Max Cookie » Workflow

Alien planet environment – Part 6

a.cangelosi — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 12:00:34 +0000

Introduction

In this video for 3ds max we’ll work again at the Alien planet environment tutorial series. This time we’ll start focusing on modeling a simple space ship that we’ll be used in our animation.

What we’ll do in Part 6

In Part 6 of Alien planet environment we’ll start working at the space ship. We’ll start with simple basic modeling to obtain a rough shape to add more details step by step. We’ll model basic shape using poly modeling tools. We”ll create engines and additional details in coming parts. Actual plan is to prepare the model with a good level of details, prepare the textures, shade it, animate it moving in the Alien planet scene, then we’ll add FX layers as engine flame/energy, etc etc.

Planet death – Part 6

a.cangelosi — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 14:00:03 +0000

Introduction

In this new video for 3ds max, we’ll continue working at the Planet death series, and this time we’ll focus on background environment and a plasma energy simulation shooting the planet.

What we’ll do in Part 6

In part 6 of Planet death tutorial series, we’ll start finishing some layers to be ready for final compositing. This time we’ll prepare the animated background created using a big spherical environment mapped with a Cellular map simulating stars, and with a little self illuminated sphere that will be used to track the sun position and adding post effects. An other layer that will be created is a plasma energy ball launched by some kind of weapon on the Earth to destroy the near planet. We’ll simulate it with FumeFX using a simple source and animating its position and various parameters as the temperature and the smoke amount.

Planet death – Part 5

a.cangelosi — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 07:00:03 +0000

Introduction

In this new video for 3ds max, we’ll be back to work at the Planet death tutorial series. We’ll focus on fire line layer finalizing simulation and look development.

What we’ll do in Part 5

In Part 5 of Planet death video series, we’ll work to finalize the stuffs prepared in Part 4. We’ll tweak parameters in FumeFX trying to obtain best compromize between fire details and simulation speed, we’ll fix the rendering look using the Fire Gradient color, color usage and alpha levels. To obtain best look we’ll work a little bit on Particle Flow setup too, so at the end of this video we’ll have an other layer finished. On coming parts we’ll focus on planet mesh destruction, dust storm due to planet collapsing and some additional tweak to the energy line and the background.

Tip : FumeFX Void source

a.cangelosi — Mon, 06 Aug 2012 12:00:42 +0000

Introduction

In this video for 3ds max we’ll talk about FumeFX Void sources. It is a less known feature but it can be really useful in every daily job workflow.

What we’ll do

In this FumeFX Void sources video, we’ll take a look at Void source feature, it is really similar to any simple fluid source, but it works in an other way. It will define where you will be able to calculate the simulation, so, imagine this 3D shape, (sphere, cylinder and/or cube), it will be a container to say which voxel will be used and which will be erased and not used. You can decide shape and dimensions, you can move it around, you can say if it is active or not and more important, if the effect is inverted or not. By default it is inverted, and it means that just the voxels inside the void volume will be used, but if you like, you can change it and use it to say that all the voxels inside the void volume must be erased during the simulation. It will be able to speed up calculation and to optimize cache, it can be useful for example, to erave voxels too distant from the camera.

Tip : FumeFX Preview

a.cangelosi — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 12:00:15 +0000

Introduction

In this FumeFX Preview video for 3ds max, we’ll continue talking about the new FumeFX release giving you a sneak peak about its new preview features.

What we’ll do

In FumeFX Preview tip video, we’ll check all the new features available in FumeFX 3 related to the preview window. We’ll see how we can use it to check the fluid look, how to create preview on hard disk saving it on animation file or still frames, and we’ll take a look at the new GPU rendering capabilities giving us the possibility to see shadows and other objects in realtime.

Tip : FumeFX N-Sim

a.cangelosi — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 12:00:30 +0000

Introduction

In this video for 3ds max, we’ll continue talking about new features in FumeFX 3.0 and this time we’ll focus on N-Sim.

What we’ll do

In FumeFX N-Sim tutorial we’ll explore how to use the N-Sim feature. It will give us the possibility to use a master grid and some child grid to create bigger simulation with no need to create a big, and expensive in term of voxel space and simulation time, single grid. These grid must follow some rules as axys alignment and minimum overlap layer, but it is a new powerful way to optimize simulation workflow. Different grid properties can be sync to control part of it or all parameters directly from the master grid FumeFX panel.

Alien planet environment – Part 5

a.cangelosi — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 12:00:55 +0000

Introduction

In this video for 3ds max, we’ll continue working at the Alien planet environment series. This time we’ll focus on sky replacement and fx layers.

What we’ll do in Part 5

In Alien planet environment – Part 5 tutorial, we’ll work to add a sky to the scene, to do it, we’ll use Terragen 2 developed by Planetside. We’ll prepare a series of tutorial to explore this software really soon, but this time we’ll use it in a really simple way to prepare a volumetric sky that can replace the sky done with mental ray. We’ll see how to control the camera position and lighting, how to work on the UI just to use the features we’ll need today, and we’ll see how to add cloud layers to the atmosphere. Obviously we’ll see some features without the need to talk about it more in delth due to what we need for the alien planet scene and due to time problems. We’ll see how to render and export it on a single frame and we’ll see if it works fine in 3ds max. Then we’ll start checking how to add some smoke/dust effects to the scene using FumeFX with a simple smoke source.

Tip : FinalRender proxies

a.cangelosi — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 12:00:32 +0000

Introduction

In this new video for 3ds max we’ll talk about FinalRender proxies, and we’ll take a look at how to use it with a simple example.

What we’ll do

In FinalRender proxies video tutorial, we’ll take a look at proxy rendering technology in Cebas engine. In the past we talkes about proxies using Multiscatter and VRay, but we can do something similar using FR-Proxy object plug-in. In this video we’ll see how to create it, how to manage materials workflow, we’ll talk about visualization and animation parameters, and we’ll talk about proxies usage in general to understand how we can have benefits in our daily basis job.

Natural environment with plants – Part 3

a.cangelosi — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 12:00:50 +0000

Introduction

In this video for 3ds max we’ll continue working at the Natural environment with plants series. This time we’ll focus on plants tweakings and animation.

What we’ll do

In this final part of Natural environment with plants series, we’ll tweak the plant setup at the beginning. We’ll tune Multiscatter random distribution, fixing some errors due to curve controlling tree presence, then we’ll add a custom modified plant to the river Multiscatter setup, and we’ll work to optimize camera clipping. Before we can launch final render, we have to animate everything. So we’ll prepare a basic camera movement animating it by hand and adding a simple subtle handy camera look using noise controller. Then we’ll animate the water using the bump noise map phase parameter. At the end we’ll animate the various plants using a simple technique simulating wind using a noise modifier and a soft selection.

Tip : FumeFX Renderwarps

a.cangelosi — Mon, 09 Jul 2012 12:00:55 +0000

Introduction

In this new video for 3ds max, we’ll start talking about some features from FumeFX 3.0. This release has a lot of powerful tools, and we’ll explore it step by step, and this time we’ll check the FumeFX Renderwarps.

What we’ll do

In this 1st sneak peek video we’ll explore the new FumeFX 3.0 Renderwarps feature. It is useful to add space warps to manipulate and change the fire/smoke shape just as soon as the simulation has been calculated. In this way can “model” the fluid in any way. For example in this video, we’ll use a FFD space warp to change a flame shape and make it more similar to a simple engine burning FX.