** NOObie's... all appz all questions **

Hi, this is a real newbie question, but if somebody
can help me out with the right terminology, I'll
know what to search for myself.

From browsing I'm familiar with the idea of a hierarchy
and bones of models, but what tells a model how to
interact with another model or a plane or whatever?
What settings determine whether or not a model figure
will pick up an object or just pass right through it?

Pretty basic stuff, I know, but I just don't know the
terminology involved. Gotta start somewhere

Thanks

Shaneo3000

 

Nothing.

In 3D when animating, it's the job of the animator to make it look like nothing is going through each other that shouldn't be. Hierarchies are just used for one object to move another object.

In 3ds Max though there are things called constraints, for instance, a LookAt constraint will make an object face another object no matter where it is. There are other constraints like that that animators use to make animating a little bit easier than just positioning objects completely manually.

 

I've seen many fan films that show shots of Coruscant or futuristic cities, all complete with building lights and spot lights. Most of them have a really cool street glow coming from below. That's what I want to know how to do. Can anybody tell me how to create a good city scene. I have no problem building the models, but texturing and lighting is something else completely. For instance, how do I make the window lights glow if I wanted to make a Coruscant night scene?

Also, what do I do to create a good depth of field and motion blur in the same scene? Like, if I wanted a ship to fly fast through a city street, I would need depth of field to show that it's a large city and motion blur to show the speed, right? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

Well, I haven't seen very many fanfilms with cities like Coruscant, and I haven't really seen any that have done them well.

It's hard to just tell you how to make a good Coruscant-like city. In the Star Wars movies they used a mixture of miniatures and CG. But a lot of the effects that they did were achieved through compositing. I would use a compositing program for the window lights and flares, the 3D programs can do those, but they don't really look all that great. Just render out a pass with just the window lights (using a self-illumination map) and then just fool with it in After Effects or whatever to add the effect. Spot lights are just that, Spot lights, I don't think that needs an explanation. And the glow from below, I would use possibly some kind of fog effect that grows less as it goes higher, or just use some lights. But I would definitely render the light from below as a separate pass and then composite it back in so you can have control over the intensity (and color if you wish).

In 3ds Max motion blur and Depth of Field is easy, just select all of the object that need motion blur, right click in 3ds Max and click Properties, then in the Motion Blur box check Image Motion Blur and set it to 0.5

Depth of Field is easy also, just go to the effects window, and add Depth of Field, it's got a tool where you can modify it without rerendering the whole frame, just setup some settings and fool around with it.

Although that's only if you are using the 3ds Max Default Scanline renderer, Mental Ray has settings for DOF and Motion Blur in the render settings. But Vray is the best at Motion Blur and Depth of Field, it's got some very easy settings and the fastest rendering time for Motion Blur and Depth of Field.

I could go into more detail, but that should push you in the right direction I think. If you are having trouble understanding these concepts then I would say you should try something easier before trying to do a model of Coruscant, because it would take a lot of work to get something that you'd like and it would be impossible for someone who isn't very experienced.

 

I think my problem might be narrow-mindedness. I never thought of doing comps. instead. I just assumed that with all the lighting options that 3d max has, the creators of the coruscant scenes would use those in some way. I never thought of using After Effects, which is probably the program I have the most background in.

Also, I'm not looking to create a Coruscant scene. I just wanted something that looked like a futuristic, kind of industrial city, and I thought it was the best example.

Thanks for the help Darth.

 

Okay, working with comps is going good, but I did have a question about the spot lights. I should have been more descriptive in my other posts, I was wondering how to create a realistic volume light effect. Like if a spot light was bouncing off of a faint fog/smog or moisture creating the light cone effect. I've tried using volume light, but every time I try, it looks like I've put a white triangle object with low opacity in front of my light. Kind of like a helicopter spot light or event lights.

 

Basically for volume lights, you need to have Far Attenuation(the light fades off the further away it gets based on your parameters). Then add the Volume Light effect to the effects section, Then just setup the settings, if the light area is too solid just turn down the density.

If you did something like that already, then I'll try to go into more detail for some good settings.

 

Thanks man, I'll give it a try.

 

I am working on a model of the Mon Calamari Bridge. I currently working on the Death Star II hologram projected from the Briefing Room's holo-table.

http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/dvd/ep6/rotj122.jpg

Here is what I am working on.

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h306/nepmarauder/DeathStar.jpg

The one and only thing I haven't been able to figure out is how to "bring" the yellow reactor shaft "out". Right now, I have the material of the shafts set to a yellow color, with 100 self-illumination, and 100 opacity. The Death Star around it is set to a crimson color, with 50 self-illumination, and 50 opacity. Both are Blinn type.

I am trying to manipulate the model so that the Death Star's opacity affects a background scene behind it, but doesn't overlay the yellow reactor shafts.

I worked on it for some time and couldn't figure it out. Do any experts here have any ideas what I could do? I assume some sort of double-render, where it would render the Death Star first and the shafts afterwards. But I'm not completely sure on how to accomplish that with only using 3DS MAX.

 

Well, I finally think I figured it out. Let me know what you guys think so far.

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h306/nepmarauder/DeathStar2.jpg

 

Nicely done!

 

Here is the finished hologram. Now it's time to get started on the Bridge.

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h306/nepmarauder/DeathStar3.jpg

 

I am new to 3ds max a little bit , I have little experience. I have a question: I can move the biped sucessfully but when i download a model from scifi3d web site i can't animate it - can anyone give me an idea? Like Darth Vader or The Trade Federation Droids.

 

What problem are you having exactly? Are you just unable to move any of the biped objects?

 

Hello mustafa911,

I'm guessing that you are having problems trying to record keyframes for biped objects. Therefore, you cannot animate you biped. As I did when I was first starting, you are probably trying to use the "key" button to record the positions. If this is so, here is your answer.

Select the biped skeleton. Click the "Motion" tab (wheel logo) in the effects window on the right side of the screen. Towards the bottom of the window, click on "Key Info". You will see a red circle, "Record" button. Use this button to record keyframes for bipeds.

So, to record a keyframe for a biped object, just click on the object or select the object from the object list. Move/twist your object to the desired spot and click the "Record" button.

Hope that helps.

 

Hi, I recently downloaded several of the models here and I'm kind of confused. I'm using 3ds max. Some of the models already had bipeds, so I could animate immediately. But I have a lot that doesn't have the bipeds. For example, the Darth Vader 3 (the one without the cape) did not have biped. I want to animate this character, so I attached the arms, head, legs to the body mesh using Edit Mesh. I was going to attach a biped, but when I rendered the character, it looked horrible. The textures were messed up. I chose not to merge the IDs when I attached each body part too.. So I'm not sure what's wrong.

Also, for General Grievous, I noticed that he had a lot of mechanical parts.. So I'm not sure how to attach a biped to animate him.

Thanks!

 

You don't want to just make all of the parts into one mesh, that won't work well, you need to apply Physique to each part, Since obviously the armor shouldn't be deforming on the model so you can just link those to the biped instead of using physique. I think General Grievous already has a biped, or at least one of them does. Otherwise you would just link the parts to the biped and make sure the joints are in the same places that the model joints are.

 

Oh okay. But I'm not sure how to do it with the whole mesh in pieces... Could you help me out a bit more? Your solution is a bit too general to follow. Could list out the steps one by one in detail? I just started playing around with 3D and I have a lot to learn!

Okay, so I create a biped, position it into Vader's body.. And then what do I do? Does each part of his body have it's own physique? So say, the helmet will have a physique with the biped head as the COM, and the eye pieces will also do the same. And the arms will have a physique with the biped arms as the COM? Or... Do I just use the "Select and Link" tool and start linking all the head meshes to the biped head.. And all the upper body meshes to the biped torsos? But then how does the physique work?

Thanks a bunch!

 

The parts that are rigid bodies (the helmet and armor parts) should just be linked to the biped part they should attach to. But for the parts that should deform then you should apply physique to each of those objects. But link them to Bip01 in physique rather than just the object they are near, that way they will be deformed by the Biped objects that are close by as well.

 

I have a problem with particles in blender:

http://img207.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sfddfaspp9.png

As you can see they are glowing, I dont know how or why but i followed [link=http://kahuna.clayton.edu/~jbrooks/blender/tutorials/volcano/]THIS[/link] tutorial as well as I could(im using a newer version of blender. Help or corretions with be fine:

http://img264.imageshack.us/my.php?image=badvolcano1bj4.png

http://img502.imageshack.us/my.php?image=badvolcano2lq7.png

http://img204.imageshack.us/my.php?image=badvolcano3xr9.png


Thanks

Laurence

 

I am having problems with the characters downloads. Most of the 3d charactors are posed with their arms and legs outwards. I have tried to adjust their limbs but when i try to rotate or move the limbs it affects the body as well. So how can i manipulate the limbs without moving the torso as well? I do kind of need a step by step guide on this as I am new to 3ds and am not entirely sure on what some of the buttons and options mean yet.

Would appreciate any help with this thanks

 

You can't just grab the arm and rotate it. Most of the time the arm is attached to the body so rotating the arm would rotate everything else too. If the character was on an animation rig (Biped or Bones) then you could rotate the arm on the rig to rotate the arm on the character, but it doesn't look like that is the case.

 

Nice, thanks. This is so much easier than my old method! I'm not finished yet, but I have another question:

When I want his arms to be by his side, they just sink into the torso. It looks funny, heh. Not sure how to fix it. I've attached some pictures so that you can see!

Regular pose:
http://img511.imageshack.us/my.php?image=48452271oi5.png

Arms by his side:
http://img263.imageshack.us/my.php?image=25620671cb7.png

Thanks again!

 

The shoulders of the biped are in the wrong place so it's pivoting wrong, you need to have the shoulder pivot in the biped lower (it needs to be in the center of his physical shoulder) then just link that shoulder armor piece to the upper arm biped object.