Month: January 2007

I need help with creating a Lava material in 3ds Max version 6. I found
a tutorial on the internet but it is for the version 3 and needs a
plugin known as electric from Blur Beta. I cant use this on max 6 and
cant find it compatible for 6. I need to find a way to create Lava
Landscape effect in 3ds Max 6. Can anyone give me some ideas??????

I can’t for the life of me figure out why, but a book that has this and
many other effects for 3ds max 6 without plug-ins is actually more expensive
on Amazon than the version for 3ds max 8 (which I own).

Search for:
Deconstructing the Elements with 3ds max 6: Create natural fire, earth,
air and water without plug-ins by Pete Draper
These are excellent texts, with lots of color screen shots and
illustrations. The “Earth” chapter has tutorials for volcanic terrain,
lava, grass and dirt, grasses, frozen wastelands, mountains and
asteroids. Why that last one is under the “Earth” chapter is beyond me!
It comes with a DVD packed with all the materials used.
Website: www.deconstructingsupport.com and
http://www.petedraper.com/forum/default.asp?CAT_ID=20
Highly recommended.

When I animate something, why does the animation accelerate at the
beginning? How can I make the animation go the same speed all of the
time?

When you animate something in 3ds, and in most all others, you create
keyframes. How you transition into/out of these keyframes is what you
need to adjust. In 3ds, the default is to “ease out” and “ease in” to
these keyframes. That is, just as you’ve seen, the transitions are
gradually brought on, and gradually left.
The short answer (and there are at least 2 long answers I can think of):
1. Before you animate, change the keyframe easing for 3ds with the
button/icon just to the right of the “set key” button in the animation
toolbar. When you click you mouse on it, you’ll see a bunch of
choices, and after you play with them you’ll see how they each work.
2. The one you want it what I’d call a “linear” easing (I’d call the
default a quad). It is the straight line.
3. Animate like you normally would.
For noise, this is all you’ll need. But for more complex animations
where objects are moving in multiple dimensions, and you want to make
the easing different for each axis, well.. we’ll leave that for
another day!

Hello,
I want to render cross sections of an architectural model . That should
probably be done with a plane that cuts the model – the cross section,
displaying one half and making the other invisable nad then rendering…
I dont know how to do that in 3ds, please help…
thanks in advance

If the 3ds “Slice” modifier (works with all objects & meshes) doesn’t
do what you want, you can always get a plugin that is more exotic, like
ScalpelMax:
http://www.cebas.com/products/products.php?UD=10-7888-33-788&PID=6

I have created a hexagon spine.
Then moved the points around to create the shape i want. The problem i am
having is its 2d and i want it 3d.
I am unable to extrude the shape as its disabled in the menu.
Is there another way i was wondering

Try this as one alternative:
1. Create -> Shapes -> NGon
2. Choose the amount of sides.
3. Draw the NGon by “dragging” the mouse in one of the viewports.
4. Right-click the spline, and select “Convert to Editable Spline”.
5. Adjust the shape to suit with “Vertex”, “Segment” and/or “Spline”.
6. Either exit the “Editable Spline” sub-object mode, or simply
select/click “Extrude”. Note: If you just select “Extrude”, you are
taken out of “Editable Spline” mode. This isn’t true of the poly and
mesh modes for some reason.
7. Choose “Extrude” or “Lathe”, depending on what you’re doing.
8. Add Parameters -> Amount to add thickness if extruded.
9. Add Parameters -> Segments if you plan to smooth or otherwise change
the shape.
Hope this helps!

Here is one case where a user wanted a simple way to create a sink like
you might find in a kitchen:
1. Make a plane the right size, and give it lots of subdivisions as
appropriate.
2. Convert it to an editable poly.
3. Go to the “Paint Deformation” rollout and change “Push/Pull” to -10.
Change “Brush Size to “10”.
4. Select the Z “Transform axis”.
5. Click “Push/Pull”.
6. Carefully trace inside the sink, and even distance from the edge,
until the sink is uniform. Do this in the “Top” view, but keep you eye
on the side views.
7. Next, give the sink some thickness with the “Shell” modifier. Set
“Outer Amount” to .5 (in my world scale, which is always feet/inches,
as I do real-scale work mostly).
8. Create a small spline to define how the edge of the sink should
look. It is blocky without this. Make it a small arc, and place it
anywhere out of the way. One trick I’ll mention here is to keep your
splines in a spline “area” by creating a spline rectangle way off to
the side, and put all your splines within that area. This way they are
easy to find later.
9. Still under “Shell” “Parameters”, check “Bevel Edges” and click
“Bevel Spline:” to select your arc spline. Modify the spline to suit
your vision for the edge.
10. Create a cylinder the diameter of your drain, and at least as tall
as your sink is thick. Center it with the sink with the “Align” tool in
the X and Y axes.
11. Position the cylinder where the drain hole is needed.
12. Subtract the cylinder from the sink:
13. Select the sink. Select: Create -> Compound -> Boolean.
14. Under “Operation”, ensure “Subtraction (A-B)” is checked.
15. Click “Pick Operand B”.
16. Select our cylinder. It goes away, the sink now has a nice drain!