How to Cheat in 3ds Max 2010

Book description

**How to Cheat in 3ds Max - updated for latest rev of Max (under NDA)**

Need to get results with 3ds max fast? Why take months to learn every button in 3ds max when you can create great visuals with just a few key tools? Learn to create quick yet stunning special effects, and animated characters with the fastest techniques possible. Need convincing grass, trees, water, shadows? You can use the memory-hogging methods that choke your display and take forever to render, or you can get it done bing-bang with this book. When you need an animated character you can spend days fiddling with polygons, or you can use this book to put it together in minutes and get the entire project done in a day. How to Cheat in 3ds max includes a host of time-saving techniques as well as little-known tools that will make you look like an expert in no time flat. This book is for busy professionals who need to get it done right, but also need it done fast.

This rev of the book will have higher-end cheats (for Intermediate users) geared towards greater realism in images, and game-centered cheats.

The DVD includes scene files and bitmaps used to illustrate the cheats, also music files, organizational samples, and instructional Camtasia movies of Michele where Michele showing some of the trickier techniques.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half Title
  3. Full Title
  4. Copyright
  5. Contents
  6. How to cheat, and why
  7. Acknowledgments
  8. How to use this book
  9. Introduction
    1. Making a scene
    2. A selection of selections
    3. Zoom, pan, display
    4. Organizing objects
    5. Transforms and coordinates
    6. Playtime: Roger’s top ten reasons
    7. Interlude: Organizing objects: a matter of choice
  10. 1 Modeling
    1. Modeling tools
    2. Reference images
    3. Virtual studio
    4. 15-minute building
    5. Modeling around maps
    6. Modeling from a plan
    7. Curvy curtain
    8. BYO weapon
    9. Modeling a gorge
    10. Modeling a character
    11. Custom engraving
    12. Importing models
    13. Interlude: How to make a mess with modeling
    14. Playtime: Secrets of the Spline
  11. 2 Materials and mapping
    1. Material Editor basics
    2. Mapping coordinates
    3. Preparing textures
    4. Applying a decal
    5. People, trees, and cars
    6. Multiple maps
    7. Background maps
    8. Procedurally speaking
    9. Gradual mix
    10. Unwrapping the mapping
    11. Normal mapping
    12. Mapping a character
    13. Basic Mental Ray materials
    14. Custom Mental Ray materials
    15. Interlude: Lumps, bumps, and dainty curly stuff
  12. 3 Lighting
    1. 1–2–3 lighting
    2. Exterior lighting
    3. Interior lighting
    4. Bright sunshiny day
    5. Space scenes
    6. Mental Ray lighting
    7. Good lighting made better
    8. Daylight savings time
    9. Interlude: How to waste time with lighting
  13. 4 Shadows
    1. Pick your shadows
    2. Shadow timesavers
    3. Where’s the shadow?
    4. Troubleshooting shadows
    5. Interlude: Shadow and wireframe presentation
  14. 5 Reflections
    1. Reflecting on reflections
    2. Bling
    3. Mirror, mirror
    4. Interlude: Dude, where’s my reflection?
  15. 6 Glass
    1. Exterior daytime windows
    2. Interior daytime windows
    3. Nighttime and dusk
    4. Glass bottle
    5. Interlude: Fun with physics
  16. 7 Animation
    1. Animation 101
    2. Spinning your gears
    3. Following a path
    4. Look-a-here
    5. Jumping beans
    6. Linktopia
    7. Linking to multiple objects
    8. Chains
    9. Cracks in a surface
  17. 8 Character animation
    1. Biped workflow
    2. Biped 101
    3. Biped fitting
    4. Skinning
    5. Walking in your footsteps
    6. Catch a wave
    7. The alternative Biped
    8. Bouncing and flexing
    9. Interlude: The life of Biped
  18. 9 Rendering
    1. Rendering basics
    2. Mental Ray rendering
    3. Depth of field
    4. A shift of perspective
    5. ActiveShade
    6. Rendering large images
    7. Interlude: What is Mental Ray, anyway?
  19. 10 Logo treatments
    1. The classics
    2. Making it 3D
    3. Perspective matching
    4. Cardboard cutouts
    5. Flying fragments
    6. Light through holes
    7. Text around a sphere
    8. Unfolding a sphere
    9. Interlude: Making it web-friendly
  20. 11 Parameter wiring
    1. Wiring 101
    2. Follow me
    3. Telling time
    4. Interlude: Spinning wheels
  21. 12 Special effects
    1. Cracks in a surface
    2. Rotoscoping
    3. Raindrops
    4. Interlude: Morphing
  22. Appendix
    1. Challenges
    2. CD files
  23. Index

Product information

  • Title: How to Cheat in 3ds Max 2010
  • Author(s): Michele Bousquet
  • Release date: September 2012
  • Publisher(s): Focal Press
  • ISBN: 9781136137495