Planet Destruction

This week in max I tried to learn how to make the vortex tool work with meshes, i.e. planets, and what I found out was that it can't because the vortex only works with particle systems. I figured that there would be some way to make it work though because there are a seemingly endless amount of things you can create with max. What I found was the PArray particle system which can be used to copy the shape of any mesh. Then using the bind to space warps I bound the PArray to the vortex and was able to achieve whatis shown in the video above.

Space Fun

This week in 3ds max I started a new project in which I will be showing the journey of black holes though our universe. The image above shows one of the last frames of a black hole (the black sphere) consuming a galaxy of stars (the blue particles). Black holes themselves are relatively simple to make considering that there are basically nothingness, so I just used a sphere with a flat black non-reflective material. In order to add something to the scene that you can actually look at I used four super spray particle systems (the blue stars), and bound them to a vortex space warp, which makes the particles get pulled in towards the black hole.

Finished Character and Fun with Physics

In spite of the title I do not actually have a video that can go up on my blog as of today because when I went to upload for this weeks post the file size was too large. Some time next week I will compress the file and upload the video of my finished character in addition to my week 12 post.

This week I made a wrecking ball that swings by a chain into a brick wall causing it to break apart and topple over. This was achieved by using the same MassFX tool that I used to make the mirror shatter from a few weeks back.

Something new that I learned this week was how to use the cloth modifier. In the picture above, the table was set up as a collision object for a plane that had a cloth modifier applied to it.

Mesh and Bones

The first thing I did this week was make some arms for my character. Then I put some new materials on the objects in the scene so that it wasn't just purple everywhere. Using the bone tool I made a custom skeleton for my character so that I could start animating him. The actual animating part never happened because I spent the last two days of this week having some trouble with both the Physique and Skin modifiers.

Eye See You

This week I worked on designing a character, and this is what I came up with, so far. I started with a simple sphere with an eye ball texture applied to it and then I modeled an eyelid around it so that it did not look as creepy as it did. Then using the reference image above I modeled a pair of legs for my character. Next week I will either make him a four legged creature or I will model a pair of arms. Which ever I choose I will then start rigging him up for animating.

I had another little side project that I worked on at the beginning of this week, while I thought of different character ideas. I messed around with MassFX, a rigid body physics tool new to 3ds Max 2012. I create a shattering mirror effect in which a ball is thrown at a mirror. The mirror then proceds to breaks and falls to pieces and the ball bounces away.

Rigging and More

This week I learned some basic biped character rigging, which was used in the top video. The stick figure man was made in about 5 minute just as a means of having something to rig up. Then I spent some time using the Skin modifier to connect to the biped bones to the stick figure mesh. When I got that setup how I wanted it I started animating him and putting him into different poses. Finally I choose to render out the scene of him walking across a floor and then up some stairs.

The second video, of a liquid being poured into a glass cup, was a little side project of mine this week. The glass cup is a simple cylinder with the center cut out of it. The liquid was made using the super spray particle system. In order to get the liquid to interact with and fill up the cup I used the Gravity tool and several UDeflectors.

MineCastle is Finished

This week I spent my time finalizing my castle presentation. I rendered out all the videos in 3ds max and then spent some time putting it all together in Adobe Premier. This is the first of many projects, and I had an abundance of fun make it, and I am looking forward to the next one.

Terrain Modeling

Last week I remodeled my castle’s terrain in 3ds Max using a combination of the noise modifier and the soft selection tool, in the editable poly modifier. After I made the terrain I used Photoshop to make a custom texture for it. Slight additions were made to the main tower, and some trees and lamp posts were added to the scene. My last addition to the scene was a plane that i modified to look like rolling waves, and then I made a custom water texture in 3ds Max. I incorporated the use of Adobe Premier in the making of the video for this week’s post. So, unlike last week’s video this one has some still images, video, sound, and video transitions.

MineCastle

This week in Max I worked on my castle project. So far, I have made the entrance and a little bridge that stretches out to the central tower. I also spent some time texturing the castle with some bricks, stone slabs, and wooden flooring. I had started on modeling out a terrain for the castle to rest on but the program crashed on me so I was unable to present it in this weeks post, hence the hastily made cylinder currently in the scene. Over the next week I will add to the central tower and make some rooms branching off the it, and model a new terrain with some foliage scatted around it.

Strange Science

           This weeks post is of a nerve cell, and its various organelles, that I am making for an AP Biology project. I used many of the different tools that were covered in Animation class these paste four weeks. I used splines and the compound object tool, Boolean, in order to make the mitochondria (the yellow capsule). The chromatin (blue lines in the bottom picture) was made using the Loft tool. Some lights,with various intensities and colors, were also added to the scene. Finally, the newest technique as of this week is the use of poly modeling to make the nerve cell membrane.

Dinning Room Table

This week in max I mad a lovely little dinning room table. The candles and plate were mad using the Lathe modifier and I applied a chrome and a ceramic material. The table top is a simple box but the legs of it were made with splines and lofts. A super spray particle system was used to create a fire effect and a red and yellow noise material was applied to that. Finally in the video render a camera was confined to a path in order to acheive a smooth wipe around.