic
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Parameters rollout, and release the mouse
when you are over the button for the first
sub-material. As before, accept Instance and
click OK.
This sub-material corresponds toMaterial ID 1.
Tip: You can change material ID assignments
in the Material Editor, by editing the values in
the ID column of the Multi/Sub-Object Basic
Parameters rollout. You can also change them
on the geometry side by using the Material
group of the Surface Properties rollout.
Sample sphere for the multi/sub-object material
Assign the material to the mesh:
The multi/sub-object material is now complete.
The last step is to assign it to the model.
1. In a viewport, click to select the Chair
Group model.
2. In the Material Editor, click Assign
Material To Selection.
The appearance of the model is unchanged, but
it now consists of a single editable mesh, so you
can use it with the Substitute modifier.
Save your work:
• Savethesceneaschair_group_single_
mesh.max.
Creating 3D Materials: Another
Approach to Wood
In an earlier lesson, you created a wood material
using a bitmap. In this lesson, you create a wood
effect using the built-inWood material. This is
an example of a 3D material. 3D materials, also
known as procedural materials, are generated by
the software. This lets you adjust their settings
interactively.
Another advantage of 3D materials is the way they
exist in three dimensions. If you slice an object
with 3DWood applied, you see the interior grain,
as you would if you sawed into a real piece of wood.
3D materials pervade an object. “Cutting” an object with
a 3D wood material (for example, by using a Boolean
operation) reveals interior grain.
Set up the scene:
• Onthemenubar,chooseFile>Open.Locate
kitchen.max in the \tutorials\designviz folder,
and click Open.
If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch dialog,
choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit Scale.
This will change your system unit, so be sure
to reset your systemunit after completing this
tutorial.
If you do not adopt the file’s unit scale, the
material you create will be out of proportion
and some of the settings you make will show
poor results.
Creating 3D Materials: Another Approach toWood 607
This scene is a model of a kitchen. At present, it
has a clean, industrial look.
You will add textures to make some surfaces wood,
giving the kitchen a warmer look. (In the exercises
that follow, you will also create a brick material for
the wall and add a tile material to the floor.)
Creating a wood material:
1. On the toolbar, clickMaterial Editor.
Tip: You can also press the M keyboard
shortcut to open theMaterial Editor.
2. In the Material Editor, click an unused sample
slot to make it active.
Reminder: Unused sample slots have no angle
brackets in their corners. Used sample slots
have angled corners.
3. In the material name field, enterWood 3.
4. On the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, change
the shader type fromBlinn toAnisotropic.
5. On the Anisotropic Basic Parameters rollout,
click the blank map button to the right of the
Diffuse color swatch.
The map button is the gray square to the right of the
diffuse color swatch.
TheMaterial/Map Browser dialog is displayed.
Note: Anisotropic is a variant of the default
Blinn shader.
6. In the Material/Map Browser, scroll to the
bottom of the list, then double-click theWood
entry.
A wood-grain material appears in the sample
slot.
Adjusting the colors and settings:
The default colors for this material are darker
than you would probably want to use in a kitchen
design. You will change them to lighter shades of
the same hue.
1. In theWood Parameters rollout, click the Color
#1 swatch.
2. In the Color Selector, assign the hue, saturation,
value (HSV) fields these values, respectively:
34, 119, 214. (Hue does not change.)
The red, green, blue (RGB) spinners update to
show 214, 194, 114.
3. In theWood Parameters rollout, click the Color
#2 swatch.
608 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
4. In the Color Selector, assign the hue, saturation,
value (HSV) fields these values, respectively:
25, 121, 169. (Hue does not change.)
The red, green, blue (RGB) spinners update to
show 169, 136, 89.
5. Close the Color Selector.
6. In theWood Parameters rollout, change Radial
Noise to 2.0, and Axial Noise to 1.2.
This gives the grain a “noisier” or “busier”
appearance.
Applying the material to the scene:
1. On the toolbar, open the Named Selection Sets
drop-down list, and chooseWood Surfaces.
This selection set consists of the portions of the
kitchen that will have wood.
Tip: The Named Selection Sets list is between
theNamed Selection Sets button and theMirror
Selected Objects button.
2. In the Material Editor, click Assign
Material To Selection, and then click to turn on
Show Map In Viewport.
Thewood grain appears on objects in the scene.
Rendering to view the wood effect:
Viewport display of 3Dmaterials is usually only a
rough approximation. To see the full effect, you
need to render the scene.
• On themain toolbar, click Quick Render.
In the rendering, you can see that the wood
grain is much too large. This wood has come
froma very big tree! To make thematerialmore
realistic, you can adjust the material.
Adjusting the size of the wood grain:
1. Minimize the rendered frame window.
2. In the Material Editor > Wood Parameters
rollout, change the Grain Thickness to 0.7.
With the grain a tenth of its former size, the
preview in the viewport looks very busy.
Using an Architectural Material on the Wall 609
As a rule of thumb for scenes of this scale,
if the grain is too “busy” and indistinct in
viewports, it is probably about the right size for
the renderer.
3. Click Quick Render.
The rendered scene looks much more
convincing. However, the grain appears to be
end-on, which isn’t right.
Adjusting the direction of the wood grain:
1. Minimize the rendered frame window.
2. In the Material Editor > Coordinates rollout,
change theXAngle andYAngle to90 (degrees).
The Angle values for X, Y, and Z are the third
column of spinners.
3. Click Quick Render.
Changing the grain angle doesn’t have much
effect on the viewport preview, but it greatly
improves the rendered scene.
Saving your work:
• Save the scene as mykitchen_wood.max.
Next, you’ll learn about the Architectural
material.
Using an Architectural Material on
the Wall
The Architectural Material in 3ds Max provides
heightened realism when used with photometric
lights and radiosity, because its settings are based
on physical properties.
The Architectural material lets you choose from
a series of templates of preset parameters for
the material. These templates approximate the
general characteristics of the kind of materials
you’re creating, such as masonry, glass, or painted
surfaces, for example.
Note: The Architectural material is not meant to
be used with standard 3ds Max lights or with the
Light Tracer.
In this lesson, you’ll explore the Architectural
material and its application to a scene. You’ll be
using the material to create a texture for the wall
of the kitchen.
610 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Set up the scene:
1. Continue from the previous lesson, or
choose File menu > Open and browse
to the \tutorials\designviz folder. Open
kitchen_with_wood.max.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit
Scale. This will change your system unit, so be
sure to reset your systemunit after completing
this tutorial.
2. If the geometry is not visible in the
viewport, click the Zoom Extents All button
twice to correct the display.
The next material you’ll create for this kitchen is a
brick material for the wall.
Setting Texture Coordinates Preferences:
1. From theCustomizemenu, choose Preferences.
2. In the General tab, under the Texture
Coordinates group, make sure the Use
Real-World Texture Coordinates option is
turned off.
3. Click OK to exit the Preferences dialog.
Creating a brick material for the wall:
1. On the toolbar, click theMaterial Editor
button.
2. In the Material Editor, click an unused sample
slot to make it active.
3. Click the Standard button to open
the Material/Map Browser and choose
Architectural. Click OK.
4. In the Templates rollout, open the Templates
list and choose some of the different material
presets and watch the Physical Qualities
rollout. You’ll see how the material presets fill
in the physical characteristics for Shininess,
Luminance, and so forth.
5. Choose Masonry before you continue.
6. In the Physical Qualities rollout, click the
Diffuse Map button.
It currently says None.
7. Choose Tiles from the list of map types and
click OK.
8. From the Standard Controls rollout, open the
Preset Type list and chooseRunning Bond.
Using an Architectural Material on the Wall 611
A typical, staggered placement of bricks
9. Open the Advanced Controls rollout and click
the Texturemap button in the Tiles Setup
group.
TheMaterial/Map Browser reopens.
10.Choose Noise and click OK.
The Material Editor shows you the Noise
Parameters.
11.In the Noise Parameters rollout, set the Noise
Type to Fractal and the Size to 10.
12.Click the Color #1 swatch and set a deep red
color in theColor Selector. Some good settings
are Red: 112, Green: 5, and Blue: 0.
13.Click the Color #2 swatch and set a lighter red
color in the Color Selector: 180, Green: 106,
and Blue: 106. Close the Color Selector dialog.
14. Click the Go To Parent button.
15.In the Tiles Setup group of the Advanced
Controls rollout, set the Horiz. Count to 6.0,
Vert. Count to 14.0, and Color Variance to 0.63.
16.In the Grout Setup group, click the Texture
swatch to re-open the Color Selector.
17.Set the Value setting to 90, then close the dialog.
Tip: If you know a color needs to be black, white
or any shade of gray in between, the Red, Green
and Blue values must be the same. Adjusting
the Value setting automatically assigns the same
value to Red, Green and Blue.
18.Set the Rough value to 5.0 to give the mortar
joints a little irregularity.
19. Click the Go To Parent button.
This puts you at the top level of your material.
612 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The primary brick mapping is complete.
Tomake the material more realistic, you’re now
going to add a bump map.
Adding realism with a bump map:
1. Open the Special Effects rollout and make sure
the size of theMaterials Editor dialog lets you
see both the Physical Qualities and Special
Effects rollouts.
2. In the Physical Qualities rollout, click the
DiffuseMap button and drag it down onto the
Bump map button.
The Instance (Copy)Map dialog is displayed.
3. Choose Copy and click OK.
You’re using Copy for this example because you
want to make unique settings for the bump
map. If you chose Instance, any change you
make to the bump map would propagate to the
diffuse map.
4. Click the Bump map button to begin working
on the bump map for the bricks.
5. Click the Noisemap on the Tiles Setup group in
the Advanced Controls rollout.
6. In the Noise Parameters rollout, leave the Noise
Type set to Fractal and set the Size to 15.0.
7. Click the Color #1 swatch to open the Color
Selector, and drag theWhiteness slider all that
way to the bottom to give you a solid white.
8. Click the Color #2 swatch and set the Red value
to 126 and Green and Blue values to 0. Close
the Color Selector.
Tip: To quickly set spinner values to zero,
right-click the spinner arrows.
9. Click the Go To Parent button.
10.Click the Texture map button in the Grout
Setup group.
TheMaterial/Map Browser is displayed.
11.Click the Tiles map and click OK.
12. In the Standard Controls rollout, set the Preset
Type toRunning Bond.
You want to duplicate most of the Tiles map
settings you used for the Diffuse map. These
settings will ensure that the grout lines for the
Bump map align properly with the Diffuse map.
13. In the Advanced Controls rollout, in the Tiles
Setup group, set the Horiz. Count to 6.0 and
Vert. Count to 14.0.
14.Click the Texture swatch for the Tiles Setup and
set it to black.
Dark colors are embossed when used with a
Bump map.
15.In the Grout Setup group, click the Texture
swatch and set it to white.
Lighter colors, on a Bump map, are recessed.
These will form the depressions along the
mortar joints.
16.Close the Color Selector and enter a Rough
value of 5.0 for the Grout Setup.
17. Click the Go To Parent button twice to get
back to the top level of your material.
Using an Architectural Material on the Wall 613
18.In the Special Effects rollout, set the Bump
amount to 50.0, and then rename the material
MyRedBricks.
Now your material is done and ready to apply
to the wall.
Assigning texture coordinates:
1. Activate the Camera01 viewport and select the
wall object namedVC Wall.
The wall is selected.
Before you can apply the brick material to the
wall, the wall needs texture coordinates.
Without texture coordinates, the texture map
will not show up and you will receive aMissing
Map Coordinates message when you render
the scene.
2. Open the Modify panel and click the
down arrow of the Modifier List.
3. Scroll down the list and choose MapScaler from
the Object Space Modifiers grouping.
Texture coordinates (UVWs) are assigned to the object
when the modifier is applied.
Applying the bricks to the wall:
1. In theMaterial Editor, click your brick material
and drag it onto the wall.
2. In theMaterial Editor, click the ShowMap
In Viewport button.
614 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The scale of the texture is way too small. The
default scale of theMapScaler modifier is 1”.
3. In the Parameters rollout, set the Scale to 2’6”.
The bricks are more proportional now.
Note: If the bricks appear crooked, right-click
the Camera01 viewport label and turn on
Texture Correction if 3ds Max is configured to
use the Software display driver. Next you deal
with the brick size.
4. Save the scene as mykitchen_brick.max.
5. Click Quick Render.
The kitchen of your trendy loft.
Material Combinations: Using
Blend to Create a Floor Material
The Material Editor provides a number of ways
to combine materials. Bitmaps and procedural
(3D) materials will probably serve your needs for
most models, but this lesson is an example of the
versatility of the Material Editor.
In this lesson, you create a complex Blend material
for the tile floor in the kitchen.
Set up the scene:
• Continue from the previous lesson, or open
the file, kitchen_with_brick.max located in the
\tutorials\designviz folder.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit
Scale. This will change your system unit, so be
sure to reset your systemunit after completing
this tutorial.
Setting Texture Coordinates Preferences:
1. FromtheCustomizemenu, choose Preferences.
2. In the General tab, under the Texture
Coordinates group, make sure the Use
Real-World Texture Coordinates option is
turned off.
3. Click OK to exit the Preferences dialog.
Create the floor material:
1. In the Material Editor, select an unused
sample slot.
2. In the material name field, enter Floor Tile.
Material Combinations: Using Blend to Create a Floor Material 615
3. Click the Material Type button to the right of
the material name field. (Initially, its label says
“Standard.”)
4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Blend in the list.
A ReplaceMaterial dialog is displayed.
5. Choose Discard Old Material, and then click
OK.
Like the Multi/Sub-Object material, a Blend
material is a container for other materials.
The Multi/Sub-Object material apportions
sub-materials among different sub-objects. The
Blend material, on the other hand, blends the
colors and other attributes of its sub-materials.
You can also control the amount and the
method of blending.
Configure the sub-materials:
1. On the Material Editor toolbar, open the
Material/Map Navigator.
The Material/Map Navigator is a dialog that
shows the components of the material in the
active sample slot. For complex materials
such as Blend, it can help you to visualize and
navigate the material hierarchy.
Note: The Navigator is one way
to move about the hierarchy of a complex
616 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
material. Another is to use the Go To Parent
and Go Forward To Sibling buttons on the
Material Editor toolbar.
2. In theMaterial/Map Navigator, clickMaterial 1.
3. In the material name field of the Material
Editor, rename this material Grout.
4. In theMaterial/Map Navigator, clickMaterial 2.
5. In the material name field of the Material
Editor, rename this material Tile Surface.
Sub-material names are automatically updated
in the Material/Map Navigator.
Set the texture and color of the grout:
1. In the Material/Map Navigator, choose the
Grout material.
2. In theMaterial Editor > Blinn Basic Parameters
rollout, click the blank map button to the right
of the Diffuse color swatch.
The map button is the gray square to the right of the
diffuse color swatch.
3. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Noise in list.
This applies a Noise map as a texture for the
Grout material.
4. In Noise Parameters rollout, change the Size to
3, and choose Turbulence as theNoise Type.
This gives the Grout material a grainy
texture, as you can see in the sample slot if you
turn off Show End Result in theMaterial Editor
toolbar.
• When the Show End Result button is
on, the final result of the top-level material is
shown on the sample sphere.
Show End Result turned on - Background turned on
for clarity.
• When Show End Result is off, you
are shown only the material level you are
working on. That way it is easier to view
your adjustments to a specific map.
Show End Result turned off.
5. In the Noise Parameters rollout, click the Color
#1 color swatch (black by default).
6. In the Color Selector, change Color#1 to
R=232, G=219, B=197.
7. In the Noise Parameters rollout, click the Color
#2 color swatch (white by default).
8. In the Color Selector, change Color#2 to
R=196, G=170, B=159.
Material Combinations: Using Blend to Create a Floor Material 617
9. Close the Color Selector.
Add a bump pattern to the grout:
1. In the Material/Map Navigator, choose the
Grout material.
Previously, the Noise map was active.
Note: You can also click the Go to Parent
button to move up one level to the Grout
material.
2. Go to the Utilities panel. Click Asset
Browser. Answer OK to the warning dialog,
and then resize the Asset Browser window so
you can see both the Browser controls and the
Material Editor.
3. In the Asset Browser, navigate to the
\tutorials\designviz folder.
4. In the Material Editor, open the Maps rollout
for the Grout material.
5. Drag the file glasblkb.gif (the image looks
like a tile pattern) from the Asset Browser to
the blank (“None”) Bumpmap button in the
Material Editor. Release the mouse.
The image in glasblkb.gif
The Maps rollout with glasblkb.gif assigned to the
Bump map button
Just as you can search for geometry models,
you can use the Asset Browser to find bitmap
files and use them in the scene. The Asset
Browser also gives you the freedom to search
for models and bitmaps anywhere on your local
hard drives or across the Internet.
6. Minimize the Asset Browser.
7. In the Material Editor > Maps rollout, change
the Bump map’s Amount to 50.
The Grout material now has a grid-like
bumpiness.
Set the texture and color of the tile surfaces:
1. In theMaterial/Map Navigator, choose the Tile
Surface material.
2. On the Material Editor toolbar, click to
turn off Show End Result.
618 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
3. In theMaterial Editor > Blinn Basic Parameters
rollout, click the blank map button to the right
of the Diffuse color swatch.
The map button is the gray square to the right of the
diffuse color swatch.
4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Noise in list.
This applies a Noise map as a texture for the
Tile Surface material.
5. In the Noise Parameters rollout, change the Size
to 10.
6. In the Noise Parameters rollout, click the Color
#1 color swatch. (Black by default.)
7. In the Color Selector, change Color#1 to
R=220, G=197, B=181.
8. In the Noise Parameters rollout, click the Color
#2 color swatch. (White by default.)
9. In the Color Selector, change Color#2 to
R=162, G=132, B=111.
10.Close the Color Selector.
The tile surface is also “noisy” or rough, and
somewhat darker than the grout.
Change the shininess and bumpiness of the tile
surfaces:
1. In theMaterial/Map Navigator, choose the Tile
Surface material.
Previously, the Noise map was active.
2. In the Blinn Basic Parameters, go to the
Specular Highlights group. Change the
Specular Level to 15. Leave Glossiness set to 10.
3. In the Maps rollout, click the Bump map
button.
4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click
Noise in the list.
5. In the Noise Parameters rollout, change the Size
to 1.
6. Click Go To Parent.
This takes you to the parent Tile Surface
material. The highlight in the Navigator
indicates the change.
7. In theMaps rollout, change the Amount for the
bump map to 15.
Combine the two materials by using a mask:
The Blend material now has two sub-materials,
Grout and Tile Surface. You will use a bitmap file
as a mask to combine them.
1. In the Material/Map Navigator, choose Floor
Tile (Blend).
This is the top level of the material. The
Blend Basic Parameters rollout shows the two
component sub-materials.
2. Restore the Asset Browser.
3. Drag the file glasblkb.gif from the Asset
Browser to theMask button on the Blend Basic
Parameters rollout.
4. Minimize the Asset Browser.
Material Combinations: Using Blend to Create a Floor Material 619
Rename the mask:
1. On the Blend Basic Parameters rollout, click
the Mask button.
2. In the material name field, rename themask
map Grout Lines.
Adjust the blending:
1. In the Material/Map Navigator, select the Floor
Tile (Blend) material.
Floor Tile, the blend material, is the top material in the
tree.
The Navigator now shows all component materials and
maps of the Floor Tile material.
2. In the Blend Basic Parameters rollout >Mixing
Curve group, turn on Use Curve.
3. Change the Transition Zone Upper amount to
1.0 and the Lower amount to 0.0.
This gives a crisp appearance to the grooves.
Apply the material to the floor:
1. In the viewport, select the Floor object.
2. In the Material Editor, click Assign
Material To Selection.
Assign coordinates to the floor:
1. With the Floor still selected, go to the
Modify panel.
2. Open the drop-downModifier List and choose
UVW Map.
This guarantees that the floor has mapping
coordinates the Floor Tile material can use, and
gives you a means to adjust them. You will need
to, as the following steps demonstrate.
Render the scene:
• On the toolbar, click Quick Render.
The floor has a tiled appearance, but the tiles
are far too large.
You will correct the tile size in the following
lesson.
Save your work:
• On the menu bar, choose File > Save As. Name
your design mykitchen_with_tile_floor.max.
You can use this file in the following lesson.
620 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Using the UVW Map Modifier to
Adjust the Floor Tiles
In the previous lesson, you tiled the floor, but
found that with defaultmapping, the tiles appeared
too large. The tiles should be 10” x 10”, with
roughly 1/4” grout lines between each tile. You can
use the UVW Map modifier to set these values.
Set up the scene:
1. Continue from the previous lesson, or open the
file, kitchen_with_tile_floor.max found in the
\tutorial\designviz folder.
Note: If you see the File Load: UnitsMismatch
dialog, choose the option Adopt The File’s Unit
Scale. This will change your system unit, so be
sure to reset your systemunit after completing
this tutorial.
2. Close theMaterial Editor and theAsset Browser.
Setting Texture Coordinates Preferences:
1. From theCustomizemenu, choose Preferences.
2. In the General tab, under the Texture
Coordinates group, make sure the Use
Real-World Texture Coordinates option is
turned off.
3. Click OK to exit the Preferences dialog.
Adjust the floor tile size:
1. Select the Floor object.
2. Go to the Modify panel.
3. With UVWMapping selected in the modifier
stack display, go to the Parameters rollout and
change the Length andWidth values to 3’5”.
(The Floor Tile material has four tiles in each
dimension, with grout lines around them.)
4. Click Quick Render.
The tile dimensions are now correct.
Save your work:
• On the menu bar, choose File menu >
Save As and name the finished model
mykitchen_final.max.
Summary
This completes the material design tutorial.
Features it has covered include:
• Using the Material Editor to create and assign
materials.
• Creating a simple “one-color” material.
• Using a map in a material.
• Creating a multi/sub-object material for
assigning multiple materials to a single object.
• Using the Architectural material to use the
material presets.
• Creating a Blend material that includes a
procedural map.
• Using the Asset Browser to find textures.
Ink ’n Paint Material 621
• Using the UVWMap modifier.
Ink ’n Paint Material
Ink ’n Paint Material
The Ink ’n Paint material lets you create
comics-style images without ever touching a pen
or brush. This short lesson will show you a few of
the options available with this versatilematerial.
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Set up the lesson:
1. Load the file tut_inkpaint_spitfire.max. This
is located in the \tutorials\materials_and_
rendering folder.
This simple scene contains a World-War II
airplane to which a standard material with a
bitmap in the diffuse channel is applied.
2. Make sure the Perspective (lower-right)
viewport is active, and then, from the
Rendering menu, choose ActiveShade Floater.
This opens a floating window that re-renders
the scene whenever you change a parameter.
Note that the background color is set to white;
this makes it easier to see the ink effects.
3. Click a viewport, and then press M to open
theMaterial Editor. If necessary, reposition the
editor dialog or the ActiveShade window so you
can see both at the same time.
The first sample sphere shows the Standard
material applied to the plane. You’ll create an
Ink ’n Paint material, and then apply it to the
fighter plane.
4. In theMaterial Editor, click the second sample
sphere to activate its slot, and then click the
Standard button.
The Material/Map Browser window opens.
5. In the browser list, double-click the Ink ’n Paint
item.
The browser closes, and the second slot now
contains an Ink ’n Paint material.
6. Drag thismaterial to the plane in the Perspective
viewport or the ActiveShade window.
622 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
After a brief pause, the ActiveShade window
re-renders the plane with the Ink ’n Paint
material, giving it a much flatter look. Instead
of black shadow, the bottom portion of the
plane’s fuselage is now colored with a darker
shade of the blue paint color. Reapply the
original material, observe the differences, and
then apply the Ink ’n Paint material again.
With the default settings, the Ink ’n Paint
look is a bit drab. You’ll explore some of the
alternatives, using first the paint controls and
then the ink controls.
Modify the paint controls:
The Paint Controls rollout contains three basic
settings: Lighted, Shaded, and Highlight. You’ll
look at each of these briefly, in turn.
1. The Lighted check box is on by default. Click it
to turn it off.
This removes all traces of paint from the object
surface as rendered in theActiveShade window,
although the inked outlines remain. It doesn’t
affect the paint highlight, although that’s not on
right now so you cannot see it anyway.
2. Turn Lighted back on, and then, over on the
right side of the rollout, click the upper half of
the Paint Levels spinner once to set it to 3.
The plane now shows three levels of shading,
with a new level between the two original levels.
By default, the Ink ’n Paint material uses
two levels of shading to match the shading
often found in color comics. However,
Ink ’n Paint Material 623
you can increase this up to 255 for a more
three-dimensional look, or to as low as 1 for
a completely flat look.
3. Try increasing the number of levels a few more
times, and then set it back to 3.
As you increase the number of levels, the area
of pure paint color becomes smaller, while the
darkest shaded area remains the same size.
Tip: To increase the size of the fully lit area,
make the light source brighter by increasing its
Multiplier setting. With this material, the light
color has no effect, and changing the lighting
intensity affects only the size ratio between lit
and shaded areas.
Next, you’ll look at the Shaded setting.
4. Currently, Shaded is turned on, and is set to 70.
Change this to 35, and then 0.
Left: Shaded=35; Right: Shaded=0
As you lower the Shaded value, the shaded
areas of the surface get progressively darker, but
the lit portion does not. Among other things,
this lets you change the apparent lighting setup
without touching the light source(s).
5. Turn off Shaded.
The spinner changes to a color swatch, currently
showing a dark blue-green color. The shaded
areas now blend between the Lighted color and
the Shaded color.
6. Click the color swatch and change the Shaded
color to a markedly different one; say, a dark
red.
After a brief pause, the ActiveShade window
displays the change.
7. Try a few other colors, and also try increasing
the Paint Levels setting for a smoother
transition.
Next, you’ll look at the Highlight setting.
8. Turn on Highlight.
624 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Bright, hard-edged highlights appear in the
same places as the specular highlights in the
original material.
9. Set the Glossiness value to 20.
This works just like the Glossiness setting
in the Blinn shader: Reducing it enlarges
the highlight, while increasing it makes the
highlight smaller.
Modify the ink controls:
1. Create a new Ink ’n Paint material and apply it
to the plane.
This lets you start over so you can isolate the
ink settings.
2. Close the Paint Controls rollout so the Ink
Controls rollout is completely visible.
3. First, turn off Ink.
Now only the painted surface is visible. As you
can see, the ink effect is very important for the
comics look. In most cases, you’ll want to keep
Ink turned on when using thismaterial.
4. Turn Ink back on, and then turn on Variable
Width.
A slight difference is visible. You’ll increase the
maximum width to make it more apparent.
5. Set Max to 10.
Now it’s easier to see that the ink is thinnest
where the light intensity is high, and thickest in
the most deeply shaded areas. This replicates
Ink ’n Paint Material 625
the look of drawn comics, where the artists ink
the outlines of shadowed areas the thickest.
To conclude this lesson, you’ll look at some of
the available ink types.
6. Move down to the Outline setting, and turn off
its check box.
The outline vanishes, but the inner line of ink
remains. The software creates outline ink only
where the object’s edges meet the background.
7. Turn Outline back on, and turn off SmGroup.
Now the lines acting like borders between
faces assigned to different smoothing groups
disappear.
8. Turn off Overlap.
Now the inner line of ink is gone. Overlap ink
is generated on the near surfaces when parts of
an object’s geometry overlap other parts.
9. Turn Overlap back on, and then turn on
Underlap.
The inner line of ink appears to have thickened.
Try toggling Underlap a few times. If you look
closely, you’ll see the thickness is added above
the Overlap line. That’s because Underlap
ink is generated on the far surfaces adjacent
to overlapping geometry (from the current
626 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
viewpoint). Try turning off Overlap to see the
difference.
Working with Maps
Lastly, you’ll look at how you can use a map to
give the rendering the look of a pencil/charcoal
drawing.
1. Create a new Ink ’n Paint material and apply it
to the plane.
2. Click the blue Lighted color swatch and set it
to white.
3. Set the Paint Levels to 5.
4. Turn off Shaded in the Paint Controls rollout.
5. Click themap button in the Shaded channel
(currently reads “None”), and then, in the
Material/Map Browser, double-click Noise.
6. On the Coordinates rollout, set the X tiling to
25, the Y-Angle to -45 and the Z-Angle to 45.
7. On the Noise Parameters rollout, set Noise
Type=Fractal, Size to 100, High threshold to
0.6 and Low threshold to 0.4.
The paint now has a pencil stroke pattern
applied to the shaded areas.
The effect can be strengthened by playing with
the light sources in the scene.
8. Go to the Display panel and turn off Lights in
the Hide by Category rollout.
9. Zoom out in the Front view and select the omni
light above the plane.
10.Go to the Modify panel. In the
Intensity/Color/Attenuation rollout, set
the Multiplier value to 0.75.
Summary
You’ve scratched the surface of the Ink ’n Paint
material with this lesson, but there’s much more to
Translucent Shading 627
it than described here. For instance, you can use
any 3dsMax map to specify almost anymaterial
component, and you can set each map’s intensity
to any percent between 0 and 100. You can use
ink to outline smoothing groups as seen on the
fighter plane in this exercise, but also on areas with
different material IDs, and set different colors for
each ink type. All of these settings let you achieve
a wide range of effects with Ink ’n Paint.
Translucent Shading
Translucent Shading
The Translucent shader in 3ds Max lets you
simulate substances that allow light but not clear
images to pass through. An example of this is
the type of screen on which slides and movies
are projected. In this short lesson, you’ll use the
Translucent shader to set up a projection screen
where on its back surface you can see the image
being projected as well as the shadow of an object
between the projector and the screen.
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Load and render:
1. Load the filetut_translucent_shader_start.max.
This is located in the \tutorials\materials_and_
rendering folder.
2. Activate the Camera02 viewport and render
the scene.
In the rendered image, you can see an image
being projected onto a screen, with a cutout of a
person walking in front of the projector casting
a shadow onto the screen.
3. Activate the Camera01 viewport and render the
scene again.
From this perspective, you can see the rear of
the screen, but no image or shadow appear on
it. You’ll make the scene lookmore realistic by
applying the translucent shader.
Change the shader:
1. In the Camera01 viewport, select the Screen
object, and press the M key to open the
Material Editor.
628 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
2. In theMaterial Editor, look at the fourth sample
sphere, at the left end of the second row.
The material is selected. Its name is Screen,
and you can tell that it’s applied to the selected
Screen object because of the solid white
triangles in the corners.
Currently, the Screen material uses the Blinn
shader, which is the default shader used by the
Standard material.
3. On the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, click
the drop-down list (where “Blinn” appears)
and choose Translucent Shader.
The name of the second rollout changes
to Translucent Basic Parameters and a new
Translucency group box appears at the bottom
of the rollout.
You control the degree and color of translucency
with the Translucent Clr (Color) setting. By
default, this color is black, which effectively
turns off translucency.
4. Click the Translucent Clr color swatch, and use
the Color Selector dialog to set the Value to 174.
By using a shade of gray, you change the
translucency amount while maintaining a
neutral tone for the translucent material.
5. Close the Color Selector dialog, and then
render the Camera01 viewport again.
Now you can see the projected image and the
shadow from the rear.
You can load this version of the scene from the
file tut_translucent_shader_finish.max.
6. Try setting different colors and values for
Translucent Clr, and render each time to see
the difference. Also try setting different colors
for the material’s Diffuse and Translucent
components, and rendering from the front and
back.
The translucent color has no effect on the
diffuse color, and vice-versa. For realistic
results, use the same colors for both.
Summary
You learned how to work with the Translucent
shader and use it to simulate the effect of an image
shining through a projection screen. Other types
of objects exhibit translucency as well, such as
plastic and frosted glass. See if you can model
such an object and give it a realistic look with the
Translucent shader.
Managing Texture Coordinates 629
Managing Texture
Coordinates
This tutorial looks at some of the 3ds Max features
related to materials, texturing, and rendering. The
first lesson, in three parts, covers functionality in
the Unwrap UVW modifier. Following this are
lessons on Render To Texture, the Ink ’n Paint
material, and the Translucent shader.
Skill level: Intermediate
Time to complete each lesson: 30–60 minutes
Features Covered in This Tutorial
In these lessons you will learn:
• UsingtheUnwrapUVWmodifier.
• Using Render To Texture to “bake” lighting,
shadows, and other scene features into a bitmap
texture for use in games and other real-time
applications.
• Using Ink ’n Paint to render comic-style images.
• Using the Translucent shader to simulate
translucent materials
Tutorial Files
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Using Unwrap UVW, Part 1
In this three-part lesson, you’ll get an introduction
to the Unwrap UVWmodifier, and use several of
its features.
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Examine the final mapping:
You’ll start by looking at the final version of a fairly
detailed object mapped with the Unwrap UVW
modifier.
1. Open the file tut_unwrap_start.max.
2. Go to the Modify panel and select the
Fuselage object; just click a wing.
You can now see the object’s modifier stack,
with the Unwrap UVWmodifier applied to the
Editable Poly object.
630 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
3. In the modifier stack display, click Face to
access this sub-object level. Also, on the
Selection Parameters rollout, make sure Select
By Element is on.
This will let you select large sections of the
Fuselage object, rather than single faces.
4. On the Parameters rollout, click Edit.
This opens the Edit UVWs dialog, also known
as the UVW editor.
5. From the drop-down menu at the top
right of the window, choose Map #10
(biplane_texture.jpg). You can now see the UVW clusters laid out
against the texture map in the background.
Each cluster represents a section of the Fuselage
geometry that is planar-mapped with the
underlying area of the bitmap texture.
6. In the Perspective viewport, click the upper
wing.
The entire wing is selected, and in the editor
window, the UVW clusters assigned to it
become highlighted.
Using Unwrap UVW, Part 2 631
7. Still in the viewport, click different parts
of the Fuselage to see which UVWclusters
correspond to them.
Highlighting a cluster makes it easier to see
how well its outline matches the shape of
the underlying section of the texture map.
To change the wireframe color used by the
clusters, you can also use the Options button
near the bottom-right corner of the Edit UVWs
dialog. Also, it often helps to lower the bitmap
brightness as well.
Most of the Fuselage parts are combined into a
single element, which uses the clusters on the
left side of the editor window.
8. In the viewport, select the nose cone (it’s right
behind the propeller), and note the cluster that
highlights in the editor.
The nose cone is mapped as a single piece,
which is convenient to texture with a single area
of the bitmap. It’s not really flat, but the planar
mapping works with it because of the UVW
editor’s ability to closely match the geometry
with the bitmap on a per-vertex basis.
9. Next, click one of the landing gear housings,
and note how it’s mapped with four different
clusters.
10.Click an empty area of the editor window to
deselect the UVWclusters.
11.In the editor, turn on Selection Modes group
> Select Element, if necessary, and click each
of the previously highlighted clusters in turn
to see which part of the housing it maps. You
might need to rotate the viewport to see the
highlighted polygons. If you still can’t see the
selection, press F2 and/or F4 to enable
Shade Selected and Edged Faces, respectively.
Also, the outermost cluster corresponds to the
inside of the wheel housing, so it might be a bit
difficult to spot at first.
Because the housing structure is more complex
than that of the nose cone, it makes sense to
map it with four clusters instead of one.
Ultimately, it’s up to you how you map your
geometry; the UVW editor gives you the power
and flexibility to use the method that works
best for you.
Using Unwrap UVW, Part 2
In this section, you’ll examine Unwrap UVW’s
Flatten Mapping command for automatic
mapping.
Use Flatten Mapping:
1. Click an empty area of the editor window to
deselect any selected UVWclusters.
2. In the Edit UVWs dialog, open the Mapping
menu and choose Flatten Mapping.
632 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The Flatten Mapping dialog opens.
3. Click OK to accept the default settings and
remap the Fuselage using this automatic
mapping function.
The software applies planarmapping to each
section of the mesh based on the Flatten
Mapping dialog settings. The editor now
displays a very different set of UVWclusters.
Each cluster consists of a set of contiguous faces
in which the angle between neighboring faces is
less than or equal to the Face Angle Threshold
setting in the FlattenMapping dialog.
Themain difference is that there aremanymore
clusters, and most of them are smaller than in
the final. The wings are relatively flat, so their
clusters are easy to identify, but most of the
rest are not. You can remedy this somewhat by
increasing the angle threshold.
Of course, the underlying texture map remains
the same when you change the mapping. If you
look at the Perspective viewport, you can see
that the mapping is now much different than
before.
4. Again choose Mapping menu > Flatten
mapping, and for Face Angle Threshold, type
61 (this is the angle used by the artist as a first
step in creating the final mapping). Click OK to
perform the remapping.
Using Unwrap UVW, Part 2 633
The result is fewer clusters than before, but
still many more than in the final. In the next
procedure, you’ll look at a couple of ways of
combining these clusters.
Combine the UVW clusters:
You can use the editor’s Stitch function to combine
clusters one at a time, and the modifier’s Planar
Map command lets you combine several clusters
simultaneously.
1. In the viewport, select the nose-cone element.
This causes all of the UVWclusters used by the
nose-cone geometry to highlight in the editor.
2. On the editor’s lower toolbar, click the Filter
Selected Faces button to turn it on.
Now only the highlighted clusters appear.
3. Click outside the bounding box to deselect
everything, and then click a vertex on one of
the smaller clusters to select the cluster.
634 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Highlighted edges and vertices appear on one
or more other clusters to show the sub-objects
shared with the selected cluster.
4. In the Tools menu, choose Stitch Selected.
The Stitch Tool dialog appears, and one of
the other clusters moves next to the selected
clusters, with the shared sub-objects “stitched”
together. The software automatically stitches
the cluster with the most shared sub-objects;
if two or more share the same number of
sub-objects, it picks the one with the lowest
vertex ID numbers. In this case, it picked the
rightmost cluster near the top of the editor
window.
5. In the dialog, click the Align Clusters check box
to turn it off, note what happens, and then click
it again to turn it back on.
When you turn offAlign Clusters, the attached
cluster moves back to its original position. Use
this when the automatic alignment positions
the attached cluster in an undesirable way, such
as overlapping the first cluster.
6. Click OK to close the dialog.
Next, you’ll use Planar Map to combine all of
the nose cone clusters at once.
7. In the viewport, select the nose cone element.
8. On theModify panel >Map Parameters rollout,
click Planar.
The Planar button turns yellow and the clusters
combine into a single cluster that’s roughly
the shape of the nose-cone texture in the
upper-right section of the bitmap. But the
cluster is oriented differently than the texture,
and is much bigger.
9. On theMap Parameters rollout, click Align X.
This will reorient the mapping gizmo so that it
is perpendicular to the nose cone element.
10.Near the bottom-right corner of the EditUVWs
dialog, click the Rot. -90 button to match the
orientation.
Using the Relax Tool on Texture Coordinates 635
11.In theModify panel >Map Parameters rollout,
click Planar again to exit PlanarMappingmode.
12. Use the Freeform Mode transform tools
to fit the cluster to the nose-cone texture. Drag
the corners of the bounding box to scale the
cluster, and drag within the bounding box to
move it. Check your work in the viewport, and
render if you like.
To get an exactmatch, you’d have to move the
vertices as well.
Tip: You can use the Edit UVWs dialog to make a
template for creating your own texturemaps. Once
you’ve got the clusters set up the way you want
them, go to the Tools menu and choose Render
UVW Template, and then use the Render UV
Template button to generate a flattened 2D image
of themapping coordinates. You can then save and
open the bitmap image into your Paint application
(such as Adobe Photoshop). Use the cluster
outlines as a guide for painting the texture map.
Summary
The Unwrap UVW modifier is a powerful tool
for applying complex mapping to your objects.
This tutorial covered a variety of methods for
using the modifier, including how to coordinate
selection of UVW coordinates and parts of the
object, usage of the automatic mapping tools such
as Flatten Mapping, combining mapping clusters,
and sketching vertices.
Using the Relax Tool on Texture
Coordinates
An important tool in the UnwrapUVWmodifier
editor is Relax, which algorithmically spreads out
texture coordinates to give more even coverage
of the underlying texture. This makes it easier to
assign specific texture coordinates to the desired
areas of the texture. This tutorial gives you a brief
look at how to use Relax in a specific texturing
application.
Skill Level: Intermediate
Time to complete: 20 minutes
Features Covered in This Tutorial
In this tutorial you learn:
• Applying a Unwrap UVWmodifier.
• Using the Relax tool to affect texture
coordinates.
Tutorial Files
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Procedures
Set up the tutorial:
• Fromthetutorials\materials_and_rendering
directory, load the scene file clown_head.max.
636 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The scene contains a model of a head, with a
UVWMap modifier set to Planar applied to the
face. Also applied to the face is amaterialwith
a Checker map. The map helps show where the
texture vertices might need to be adjusted.
Apply the Unwrap UVW modifier:
1. Select the head object and go to the Modify
panel.
2. Apply an Unwrap UVWmodifier.
The Unwrap UVW modifier appears at the top
of the stack, but doesn’t provide a sub-object
mode because you’re applying it to an existing
sub-object selection.
Edit the UVW mapping:
1. On the Parameters rollout, click the Edit button.
The Edit UVWs dialog opens.
Only the selected parts of the mesh appear, and
all texture vertices are selected.
Note that the texture vertices are most dense
around the detailed parts of the face: the eyes,
nose, and mouth. This is where you can use
Relax to spread out the vertices for easier
manual editing.
2. Drag a selection region around the eyes.
3. Fromthe Edit UVWs dialog menu bar, choose
Tools > Relax dialog.
The Relax Tool dialog appears.
Using the Channel Info Utility 637
The Relax Tool dialog is modeless. It offers
different algorithms to relax the mapping. The
default mode, Relax By Edge Angles is often
recommended as it minimizes the overlapping
of edges.
4. Click the Apply button twice.
The selected vertices move apart slightly.
5. Similarly, use Relax on the vertices around the
nose and mouth.
Summary
The Relax tool in Unwrap UVWcan save you time
and effort by automatically spreading outmapping
vertices. In some cases, you’ll need to follow up by
moving vertices to the desired final locations.
Using the Channel Info Utility
This tutorial shows a number of different methods
for using the Channel Info utility. This is an
intermediate-level tutorial; you should be familiar
with standard 3dsMax procedures such as creating
and applying materials.
Skill level: Intermediate
Time to complete: 90 minutes
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\materials_and_rendering directory.
Before starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials
folder from the disc to your local program
installation.
Reduce a mesh object’s memory footprint:
When working as a 3D artist on a
game-development project, you might
receive models to work on that have already
been mapped, but it’s difficult to tell what the
mapping is. In addition, the mapping might
have been applied inefficiently, so that it takes
up more memory than necessary in the model’s
data structure. This lesson shows you how to use
Channel Info to adjust a model’s mapping, thus
recovering the unused memory, which can then be
used by other game assets.
1. Open the ostrich.max scene file.
2. Apply a UVWMapmodifier to the ostrich
model. Set Map Channel to 4.
3. Collapse the ostrich object’s stack; this results
in an Editable Mesh object.
This simulates a situation you might encounter
as a 3D artist working for a commercial game
developer: You receive a mesh object to work
on that already has mapping applied, but you
don’t have direct access to the tool (modifier)
638 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
originally used for applying mapping, and
you need to minimize the object’s memory
footprint for embedding into the game.
4. Create a standard material with a Checker map
applied as a Diffuse map. For the Checker map,
set U and V Tiling both to 4.0, and set Map
Channel to 4.
5. Turn on Show Map In Viewport, and apply
the map to the ostrich model.
The map appears on the model, mapped in a
planar manner parallel to the world grid.
6. Go to the Utilities panel, click theMore
button, and then double-click Channel Info to
open the utility. On the Utility panel, click the
Channel Info button.
TheMap Channel Info dialog opens:
The dialog lists all pertinent channel
information for the object. This is described in
detail in the Interface section.
The last channel, whose ID is “4:map,”
represents the mapping you applied with the
UVWMapmodifier. It’s preceded by three
empty map channels, each of which contributes
about 33 kilobytes to the object’s memory
footprint. These were created because the
software requires consecutive numbering of
map channels, but the memory isn’t being used
for anything.
You’ll use the Channel Info tools to remove the
empty channels, thus freeing up the unused
memory. But first you’ll copy the mapping to
the first available mapping channel, because
you can delete channels only starting with the
last one.
7. Right-click the last channel, and from the
right-click menu, choose Copy.
This places the texture mapping created by the
UVW Map modifier into the copy buffer. The
Using the Channel Info Utility 639
status line on the dialog, beneath the row of
buttons, reads “Copy Buffer Info: Node: ostrich
Map Channel 4”.
8. Right-click the channel whose ID is “1:map”
(the first available texture map channel), and,
from the right-click menu, choose Paste.
The Channel Name dialog appears, giving you
the opportunity to name the pasted channel.
9. Type Planar Mapping and press Enter or
click OK.
Map channel 1 now also contains the planar
mapping originally applied to channel 4. You
can now delete the remaining map channels,
but first you’ll demonstrate that the planar
mapping is indeed applied to channel 1.
Note: With an object that has default mapping,
such as a geometric primitive, you might
have pasted to channel 2 instead. This would
preserve the original, defaultmapping as well as
the planar mapping in two different channels.
10.Open the Material Editor, if necessary, and go
to the material’s diffuse map level. Use theMap
Channel spinner to decrement the value to 1 by
clicking the down arrow three times.
At map channels 3 and 2, no map appears
on the ostrich model, because those channels
don’t contain any mapping values. But at map
channel 1, the checker texture reappears on the
object.
11.Right-click the 3:map channel, and from the
right-click menu, choose Clear.
The channel remains, and still uses 33 kilobytes
of memory. This demonstrates that you can’t
delete intermediate channels.
12.Right-click the 4:map channel, and from the
right-click menu, choose Clear.
The channel disappears.
13.Clear the 3:map channel, and then the 2:map
channel.
Onlymap channel 1 remains. You’ve deleted the
others, thus reducing the object’s total memory
footprint by approximately 99 kilobytes (the
memory consumed by the three unused map
channels).
640 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
14. On theModify panel, look at the object’s
modifier stack. It contains a UVW Mapping
Paste and four UVWMapping Clear modifiers;
the Channel Info utility uses these modifiers
to help do its work. To get rid of these, simply
collapse the stack.
Enable vertex sub-object selections to survive
topology changes and object type changes:
Because Channel Info provides access to the
channel that stores the current vertex selection,
and lets you copy that information to other
channels, you can store the vertex selection. Once
you’ve done so, the vertex selection will survive
topology changes, such as adding mesh resolution
and even changing the object type.
It’s important to remember, however, that the
vertex-selection channel has only one component,
while map channels have three. Thus, you
need to copy the vertex-selection channel to a
subcomponent of a map channel.
This lesson also demonstrates usage of the Select
ByChannelmodifier in conjunction with Channel
Info.
1. Open the octopus.max scene file.
This octopus is at an early stage of modeling.
You’ll use it to learn how to retain sub-object
selections after subdividing the mesh.
2. Select the octopus object, open the Channel
Info utility, click one of the tracks, and then
click Add to create a new map channel.
You can use the extra map channel to store
the vertex-selection data, thus retaining any
information already in the original map
channel.
3. On the Modify panel, go to the
Vertex sub-object level of the Editable Poly base
object.
4. From the Region Selection flyout on the
toolbar, choose Lasso Selection Region and, in
Using the Channel Info Utility 641
the Left viewport, select all the vertices in the
octopus head. Drag out an approximate region
selection; you needn’t be particularly careful
about not selecting non-head vertices for this
exercise.
Next, you’ll determine whether this selection
can survive a topology change on its own. You
can use a special feature of Editable Poly to
automatically convert the vertex selection to a
polygon selection.
5. On the Selection rollout, Ctrl +click the
Polygon button to go to that sub-object level
while simultaneously selecting the polygons
used by the existing vertex selection.
6. On the Edit Geometry rollout, click the
Tessellate button, and then return to theVertex
sub-object level.
The vertices you selected before are interspersed
with the new, unselected vertices that were
created by tessellating the mesh. The vertex
selection did not survive the topology change.
That is, not all of the head vertices are still
selected.
7. Press Ctrl+Z to undo the tessellation.
The software restores the original vertex
selection.
8. In theMap Channel Info dialog, right-click the
vsel channel and choose Copy.
“vsel” is short for vertex selection. This channel
stores the current selection set of vertices.
642 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
9. Right-click the 2:map channel you created in
step 2.
The Paste command is unavailable, because
map channels each have three components, but
the vertex-selection channel has only one. You
can’t copy and paste between a one-component
channel and a three-component channel.
Fortunately, Channel Info gives you
optional access to individual components of
three-component channels.
10.At the top of theMapChannel Info dialog, click
the SubComp (subcomponents) button.
All three-component channels expand
into their subcomponents. vsel is the only
one-component channel.
11.Right-click the 2:map:X channel and choose
Paste. When the Channel Name dialog opens,
type Head Vertices and press Enter .
The software adds a UVW Mapping Paste
modifier to the object’s stack.
12.Return to the Editable Poly > Vertex sub-object
level, and select all of the octopus’s leg vertices.
13.Copy the vsel channel to the 2:map:Y channel,
and name it Leg Vertices.
14.In the modifier stack, right-click one of the
UVW Mapping Paste modifiers and choose
Collapse All.
All of the additional modifiers are deleted, and
the pasted data is “baked” into the object mesh.
15.Apply a Tessellate modifier to the model.
Using the Channel Info Utility 643
The mesh resolution increases significantly.
16.Apply a Select By Channel modifier to the
octopus model.
This modifier lets you select channels that you
named in Channel Info.
17.In the Select By Channel modifier, open the
Selection Channel drop-down list.
The entries are the same as the vertex selections
you copied and pasted to the map channel
subcomponents.
18.Choose each of the items from the drop-down
list in turn.
The corresponding stored vertex selection
appears on the object, including all new vertices
created by the tessellation. Note that the
software automatically creates a soft selection
for any vertices that the tessellation created
between the original selected and unselected
vertices; that is, on the border of the selection.
You could get the same results by copying the
stored channels back to the vsel channel in
the Map Channel Info dialog, but Select By
Channel makes it easier to access the various
stored selections. You can pass the selection
in the active selection channel up the stack to
further modifiers.
Normally, if you change an object’s geometry
type, it’s possible to lose a sub-object selection.
But with Channel Info, stored selections remain
intact, as you’ll see in the final part of this
lesson.
19.Right-click the octopus and convert it to an
Editable Patch object. Reapply the Select By
Channel modifier and access the different
stored channels.
The channels are empty, because Channel Info
doesn’t support stored vertex selections in
patch objects. But, as you’ll see in amoment, the
stored mesh-vertex selections are still available.
20.Convert the octopus to an EditableMesh object.
Apply another Select By Channel modifier and
access the different stored channels.
The vertex selections remain intact. If you
performed the same series of conversions,
starting with an editable mesh with a vertex
selection, the selectionwould be permanently
lost after the first conversion.
Tip: If you’re doing this sort of work and find
that you can’t paste a copied channel that you
think you should be able to, try clicking the
Update button on theMap Channel Info dialog.
This step is necessary, for example, after object
type conversions and topology changes.
The next procedure follows on from this one. If
you’d like to try it later, save this file first.
Apply texture blending with the Vertex Color map:
In 3ds Max, the Vertex Colormap works in
conjunction with Channel Info to provide access
to the different named channels. This lesson shows
how to use the capabilities of the Vertex Color
644 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
map along with stored vertex selections to blend
textures on an object’s surface.
This lesson follows on fromthe one above (page
640). If you haven’t done the previous procedure,
please complete it before attempting this one.
You’ll create a composite material and use opacity
to specify which sub-material should appear
where.
1. Continue from the previous procedure, or
open the file you saved at the end, or open the
included file octopus01.max.
2. Open the Material Editor and apply the first
material (1-Default) to the octopus.
3. In the Material Editor, click the Standard
button, and in the Material/Map browser,
double-click Composite. When the Replace
Material dialog appears, click OK to continue.
4. At the top of the Composite Basic Parameters
rollout, click the BaseMaterial button.
5. Click the Diffuse color swatch and set it to a
bright green color.
6. Click the Go To Parent button, and then click
theMat. 1 button. Choose a Standard material
for material 1.
The Composite material uses opacity to
determine how the differentmaterials overlay
the base mesh, so that’s where you apply a
Vertex Color map. You’ll use Vertex Color
because it provides access to the named, stored
channels.
7. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the
Opacity map button to the right of the spinner,
and choose the Vertex Color map.
8. On the Vertex Parameters rollout, find the
Channel Name field and click the arrow button
to its right.
The drop-down list shows the vertex-selection
channels you pasted and named.
9. Choose the Head Vertices channel.
10.Click the Go To Parent button, and set the
Diffuse color to a bright red.
11.Apply a UVW Map modifier to the object.
This is just so the renderer doesn’t complain
about missing map coordinates when you
render.
12.Render the Perspective viewport.
A slight amount of blending between the colored areas
is the result of the soft-selected vertices created by the
tessellation.
Using the Channel Info Utility 645
13.Click the Go To Parent button, and set Mat.
2 to a blue, Standard material, with Opacity
mapped with a Vertex Color map set to the Leg
Vertices channel.
14.Render again.
You now have an RGB octopus.
You can find the completed scene file in
octopus_final.max.
15.Also try setting the different sub-materials to
different maps such as Checker and Cellular.
This is a very powerful method of using
any mapping channel to combine different
materials on an object’s surface.
Enable a morph object to survive a topology change:
Sometimes, after you set up a morphing animation
with the Morpher modifier, you need to change
the object geometry. For example, the client or
technical director might request that you add a
facial feature such as wart, which requires you to
increase mesh resolution.
Normally, if you change the topology of the
base morph object, the morphing animation is
completely lost because the base object’s topology
then differs from that of the targets. To recover,
you must re-create the morph targets using the
new topology, which can be a lot of work.
Instead, you can reuse the original morphing
animation via the Channel Info’s Copy and Paste
functions, thus saving a great deal of time and
effort.
1. Create a base object, convert it to Editable
Mesh or Editable Poly, make several copies, and
modify the copies to create morph targets. Use
the Morpher modifier to set up a morphing
animation on the base object.
You can use your own scene, or load the
included scene file octopus_morph.max. The
remainder of the lesson assumes you’re using
this scene, which contains a low-polygon
octopus moving its head and legs using three
morph targets.
2. Play the animation.
The leftmost object, the one animated with the
Morpher modifier, moves its head and legs.
This is also referred to as the base object. The
remaining objects aremorph targets; the base
object uses these poses for the different phases
of its animation. All four objects have the same
646 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
geometry; this is a requirement formorphing
animation.
Before starting, you’ll demonstrate how
changing the object geometry loses the
morphing animation.
3. Select the base object,octopus base, and, on the
Modify panel > modifier stack, click Editable
Poly twice to go to theVertex sub-object level.
4. On the Edit Vertices rollout, click the Extrude
button, and then, in the Perspective viewport,
drag one of the neck vertices upward to extrude
it outward.
5. In the modifier stack, click Editable Poly again
to exit the Vertex sub-object level.
6. Play the animation again.
The animation is lost. This happened because
the base object’s geometric structure, or
topology, is now different fromthat of the
morph targets.
7. Press Ctrl+Z several times until the octopus is
no longer selected, and then play the animation.
The morphing animation is restored.
To begin, you’ll use Channel Info to copy each
of themorph targets’mesh channels to different
channels in the base object.
8. Select the base object, octopus base, and then
open the Channel Info utility.
9. On the Map Channel Info dialog, click any
channel, and then click the Add button three
times to add three new map channels.
You can store the mesh data in existing channels
such as Alpha, Illum, and vc, or add new
channels to hold it. In this lesson, you’ll do the
latter.
10.Select the first morph target, octopus head
forward. On the Map Channel Info dialog,
right-click the first channel, poly, and choose
Copy from the menu.
Using the Channel Info Utility 647
The poly channel contains the object’s mesh
data.
11.Select octopus base again and use the Map
Channel Info dialog to paste to the 2:map
channel, which is the first new channel you
created earlier with the Add button. Name the
channel octopus head forward.
12.Similarly, copy the poly channels from the
octopus legs 1 and octopus legs 2 objects (the
second and third morph targets) to the octopus
base object’s 3:map and 4:map channels,
respectively, naming the channels octopus legs
1 and octopus legs 2, respectively.
Tip: If you select multiple objects, they all
appear in theMap Channel Info dialog, so you
can copy and paste channels without having to
change your selection.
13.Select the base object and, in itsmodifier stack,
move the Morpher modifier above any UVW
Mapping Paste/Addmodifiers (drag it to the
top of the stack).
14.Right-click the uppermost UVW Mapping
Paste modifier and from the context menu
choose Collapse To.
The added/pasted channels are combined
into the base object; only it and the Morpher
modifier remain.
15.At the Editable Mesh/Poly level, refine the
mesh. For example, you might use Slice, Cut,
or Tessellate to add resolution. Try this: Select
a few polygons on the front of the neck, click
the QuickSlice button, click once on either side
of the polygon selection, and exit the Polygon
sub-object level.
648 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
16.Play the animation.
Because of its modified topology, the base
object no longer morphs into the target shapes.
17.Delete all the morph targets (not the base
object).
18.Make three copies of the edited base object.
Each of these copies has the same topology as
themodified base object, and contains all of the
original morph targets’ shapes in its mapping
channels.
19.Select the first copy, open the Map Channel
Info dialog if necessary, and copy the octopus
head forward channel to the poly channel. It’s
not necessary to rename the poly channel when
you paste.
The first morph target regains its head-forward
pose.
20.Similarly, copy theoctopus legs 1 and octopus
legs 2 channels on the second and third copies,
respectively, to the poly channels .
21.Optional: Recover extra memory used by
the morph targets by deleting the mesh data
stored in their mapping channels with the Clear
function.
Lastly, you’ll set the Morpher modifier to use
the new targets.
22.Select the base object, go to the Modify panel,
and click the Morphermodifier in the stack,
if necessary.
23.On the Channel List rollout, right-click the first
target name button (octopus head forward),
choose Pick From Scene, and click the first
morph target object in the viewport (octopus
base01).
The new target name replaces the old one on
the button.
24.Similarly, use the Channel List buttons to set
octopus base02 and octopus base03 as the
second and third morph targets.
25.Play the animation.
Themorphing animation is restored intact with
the modified topology.
You can find the end result of this lesson in the
file octopus_morph_final.max.
Summary
With its ability to store different kinds of
information in mapping channels for later
retrieval, the Channel Info utility can play a role in
helping you master a variety of tasks in 3ds Max.
You can use it to:
• Eliminate unused mapping channels in an
object, thus minimizing memory usage.
• Enable vertex sub-object selections to survive
topology changes and object type changes.
• Blend texture edges on an object’s surface, in
conjunction with the Vertex Color map.
• Name map channels and sub-channels for
access by the Select By Channel modifier.
Mapping a Character 649
• Restoremorphing animation to an object after
changing its topology.
Mapping a Character
Mapping a Character
This tutorial explains how to map a character
model with the Unwrap UVW modifier. This
modifier provides a wealth of tools that go well
beyond traditional mapping techniques. You
will use the character you built in theModeling
a Low-Poly Character (page 149) tutorial to that
effect.
You will use Unwrap UVW to map textures
using simple methods like planar or cylindrical
mapping. You will also use it tomap textures using
more elaborate methods such as Pelt mapping to
map the camouflage texture seamlessly around the
pants.
Skill Level: Intermediate
Time to complete: 1-2 hours
Features Covered in this Tutorial:
• Applying materials to objects
• Applying the UVWModifier
• Using simple mapping techniques such as
Planar and Cylindrical
• Working withMaterial IDs to separatemapping
types
Tutorial Files
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials\unwrap_uvw
directory. Before starting the tutorials, copy
the \tutorials folder from the disc to your local
program installation.
Mapping the Shirt
In this lesson, you use the UVWmodifier to map a
T-shirt onto a helicopter pilot. The materials have
already been provided, you need only apply them
to the objects and then use the proper mapping
techniques.
Apply the material to the shirt:
1. Load the file pilot01.max found under
\tutorials\unwrap_uvw.
2. Zoom in on the pilot’s shirt in the Perspective
viewport.
3. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
4. Find the material named Pilot_Shirt_Boots_
&_Belt (it should already be selected). Drag
this material and drop it on the shirt in the
Perspective view. The shirt turns black.
5. Close the Material Editor.
1. Select the shirt and then go to theModify
panel.
650 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
2. From theModifier List, choose Unwrap UVW.
3. In the modifier stack display, expand the
Unwrap UVWmodifier and then choose Face
sub-object level.
4. Press Alt+W to switch to a four-viewport
configuration.
5. Adjust the zoom factor in the Front viewport so
that you see the T-shirt in its entirety.
6. Using Region Select, make a window around
the shirt. Only those polygons facing the Front
viewport are selected. Notice in the Selection
Parameters rollout that face selection is set to
Ignore Backfacing by default.
7. On theMap Parameters rollout, click the Planar
button. In this case the planar gizmo was
created using the correct orientation and the
correct size.
8. Click the Planar button again to turn it off.
9. On the Parameters rollout, click Edit. The Edit
UVWs dialog appears, displaying the selected
polygons against a checkered background.
10.In the top-right corner of the dialog, fromthe
drop-down list, choose the map that displays
the texture of the T-shirt. This turns the
checkered background into a tiled version of
the map that is part of the material applied to
the object.
Mapping the Shirt 651
11.In the bottom-right corner of the dialog, click
the Options button.
12.In the Bitmap Options group that appears, set
Brightness to 1.0. Thismakes the background
image easier to read.
13. On the dialog’s main toolbar,make sure
the FreeformMode tool is active.
14.Place the cursor on the bottom-right corner
of the gizmo surrounding the red area
representing the selected polygons. The mouse
is now in Scale mode. Click and drag to scale
the selection until it is about the size of the
t-shirt in the background.
15.Zoom in on that area in the dialog. You can use
the mouse wheel to zoom and pan much like
you would do in a viewport.
16.Place the cursor anywhere inside the area of
the selected polygons. You are now in Move
mode. Reposition the selected polygons over
the T-shirt with the label “Army” on it.
17.In the Selection Modes group at the bottom of
the dialog, choose Vertex sub-object mode.
652 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
18.Drag a region to select all the vertices that make
the top half of the torso, including the arms.
19.Using Scale (corner boxes) andMove (cursor
inside the selection area), adjust the vertices so
they are all contained inside the t-shirt image.
20.Select the bottom vertices representing the
lower section of the shirt. Adjust scale and
position to equalize the flow of vertices on the
3D-object structure.
21.Continue selecting and adjusting groups of
vertices to fit the wireframe structure to the
image in the background. Always try to keep
the flow of the vertices even to prevent any
stretching in the texture, especially when the
texture has patterns or labels on it.
Map the back of the shirt:
1. Right-click the label in the top left corner of the
Front viewport. From the menu that appears,
choose Views > Back.
2. In theModifier stack, switch the Unwrap UVW
sub-selection level to Face.
3. In the back viewport, drag to region-select all
the polygons that make the back of the T-shirt.
Mapping the Helmet 653
4. On theMap Parameters rollout, click the Planar
button once to reset the mapping coordinates
of the selected faces.
5. Click the Planar button one more time to turn
it off.
6. Using Scale andMove modes as you did earlier,
position the back faces on top of the back of the
T-shirt in the background picture.
7. In the Selection Modes group at the bottom of
the dialog, choose Vertex sub-object mode.
8. Adjust groups of vertices as you did earlier
to fit the wireframe structure on top of the
background image.
9. Exit the Edit UVWs dialog when done.
10.Turn the Back view into a Front view again.
11.In theModifier stack, exit sub-object mode.
12.Save your file as my_pilot_shirt.max.
Mapping the Helmet
In this lesson, you use the Unwrap UVWmodifier
to map the helmet of the helicopter pilot. Unlike
the shirt, the helmet cannot be easily mapped with
a Planar projection. You will use a cylindrical
projection instead.
Apply the material to the helmet:
1. Continue working on your file from the
previous exercise or load the file pilot02.max
found under \tutorials\unwrap_uvw.
2. Zoom in on the pilot’s helmet in the Perspective
viewport.
3. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
4. Find the material named Pilot_Head. Drag
this material and drop it on the helmet in the
Perspective view.
5. Close the Material Editor.
Map the helmet:
1. Select the Helmet, and then go to the
Modify panel.
2. From theModifier list, choose Unwrap UVW.
3. Expand the Unwrap UVWmodifier, and then
choose Face sub-object level.
654 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
4. On the Selection Parameters rollout, turn off
Ignore Backfacing.
5. Drag to region-select all the faces that make the
helmet. The whole helmet turns red.
6. On the Map Parameters rollout, click the
Cylindrical button. A cylindrical mapping
gizmo appears, but its size and orientation are
incorrect.
7. On the Map Parameters rollout, click on Align
Y to adjust the gizmo to the helmet.
Note: Take a look at the vertical green edge at the
front of the cylindrical gizmo. This represents
the edge that will be used to unfold themap.
You will need to rotate that edge to the back
of the helmet to better fit the map assigned to
the material.
8. Fromthe main toolbar, click the Rotate tool
and set Reference Coordinate System to Local.
9. Press the A key to turn on Angle Snap.
10.In the perspective view, rotate the gizmo 180
degrees on the Z axis (blue axis) until the green
edge is at the back of the head.
Mapping the Helmet 655
11.On the Parameters rollout, click Edit to open
the Edit UVWs dialog.
The selected faces are unfolded against
a checkered pattern, but it might not be
completely symmetrical.
12.Rotate the cylindrical gizmo an additional 5
degrees on the Z axis.
This fixes the selected faces into a perfectly
symmetrical layout.
13.On the Map Parameters rollout, click the
Cylindrical button to exit that mode.
14.In the editor, from the map drop-down list,
choose the helmet map defined in the material.
15.Make sure the Options button in the bottom
right corner of the dialog is active.
16.In the Bitmap Options group, set the Brightness
to 1.0. Thismakes the background image easier
to read.
17. On the dialog’s main toolbar, make sure
the FreeformMode tool is selected.
18.Position the cursor on one of the corner boxes
to scale the selected faces, or anywhere inside
the selection to move the selected faces.
19.Make a preliminary adjustment for the selected
faces to fit the background image.
20.In the Selection Modes group at the bottom of
the dialog, choose Vertex sub-object mode.
656 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
21.Adjust groups of vertices, as you did in the
previous exercise.
22.Exit the EditUVWs dialog when done. In the
Modifier stack, exit the sub-object level.
Things to try:
If you have time, try to adapt this tutorial to the visor and the
oxygen mask. Both present the same workflow (cylindrical
mapping) as the helmet and they should be assigned the
same material.
When you are done, save your file as
my_pilot_helmet.max.
Mapping the Pants
In this lesson, you use the Unwrap UVWmodifier
to map the pants of the helicopter pilot using a
camouflage pattern. The pants would be difficult
to map using conventional mapping methods,
especially when you use a pattern like camouflage,
without getting smearing and stretching of pixels.
Using multiple planar and cylindrical maps might
work to keep the pattern equal but may give you
problems with stitching. It is best to use Pelt
Mapping in such a situation.
An added constraint is the belt, which is part of the
pants object. Since the belt will be using a different
material than the rest of the pants, you need to
apply a Multi/Sub-Object Material and map the
two elements differently, using pelt mapping for
the pants and a simpler cylindrical mapping for
the belt.
Adjust material IDs:
1. Continue working on your file from the
previous exercise or load the file pilot03.max
found under \tutorials\unwrap_uvw.
2. Zoom in on the pilot’s pants in all viewports.
3. Select the Pants object and go to the
Modify panel.
4. Expand the Edit Poly modifier in the stack and
go to Polygon sub-object level.
5. Activate the Front viewport and then press
Ctrl+A to select all the faces that make up the
pants object (pants + belt).
6. Scroll down to the Polygon Properties rollout
at the bottom of the Modify panel. Set the Set
ID value to 1.
This sets all the faces to be applied with the
first material in a multi/sub-object material
definition.
Mapping the Pants 657
7. Using a window selection, drag to select
all the faces that make the belt.
8. On the Polygon Properties rollout, set the Set
ID value to 2.
The faces representing the belt will receive the
second material in a multi/sub-object material
definition.
9. Click an empty area of the viewport to deselect
all polygons.
10.Exit Sub-object selection level, and then go
to the top of the stack by clicking the Smooth
modifier entry.
Apply the material to the pants:
1. In the Perspective viewport, zoom in on the
pilot’s pants.
2. Press M to open theMaterial Editor.
3. Find the material namedPilot_Pants and select
it.
This is a Multi/Sub-Object material with two
defined sub-materials.
4. Drag this material to on the pants in the
Perspective viewport.
5. Close the Material Editor.
Create pelt seams:
When you use Pelt mapping, it is best to start by
defining pelt seams. Pelt seams are like virtual
“cut” lines that the UVW Map modifier uses to
unfold the Pelt map.
1. Select the Pants object and then go to the
Modify panel.
2. From theModifier list, choose Unwrap UVW.
3. Maximize the Perspective view and press F4 to
turn Edged Facesmode on if it is not on already.
4. Press F3 to display the view in wireframe.
5. Expand the Unwrap UVW modifier and in the
modifier stack, go to Edge sub-object level.
6. On the Parameters rollout > Display group,
turn off ShowMap Seam. The greenmap seams
will make the blue Pelt seams difficult to see.
7. Select the vertical edge at the back center of the
belt.
658 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
8. On the Selection Parameters rollout, click the
Loop button.
The edges are now selected in a loop fromthe
back to the front passing between the legs.
At this point, you can convert this edge selection
to a Pelt Seam, but you really only need the
selected edges at the back of the pants. You can
deselect the edges you do not want or use a
different approach called Point To Point Seam.
9. Click a blank area of the viewport to deselect
the edges. At the very bottom of the command
panel, click the Point To Point Seam button.
10.Click a point on the belt where you want the
pelt seam to start.
11.Arc Rotate to view the pants from a lower angle
and click a point in the middle between the
pants legs.
12.Right-click to accept the seam. You now have a
pelt seam running along the buttocks.
Mapping the Pants 659
13.Repeat the Point To Point procedure to create a
pelt seam running along the inside of a leg.
14.Create a pelt seam for the inside of the other leg.
15.Press F3 to restore the view to shaded mode.
16.In the modifier stack, set the sub-object level
to Face.
17.On the Selection Parameters rollout, turn off
Ignore Backfacing.
18.Press Ctrl+A to select all the faces that make
up the pants.
They turn red in the viewport.
19.On the Map Parameters rollout, click the Pelt
button.
A planar mapping gizmo appears in the
viewport.
20.Click the Align Y button to align the gizmo
with the world XZ plane (that is, perpendicular
to the Y axis).
21.At the bottom of the rollout, click the Edit Pelt
Map button.
The Edit UVWs dialog appears along with the
Pelt Map Parameters dialog.
Note: The display of the geometry in the Edit
UVWs dialog is slightly different from what
you have seen so far. A circular Stretcher
is displayed. you’ll use this to simulate Pelt
mapping by stretching the geometry. You need
to adjust it slightly so that it works properly.
22.Fromthe Maps drop-down, choose themap
that was defined in the Multi/Sub-Object
material for the pants.
The camouflage texture appears in the
background.
660 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Note: Because the material applied to the pants
is a Multi/Sub-Object material, all maps used
in the material definition are automatically
displayed in the map drop-down menu; in this
case the camouflage and the belt map.
23. On the Edit UVWs main toolbar, choose
the Scale tool.
24.Position the cursor on one of the Stretcher
control points. Scale the stretcher up
slightly until it reaches the boundaries of the
camouflage map.
25. On the Edit UVWs toolbar, choose the
Rotate tool.
26.Make sure Angle snap is off. Position the cursor
on one of the stretcher’s control point, and
rotate the stretcher to get a more symmetrical
layout.
27.In the Pelt Map Parameters floating dialog,
click the Simulate Pelt Pulling button.
The faces are stretched out based on the pelt
seams you created.
Mapping the Pants 661
28.Click the Simulate Pelt Pulling button two more
times for additional stretching.
The end results are getting better in the
viewport, but the mapping can be made better
with a bit of “relaxing.”
29.On the Pelt Map Parameters floating dialog,
click the Relax (Light) button three times. Keep
an eye on the viewport to compare the results.
Map the belt:
Unlike the pants, the belt uses a simple cylindrical
mapping, much like the one you used on the
helmet in the previous exercise.
1. In themodifier stack, switch the Unwrap UVW
sub-object level to Face.
2. In the Map Parameters rollout, click the Pelt
button to exit this mode.
3. Click a blank area of the viewport to deselect
the faces.
4. On the Edit UVWs dialog, open the face ID
dropdown list.
662 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
5. Choose 2:Pilot_Belt (Standard) from that
list. Only the faces that make out the belt are
selected.
Note: The background automatically switches
to reflect the map associated with the faces that
use that Material ID.
6. In the EditUVWswindow, drag to region-select
all the faces representing the belt.
The corresponding faces are selected in the
viewport.
7. Press F3 to switch to wireframe display mode.
8. On the Map Parameters rollout, click
Cylindrical, and then click Align Z to align the
cylindrical gizmo to the belt.
9. Make sure Angle Snap is on and rotate the
gizmo 90 degrees on the Z axis (blue axis) so
that the green seam is at the back.
10.On the Map Parameters rollout, click the Fit
button to fit the gizmo to the belt.
11.Click theCylindrical button to turn it off.
12.At the bottom-right corner of the Edit UVWs
dialog, click the Options button.
13.In the extended group that appears, set the
Brightness value to 1 to get a better view of the
background.
14. On the Edit UVWs toolbar, click the
Freeform mode tool.
15.Make a preliminary adjustment using Scale
(cursor on the corner control points) andMove
(cursor inside the selection) to position the
selected faces over the belt in the background
image.
Vertex Color and Interactive Shading 663
16.Press F3 to return to shaded display mode.
17.On the Edit UVWs dialog, switch the selection
mode to Vertex.
18.Select all the bottom vertices on the belt line.
19. From the Edit UVWs window’s main
toolbar, open the Scale flyout and choose the
Scale Vertical tool.
20.Place your cursor on one of the selected vertices
and then click and drag down to straighten the
belt line.
21.Select the upper belt line and straighten it as
well.
22.Select the vertices around the buckle.
23. Using Scale Horizontal and Move, adjust
the vertices to get a better-looking buckle in
the viewport.
24.Close the Edit UVWs dialog when done.
25.In the modifier stack, exit the sub-object level.
26.Save your file as my_pilot_pants.max.
Things to try:
You have used the Unwrap UVW modifier to apply various
types ofmaps such as Planar, Cylindrical and Pelt. If you have
time, continue mapping the rest of the objects that make
the character such as boots, arms and neck. All materials
have been already provided. Remember that you only
need to map one boot and one arm, because you created
the opposite limb as an instance.A finished version named
pilot05.max can be found under \tutorials\unwrap_uvw.
Summary
This tutorial has introduced you to several
mapping methods using the Unwrap UVW
modifier. You have used simple mapping
techniques such as planar and cylindrical, as well
as more elaborate techniques such as pelt mapping
to seamlessly wrap textures around objects. These
tools can be adapted to the task of mapping any
object in 3ds Max.
Vertex Color and Interactive
Shading
Interactive and immersive environments such as
those required in interactive games require that
the scene artists employ variety of techniques to
make the modeling and texturing as realistic as
possible, while making sure it is “lightweight”
enough to update efficiently in the display
system. Minimizing polygon counts in models
are discussed elsewhere, but these tutorials focus
664 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
on how to “bake” textures, shading and lighting
effects directly into the geometry of your scene.
Games professionals will want to familiarize
themselves with the options 3dsMax gives them to
manipulate vertex color and interactive shading.
Files for This Section
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials\vertex_color
directory. Before starting the tutorials, copy
the \tutorials folder from the disc to your local
program installation.
Painting Vertex Color
In this tutorial, youwill load in a scene of a garage,
a typical games environment. You will take the
lighting information in the form of a radiosity
solution and learn to “bake” the radiosity into
Vertex Paint modifier layers. You’ll also get a
chance to explore painting on multiple layers and
animating the layer opacity to create the illusion of
flickering fluorescent tubes in the scene.
Skill Level: Intermediate
Time to complete: 20 minutes
Features Covered in This Tutorial
• Generating radiosity solutions using Advance
Lighting Override Materials
• Adding radiosity into Vertex Color
• Using Blur selected to correct lighting problems
• Painting vertex color on layers
• Animating layer opacity to create flickering
lights
Tutorial Files
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials\vertex_color
directory. Before starting the tutorials, copy
the \tutorials folder from the disc to your local
program installation.
Adding Radiosity to Vertex Color
You can take the lighting information from your
file and add it to the vertex color information. In
this exercise, you will open a scene of a garage,
a typical game environment. The skylights and
fluorescent tubes in the garage have advanced
lighting override materials applied to them. You
will calculate a radiosity solution and then “bake”
it in the vertex color channels using the Assign
Vertex Colors Utility.
Radiosity with advanced lighting override materials
Setup the tutorial:
• Opentut_vertexpaint_garage_start.max.
All the files necessary for this tutorial
are provided on the program disc in the
\tutorials\vertex_color directory. Before
Adding Radiosity to Vertex Color 665
starting the tutorials, copy the \tutorials folder
from the disc to your local programinstallation.
This file has been prepared so that it has
advanced lighting override materials placed on
the fluorescent tubes, the overhead skylights, the
hanging lamp, and the rear red skylight in the back
of the garage. First, you will adjust the luminance
scale on these materials.
Adjust the Advanced Lighting Materials:
1. Open the Material Editor.
If you only see 6 material slots, do the next step.
2. ChooseMaterial Options and set Slots to 5 x 3.
Now you should be able to see 15 material slots.
3. Find and highlight the Skylight Material.
4. Increase the Luminance Scale from 500 to
12000.
5. Select theCone_Light material and increase the
Luminance Scale from 5000 to 10000.
6. Select the Fluorescent_Light material and
increase the Luminance Scale to 10000.
The Advanced Lighting OverrideMaterial will
give the illusion that the objects are casting
lighting in the scene. By increasing these
Luminance Scale values the garage will become
more brightly lit, once the radiosity is solved.
Note: This tutorial does not use Exposure
Control. Generally, when working with
radiosity, you can turn on Logarithmic
Exposure Control for best results.
Next, you will calculate the radiosity solution.
Calculate the radiosity solution:
1. On the Renderingmenu, choose Render.
2. On the Render Scene dialog, click the Advanced
Lighting tab.
3. Make sure Display Radiosity In Viewport is
turned on, and that Initial Quality is set to 70 %
Then click Start.
The Radiosity solution is created, and the
viewport displays the shadowing created using
the advanced lighting.
Radiosity displayed in viewport
You’ll repeat the technique you just used one
more time.
4. In theMaterial editor, select thematerial named
Red_Light.
5. In the Special Effects group, increase the
Luminance Scale to 40000.
6. Close the Material editor.
On the Render Scene dialog, there is a message
saying the Solution is invalid at the current time
frame.
7. On the Render Scene dialog in the Radiosity
Processing Parameters, click Reset. Click Yes
on the dialog that asks if you are sure.
The viewport updates to reflect the reset
Radiosity.
8. Click Start again.
666 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
The radiosity solution calculates then displays
in the viewport. The red light color is now
splashed prominently on the back walls.
Red skylight color increased
Next, you will take the radiosity lighting
information and add it to the vertex color
information by using the Assign Vertex Color
Utility. This will create a vertex paint layer that you
can then manipulate.
Bake radiosity into the vertex paint layer:
1. On the toolbar, find theNamed Selection Set
drop-down list and click the down arrow.
ChooseVertPt_set from the list.
This will select all the objects in the scene
except for the lights.
2. On the Utilities panel, choose More >
Assign Vertex Colors.
3. In the Assign Vertex Colors rollout, leave the
Channel set to Vertex Color.
4. Make sure in the Light Model group that
Lighting + Diffuse is turned on.
5. In Color assignment, turn on Color By Vertex,
if it isn’t already.
6. In the RenderingOptions rollout, make sure
Mapping is on, and choose Radiosity, Reuse
Direct Illum. From Solution.
7. Click Assign To Selected.
The Radiosity information is assigned object by
object throughout the scene. You will see each
object update in the viewport.
The vertex information has been applied to the
geometry, but the vertex isn’t really displaying
it yet. To see the vertex color information, you’ll
use the floating vertex paintbox
8. On the Utility panel > Assign Vertex Colors
rollout, click Edit.
The floating vertex paintbox appears, and the
Modify panel is now displayed instead of the
Utility panel. The VertexPaint modifier is
now visible in the stack. It appears in italics,
indicating that it is an instanced modifier,
shared by several objects in the scene.
Display the vertex color in the viewport:
At the top of the paintbox is a row of buttons which
allow you to control the viewport display as you
work.
Adding Radiosity to Vertex Color 667
Tip: It’s important you understand these modes.
For example you can find yourself painting on
something you can’t see, because you aren’t
displaying it in the viewport.
1. Click the Vertex color display – unshaded
button.
Unshaded vertex color displayed
The viewport now displays the vertex color
without the viewport lighting.
2. Click the Vertex color display – shaded
button.
Shaded vertex color mode
The viewport now displays the vertex color
with the viewport lighting.
3. Click the Vertex color display – disable
vertex color button.
The vertex color is hidden.
Vertex color disabled
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4. Turn display vertex color display –
shaded on.
This is the mode youwill use when you do your
vertex painting.
In the next section, you will explore using
the vertex paint tools to blur shadows, adjust
color and paint directly on the garage floor
using multiple vertex color layers. But first you
should save your work.
5. Save your file as mygarage_
vertexcolor01.max.
Painting the Garage with
VertexPaint
Now you will explore the vertex paint modifier
tools.
Set up the tutorial:
• Continue from the previous exercise, or
open \tutorials\vertex_color\tut_vertexpaint_
garage_blur.max.
If you are opening the provided file, select the
VertPt_set from the toolbar Named Selection
sets list. On the Modify panel, display the
floating vertex paintbox by clicking the Edit
button.
Blur the shadows:
1. Navigate the viewport to explore the scene. Use
the Zoom and Pan tools to see what the interior
of the garage looks like.
2. Use Arc Rotate to look at the skylights and
fluorescent fixtures. Look up at the ceiling from
the center of the room. You may notice the
lighting information around the skylight is a
bit coarse.
Problems on the ceiling
Painting the Garage with VertexPaint 669
It’s easy to smooth this out using the blur
command.
3. Right-click the Perspective viewport label and
choose Edged Faces.
4. Press the H key on the keyboard and select the
GARAGE_WALLS object from the list.
Next you’ll select the faces that need work.
5. On the Parameters rollout in the
Selection group, turn on Ignore Backfacing,
then click the Face Selection button.
6. On the toolbar, turn on Window
selection, then drag a selection rectangle
around one of the skylight areas.
You can use Soft selection for the blur operation
since you want tomake sure the blur happens
smoothly.
7. On the Parameters rollout, click the Soft
Selection button, then in the Soft Selection
dialog, turn on Use Soft Selection.
Use Soft Selection
8. To blur the selected area, click the Blur
All button.
The lighting is smoothed out in the ceiling.
Blur applied to ceiling faces
If you like, you can repeat the blurring
procedure on the roof areas surrounding the
other two skylights.
670 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
9. Choose File > Save As to save your file. Use the
plus button to save to an incrementally named
scene.
Paint additional layers:
You can add asmany layers as you want. Each layer
is applied as another VertexPaint modifier in the
stack. These layers can be adjusted or animated
individually.
1. On the vertex paintbox, click New Layer.
Accept the default setting in the dialog that
appears, then click OK.
A second modifier is added to the stack.
2. Navigate the viewport so you can see the floor
of the garage.
3. Click the color swatch next to the Pick Color
From Object (eyedropper) button, then choose
a bright yellow from the color selector.
4. Click the Paint button, then
move your cursor over the garage floor and
paint.
Painting a second layer
This paint layer is very adaptable. In the next
few steps, you’ll see some of the adjustments
you can make to this layer.
5. Change the opacity of the Layer by dragging the
opacity slider to the left.
6. Change the Mode. Click the drop-down arrow
and choose Color Dodge, then set the opacity
back to 100.
This creates the effect of a washed out spot on
the floor.
You can use the Adjust Color command to
change the Hue, Saturation or Value.
7. Change the mode fromColorDodge back to
Normal and change the opacity to 39.
8. Click the Adjust Color
button. In the Adjust Color dialog, drag the hue
slider to change the color. Click Apply.
Animating Vertex Paint Layer Opacity 671
9. Drag the Saturation slider to the left to make
the effect more subtle. Click Apply, and then
click OK to close the Adjust Color dialog.
10.Save you work using File > Save As. Use
the plus button to increment the name to
mygarage_vertexcolor02.max.
Animating Vertex Paint Layer
Opacity
In this lesson you will separate the lighting
information from the individual objects onto
independent layers. We’ll show you how its
done, then you will load a file that has the work
completed.
You’ll create the illusion of a flickering fluorescent
tube by animating the opacity value of the vertex
paint layer, and then keyframing the material self
illumination color.
Set up the tutorial:
• Continue from the previous procedure.
Create separate radiosity layers:
1. With the garage walls still selected, hold
down the Ctrl key, then on the Modify panel
select the two VertexPaintmodifiers in the stack
and delete them using the Remove Modifier
From Stack button below the modifier window.
You can use the LayerManager to quickly hide
and unhide parts of your scene. You’ll hide all
the lights but one, then create a radiosity pass
for that and bake it into a vertex paint layer.
2. On the toolbar, click the LayerManager
button.
3. On the LayerManager dialog, click Hide for all
the objects except FlourescentFlicker andMisc.
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Layer Manager
Now the only objects visible in the scene are the
garage elements and the one fluorescent tube.
4. On the Rendering menu, choose Render. Then
on the Advanced Lighting Tab, click Reset.
Then click Start.
The radiosity solution is calculated for the light
coming fromthe single fluorescent tube.
Radiosity from single fluorescent fixture
Of course, the next step is to create the vertex
color layer.
5. On the Utilities Panel, click More > Assign
Vertex Colors. Make sure the selection set
namedVertsPT_set is selected, then click Assign
To Selected.
The lighting coming from the one fluorescent
tube is applied to this vertex color layer.
6. Click the Edit button to jump to the Modify
panel.
In the Modifier stack, highlight the Vertex
Paint layer and right-click, then rename it
VertexPaint Flicker .
7. Repeat the procedure for the another light layer.
On the LayerManager, unhide the layer named
Fluorescent Lights, and hide the layer named
Fluorescent Flicker. Repeat the above steps to
reset radiosity, create a new radiosity solution,
and assign it to a vertex color layer.
Radiosity for the rest of the fluorescent tubes.
You could do the same for the skylights.
Animating Vertex Paint Layer Opacity 673
Radiosity for the skylights
We’ve provided a finished file that has all the
work done for you.
8. Save your file if you wish, then open
tut_vertexpaint_anim_start.max to continue.
Animate the layer opacity:
Now you can create the illusion of a flickering
fluorescent tube. The technique you use is simple.
You select the layer with the lighting information,
then in Auto Key mode, keyframe the opacity
of the layer. You’ll then complete the illusion by
keyframing the self-illumination color of the
material.
1. In the new file you just opened, look at the
modifier stack for the VertPT_set objects.
There are six vertex paint layers in this file.
2. In themodifier stack, highlight VertPT_Flicker ,
then click the Edit button to display the vertex
paintbox if it isn’t already visible.
3. Turn on the Auto Key button.
4. Move the time slider to frame 10.
5. On the floating vertex paintbox, move the
opacity slider down a little, then back to 100.
This sets a key at frame 10, and frame 0.
6. Move to frame 12 and slide the opacity slider
down to 0.
7. Move to frame 14 and slide the opacity slider
up a little, then back down to 0.
8. Advance to frame 16 and slide the opacity slider
up to 100.
9. Play the animation in the viewport. The light
flickers once.
10. Open the Material Editor and find the
Flourescent_light material. In the Advanced
Lighting Override Material rollout, click the
Base Material name.
The Base material parameters appear.
11.Move to frame 10 and click the Self-Illumination
color swatch. Move the whiteness slider toward
grey, then back to white.
The color swatch is outlined in red, to show it
is animated.
12. Move to frame 12. Change the
Self-illumination color to Black using
theWhiteness slider.
Move to frame 14, and keyframe the color as
Black again.
13. Move to frame 16 and keyframe the
Self-Illumination back to white.
14. Turn off Auto Key and close the
Material Editor.
15. In the track bar, drag a selection rectangle
around the keys. Hold down Shift and drag
the keys tomake copies so the flickering repeats.
If you play the animation now, its a little slow.
You can improve the performance by collapsing
the layers.
674 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
Preserve the flickering layer:
You’ll use the Preserve Layer command to keep the
animated layer while condensing the remaining
ones.
1. On the Parameters rollout, with the
VertPt_Flicker layer still selected, turn on
Preserve Layer.
2. Now highlight the Layer at the top of the stack.
3. On the floating vertex paintbox, click
Condense To Single Layer.
The five other layers are collapsed into a single
layer, while the flicker layer is preserved.
4. In the Modifier stack drag the Flicker layer
so it is at the top of the stack, then play the
animation in the viewport.
Summary
In this tutorial you have explored the use of the
VertexPaint modifier. You have learned to bake
radiosity into vertex color using the Assign Vertex
Color Utility, and how to add paint layers in the
modify panel. You have learned to animate the
opacity of the layers to create a flickering lighting
effect that can be exported to a game engine.
Render to Texture
The Render To Texture tool in 3ds Max lets you
render, or “bake,” various scene elements into
your textures, including lighting and shadows.
You can use these special textures in real-time 3D
applications such as games to reduce the burden
on the renderer, thus improving the frame rate.
In this lesson, you’ll look at basic usage of this
feature.
All the files necessary for this tutorial are provided
on the program disc in the \tutorials\vertex_color
directory. Before starting the tutorials, copy
the \tutorials folder from the disc to your local
program installation.
Examine the setup:
1. Load the file tut_texturebake_start.max. This
file is in the \tutorials\vertex_color folder.
The scene consists of a texture-mapped biplane
model and a single shadow-casting Omni light.
First, you’ll see how the scene looks rendered in
3ds Max.
2. Make sure the Perspective viewport is active.
On the toolbar, click Quick Render, or press
Shift+Q to render the scene.
Rendering to Texture 675
In the rendered image, note the presence of
shadows, particularly those cast by the propeller
blade and the vertical strut between the upper
and lower wings. These shadows don’t appear
in the Perspective viewport, though.
3. Close the rendered frame window.
4. Select the Fuselage object; this is the main body
of the biplane.
The Fuselage uses an Unwrap UVWmodifier
for complex and precise texture mapping.
Because this is the only texture-mapped object
in the scene, you’ll concentrate on it for this
lesson. First, you’ll take a look at the texture.
5. Go to the Modify panel, and in the modifier
stack display, make sure the Unwrap UVW
entry is highlighted.
6. On the Parameters rollout, click Edit.
This opens the Edit UVWs dialog. You can see
how the texture map is divided into various
sections, with different face clusters overlaid on
each. These face clusters are UVW mapping
coordinates that correspond to different parts
of the Fuselage mesh.
7. Close the dialog.
8. Press M to open the Material Editor, and note
that the fuselage is mapped with a standard
material named Fuselage. Close the editor
window.
Bake the texture:
1. Fromthe Renderingmenu, choose Render To
Texture.
The Render To Textures dialog opens.
2. On the Objects to Bake rollout, note that the
Fuselage is the only object listed. Also note that
the Selected Object Settings group > Enabled
check box is on, and All Selected is chosen.
This means that Render To Texture will use any
selected objects.
If you like, try selecting different objects in the
Perspective viewport, and note that theObjects
To Bake list updates dynamically. Finish by
selecting only the Fuselage object.
3. On the Output rollout, click the Add button.
This opens the Add Texture Elements dialog,
with a list of different types of texture elements
you can render. Typically, you want to combine
all elements into a single texture, so you use
CompleteMap.
4. In the Add Texture Elements dialog list,
double-click CompleteMap, or highlight it and
then click the Add Elements button.
5. When you use Render To Texture, the software
creates a new material. You must specify where
in this new material the rendered texture will
go. In the Selected Element Common Settings
group, click the drop-down list next to Target
Map Slot and choose Diffuse Color.
CompleteMap appears in the Output rollout
list, along with the default texture size to be
generated: 256x 256. The original texture map
is fairly large, so you’ll probably want to render
it to a bigger size.
676 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
6. Near the bottom of the Output rollout, click the
768x768 button.
Other sizes are available from the preset
buttons, and you can use the Size setting to
specify any output size you want.
This size is lower than that of the original
texture; using it will help you see the differences
between it and the one that Render To Texture
generates.
7. In the Name field, change the “CompleteMap”
text to MyCompleteMap. Press Tab to refresh
the dialog.
The name in the output list changes to reflect
your edit, as does the File Name And Type
entry.
8. At the bottom of the Render To Textures dialog,
click the Render button.
Alerts appear briefly, displaying the progress
of flattening UVs and baking the texture, and
then a virtual frame buffer window opens with
the newly rendered CompleteMap texture. This
image looks similar to what you saw in the Edit
UVWs window, but the texture is subdivided
differently.
9. Close the rendered frame window, and then
close the Render To Textures dialog.
Examine the results:
1. Take a look at themodifier stack display, and
then look at the biplane in the Perspective
viewport.
A second modifier, named Automatic Flatten
UVs, has been added to the Fuselage. This is an
Unwrap UVWmodifier, but it was created and
applied automatically by the Render To Texture
function.
Rendering to Texture 677
The Fuselage object is still mapped accurately,
but the cast shadows now appear in the
viewport. For example, if you move the light
source, you can see that the shadows cast onto
the fuselage fromthe propeller don’t change
with as the light sourcemoves, because they’re
baked into the texture.
You can also see that the texture map as applied
to the fuselage in the viewport is of lower
quality, but if you render the image, the texture
is of its original high quality. In the next few
steps, you’ll see why that is.
2. Again open theMaterial Editor. Click the first
material, which was previously named Fuselage.
The software has renamed the material
orig_Fuselage.
3. Scroll down to find an unused sample
sphere, click it, and then click the GetMaterial
button.
4. From the Material/Map Browser dialog >
Browse From group, choose Selected.
A single material now appears in the list. Its
name is Fuselage (from the object it’s applied
to), and the type, Shell Material, appears next
to the name. This material was generated
automatically by Render To Texture, and then
applied to the Fuselage object.
Basically, a Shell material lets you combine two
materials into one; you can see one material
in the viewports while rendering with the
other. When Render To Texture generates a
Shell material, it uses the original material
for rendering, and the baked material for
displaying in the viewports.
5. Double-click the texture in the list to add it in
the Material Editor. Close theMaterial/Map
Browser dialog.
You can find the scene to this point in
tut_texturebake_finish.max.
This material has only one rollout: Shell
Material Parameters. It shows that the original
material (orig_Fuselage) is to be rendered with,
while the baked material (baked_Fuselage,
generated by Render To Texture) is to be visible
in the viewports.
6. Click the Original Material button, and
then, on the Material Editor toolbar, click the
Show Map In Viewport button.
678 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping
This step lets you see the material in the
viewport in the next step.
7. Return to the top level of the material, and
on the ShellMaterial Parameters rollout, under
Viewport, click the top radio button (next to
Original Material).
In the Perspective viewport, the Fuselage
returns to its previous appearance, and the
shadows go away.
8. Trymoving the light source, and then rendering
with the baked texture.
The original shadows remainwhere you baked
them. Depending on where you position the
light source, you might see an additional set of
shadows, cast by the light during the rendering.
9. In the shell material, return viewport display
to the baked material.
Render other elements:
Besides the CompleteMap, you can render
individual elements, one or more at a time.
1. Open the Render To Texture dialog and on the
Output rollout, delete the MyCompleteMap
element, and then add a ShadowsMap element.
Set Target Map Slot to Diffuse Color.
2. Click Render.
The new material is unshaded, except where
the shadows fall. You can use this type of
texture if your target rendering engine supports
compositing multiple textures.
Note that the rendered frame window still
shows the CompleteMap, even though Render
To Texture didn’t save one. This is always the
case, no matter which types of elements you
render. You can turn off the automatic display
of the frame window on the General Settings
rollout.
3. On the Render To Textures dialog, delete the
ShadowsMap texture element, and then add, at
the same time,DiffuseMap and LightingMap
elements.
They appear in that order in the list. With
multiple textures in the list, you can specify
output settings for each by clicking its list entry.
4. In the list, click the DiffuseMap entry, and then
set TargetMap Slot to Diffuse Color.
5. Click Render. When the Missing Map Targets
alert appears, click the Continue button.
The Missing Map Targets dialog shows any
texture elements that aren’t assigned to target
map slots.
The new Shell material is created for the
first element in the list only, as shown in the
Perspective viewport. However, all textures
are saved in the target directory. You can see
the LightingMap texture in the viewport by
deleting the DiffuseMap.
6. Delete the DiffuseMap list entry, set the
LightingMap’s TargetMap Slot to Diffuse Color,
and then click the Render button.
Render To Texture generates a new material
and applies it to the Fuselage, so it is now visible
in the viewport. The LightingMap element
includes all shading and shadows, but no
diffuse coloring.
Note: Only one texture element at a time can
be set to any given target map type. Also, if
you add a texture element that was previously
assigned a target map type, the software
automatically assigns the most recent target
map type that it used, if no other active texture
element is already using that target map type.
If another active texture element is using that
target map type, the target map slot for the
newly assigned texture element is blank.
Summary
Render To Texture is a versatile tool that can save
you time in generating texture maps for real-time
Rendering to Texture 679
applications. In this tutorial you learned how to
bake different types of textures, and how to work
with the Shell material that Render To Texture
generates. Try generating other texture elements,
and then exporting them to your real-time 3D
engine.
680 Chapter 5: Materials and Mapping