3D Tips BLOG: Tutorials and Workflows

3d masters

2009-11-09T18:09:00.002+02:00

Here are one of my favourites:

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/inspired_by_nature

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/soa_lee_3d_illustrator

http://maxwellrender.com/videos/advertising_videos/advert02.php

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/toma_temuejin_mueller

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/publications_by_alex_roman

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/massimo_righi_beautiful_things

http://area.autodesk.com/inhouse/bts/steven_stahlberg

MaxwellRender - and Cuda toughts

2009-11-07T17:23:00.004+02:00

Hello, I was just wondering if MaxwellRender can implement on Cuda architecture or maybe in fermi, also to be extended with openCl and cuda gpu languages. Soon we will have real time unbiased renderer accelerated with 512 Cuda's : NVidia fermi

See this but image it will be in real or at least managed per frame time: MaxwellRender Video gallery

What will be the answer of Mental Images - maybe they will point forces on path tracing to concurrent the new leader. Only the future will show.

Modeller must have - basics for organic modeling

2009-10-15T18:33:00.001+02:00

Here is small compilation of forum topics and tutorials that I've collected and find crucial for modeling process..

If you're new to organic modeling this is for you. Most of tuts are not for specific program or silo so they can be used in every software. Maya, Max, modo, zbrush etc.

http://www.mininova.org/tor/3046756

Making custom shader in MentalRay

2007-07-07T15:36:00.001+02:00

You have a big complicated shader in Mental Ray and you want to shrink it in one simple with few parameters for control and maybe to share it with other people in internet?
Your answer is Phenomenon shader. Here is how to make it happen.
First analyze your shader and decide what parameters you want to keep for configuration in the new shader.
Making part:
1. Window/Rendering editors/Hyper shade
2. Create/Create render node/Mental Ray/Miscellaneous/Mental Ray Phenomenon
3. Click on the Mental Ray Phenomenon shader and open Attribute editor
Here you have three main parts:
-Interface:Determine which attributes the user can see and configure in new shader
(Color, Transparency... from older shader. You can rename it as you want)
-Root:The base shader from witch Phenomenon start to collapse down.
(Say top of the shader you made if you want all to be included)
-Options: Determine what kind of shader will be the newly created.(Lens shader, Photon, Material shader...)
4. Make the Root connection: Drag (with middle mouse click) the old shader in Hyper shade to the Phenomenon shader and click Other. This will open connection editor. In the Left display (not phenomenon other shader) switch on Show hidden. This will show more attributes and one of it is Message. Click on it (it will became italic) and then click on the Root attribute in the phenomenon to make the connection. Don't worry that this will not show highlighted you have to watch down into script editor for: "// Result: Connected ...." This is indication for working.
You should see the connection in the phenomenon attributes editor.
5. Make Interface connections: So after decision which attributes to left. You should go to the node that has it for examples if you want to have a control over an Intensity of light click find your Light Shape shader with controls of color and intensity. Then Drag Mental Ray Phenomenon in hyper shade to this particular node to let the shade leech the attributes. It will again open attribute editor this time connect interface with attribute you want to leech you can drag it with MMB to the attribute editor if you don't know the name of the attribute repeat for all thinks you want to keep. After you've done you will see the parameters inside the interface tab of the Phenomenon.
6. Rename the name of the Phenomenon. Instead mentalrayPhenomenon1 type something related because this will be the name of the new shader. Rename also attributes how you want it to be. For color you may choose skin or what is related...
7. Configure Options. Choose version. If you don't use any new features or it is simple shader leave it to 1 to be more compatible. Choose what type of shader you want to be into Apply flags. Say material if your shader is material, light if it is light etc... And it will show into material swatch of the mental ray materials.
8. Export the new Phenomenon shader out from Maya:
-Select your Phenomenon shader in hyper shade.
-File/Export all/Option box
-In General Options/File type/Mental Ray
-If you don't want to further adjust the material choose binary for file format. Choose ASCII. And we will have to make so choose ASCII anyway.
-Go down switch: Export selected items only
-Predefined export filters: Factory shaders, Phenomenizers
-Export all
-Choose where Maya/Mental ray/include folder is located mine is C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Maya8.5\mental ray\include. And name it the same as the shader name.
9. Go to directory and find your shader.mi file
10. Open it. Choose Select program from a list. Choose WordPad and always use selected program to open... Checkbox then Ok

Editing Part of the file

11. Bring back in Maya the shader:
-Window/Rendering Editors/mental ray/Shader Manager
-Check Loaded near your name of material. If you don't see it you have chosen different directory it is ok but you must have to configure maya.rayrc found in Maya\mental ray folder to include the shader.
-You will see bunch of errors we will fix depend on which file type you choose Binary or ASCII they are different.
-First you must declare the shader above everything on the second line because it is a bug it will start phrasing on 2nd line of script:
declare shader
"NewMaterialShader" ( )
end declare

-You should make then unique Id number:
declare shader
"NewMaterialShader" ( )
#: nodeid 125097
end declare
-and below to the procedure
Apply material
#: nodeid 125975
end declare

-Just type a random number for ID mine is 125975. Then save and reload the shader from shader manager.
-You will have couple more errors for the xpm these are for the icons in hyper shade.
But this you can make it later it is just for visual interface.
12. Open hyper shade find your new material and assign it into an object. Then render it.
You will see that nothing is happened. Open the outliner and see message, that Mental Ray aborts the render because of an error. It is undeclared function to the shader.
This is because Maya don’t know where to find the new shader we made.
13. Open Maya.rayrc and have to specify directory in which Maya to look for the shader.
Before echo type:
mi "{MAYABASE}/include/NewMaterial.mi"
-Save

-Then restart Maya. Ignore the first warning about .dll file. If you have more warnings about attributes and cannot creating it. Maybe they are scalar which is not supported by Mental Ray. Just remove it and place color
declare phenomenon
color "mentalrayPhenomenon1" (
scalar "transparency",
scalar "shiny",
scalar "edge_color_bias"
)
from

to

-Reload the shader
And VOALA you are ready.

You may make .dll about the shader and place it in your maya/mentalray/lib folder also .mel in your My documents\maya\X.X(Version of Maya)\scripts folder and icons .xpm in your My documents\maya\X.X\prefs/icons folder, .fti in your maya/icons folder

Optimize and boost Maya or 3ds Max performance

2007-07-04T06:41:00.000+02:00

How to optimize and boost Maya or 3ds Max performance?
When I started tutorial about the Interior Modeling in Maya I soon realized that I have to speed up my computer and optimize/configure Maya settings to work well with big scenes. So here's some tips about boost your 3d Software.

Three are the things that control most your 3d user experience (CPU, Memory and Graphics Card) and they all have a thumb of rule "The more expensive they get higher performance they give." - Marketing rule and in some cases it is true. But not anyone has a big company for this investment. Say you are a home user (student) what should you do? You have to find compromise variant to suits your needs but it is not so expensive. Ok let’s say you buy something for gaming purposes and you have mine configuration just for example:
AMD Sempron 2800+ X86 model 8 Stepping 1 works on 2200 MHz
Main board АGP Ashrock K7S8X
Video (Graphics) Card Nvidia GeForce FX 5200
Win XP pro Service pack 2
Total phy memory 767.48MB
Free phy memory 346.91Mb
Max page file 1.83
RAM (Memory) 768MB
First is CPU so you have a very low class CPU what should you do? First thing is overclocking it you may say yes but be careful. When I bought it before 2 years first thing to do was to find nice info about clocking. There are many ways to do it first with hardware (not recommended if you don't know what you are doing or if this computer has your last money from a bank account). So the second is by something called BIOS (control panel of the computer). I've done this and set it to 166 frequencies. So I started Maya try renders but it crushes with no warning just halt. I think maybe this was from version or drivers so I wait for newer versions and make some adjustments but still the same problem. And guess what after one year it still crushes my renders so I realized finally that was this. And I gave the default BIOS options with 100 frequencies and everything worked fine. When realizing this I go to BIOS again and do small boost and check the render and now it works realy nice at 150 frequencies so it is 2200+ MHz not real. The last is over clocking by software and check performances. Well I've don't do this because they ware a lot of advertisement in the software also wanted to pay and etc. Just check my CPU performance with ctrl + alt + Del. Also in Process sections i set priority to below normal to the render (say Mayabatch.exe) and maybe sometimes Maya so if I want to watch a movie or something else you can do it with render turned on cool ;-). The problem was that CPU turns on its prevent functions from destroy and halts or reboots the system. So I wanted a control all of this. I want a program that checks the CPU process for me and when it reaches 80-90% of using to run a blank process or something and to hold the windows and CPU wont use its functions so when a program finish the windows won't crash but continues. I found one but it was with payment (Frost Shield I think was the name). If you know any software for free like this tell me please.
Ok about the memory they are a lot of things. First don't use more than one software to boost performance (just type Ram in download.com). I personally don't use it at all or use one and uninstall it later. Second if you have different memories check in internet are they matching each other if not just use one of it. If you have blue screen it will be caused in most cases by memory crush.

So what we can do to boost memory? Few things actually. First go to Control panel/System/Advanced. Then in Performance/Settings/Advanced/Virtual Memory/Change go to custom size and make this file as bigger as you can. This Virtual memory is when your computer run out of Physical (hardware) memory it makes files in your hard drive is this space you have make and it wont crush also it can be used for operations like copy etc...
Second go to Control panel/System/Advanced/Start up and Recovery. Go to Edit it will open boot.ini found in your local hard disk directory where windows is installed so mine is c:\boot.ini. You can also edit it from there. So it is very simple with new just go and use you extra that Maya gives it to you for free it is "/3GB" you should. Here is mine:

[boot loader]
timeout=16
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /3GB /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
If you want you can write debugging information. Mine is to Small memory dump.
Reference:
www.microsoft.com memory improve

Windows XP SP1 may have problems starting if /3GB is used. See Microsoft knowledgebase article: 328269

Memory improving for Windows

Maya has its own configurations for boost too.
Go to Maya help and read "Get the most out of Maya" to speed your Maya. Set your Undo in Preferences to Finite say 100 in the queue size. If you are using mental ray go to Rendering tab. Set Render/Render current frame/ option box and set your memory or just do automatic. Calculate will use less memory. Do the same in Batch Render option box. You can also do it by going to the Outliner/Uncheck Show DAG objects only and find/ Mental Ray Globals/Memory and Performance settings. Memory limits let say i have 768 i set it to 700mb For very big scenes set the acceleration method to large bsp to prevent mental ray of crushing. It is bit slower but... And last but not least. Shading/Interactive shading option box and choose Bounding Box. So when the objects are still they will be shaded but when you move or manipulate it they will be bounding boxes very useful.

Ok the last thing that doesn't reflect rendering time just the preview viewport performance is Graphics Card. Mine as you see is very low game class - Video (Graphics) Card Nvidiq GeForce FX 5200. So what we can do about it. Well a few things. First was the over clock but why to over clock it when you can use different driver for professional card and then over clock this. So this is what to do if you want your game class Nvidia video card to concentrate the performance in 3d software like Quadro. It won't be exactly the same as Quadro but still... See this web site:
NVWorld.ru SoftMod Quadro
After this go to Riva tuner and in the second panel: Force Ware detected go to customize Overclocking. Enable and move the clock into the end of the safety dark blue zone. If you want you can do it more but I'm scared student so doesn’t want to crush my system... Next go to Control panel/ Nvidia control panel/3d settings/Adjust image settings with preview/Use advanced 3d image settings/Take me there and choose Maya into Global Presets and then Apply. If you're using Max (get MAXtremeD3D) or AutoCAD (get Power Draft) from the Nvida web site you can go and see also other software from there. These are highly optimized for these software drivers. Speeds up like 50% of your performance. For Windows it is very nice to do full scandisk and disk defragment + clean up registry and spyware/viruses once in a while. Also I recommend to have say a little hard disk 20gb with Maya and windows only for rendering and other with all the stuff but not partitions different hard if you use partitions just install two windows and use one for everyday basis other for rendering... Use start/run/msconfig to and disable services and startup you don’t want you can check first hide all Microsoft services then get rid of some of them also. Use Control panel/Administrative Tools/Services and also stop it for run in background mode.

Ok this is all for now. If you have advises give it to me I will share it here I want to type more for 3ds max and ATI graphics but I won't use it at the moment so if anyone knows something....
For more info see also these great resources:
GPU Overclocking
Guru3d overclock resource

Interior Modeling in Maya

2007-06-26T08:13:00.000+02:00

Visualizations became big part of 3d. So I decided to make a few posts about making the interior room from modeling to rendering. This first will be modeling part.

There are a lot of methods to make this and you can use also reference images Simply Maya tutorial about the image planes and Digital Tutors tutorial about the image planes ((I found a easy way to make thinks exact in Photoshop just make new file with twice width and exact height of one picture move it over file then move second near. Show rulers in some key points of your image say front view than see side view and find this spots scale with free transform to match then crop images with same width and height and save it. You can adjust this also in image plane options in Maya but this is my preferred method. If you mess up this your project will not meet the requirements)) (photographs, drawings, sketches) or dwg drawings from AutoCAD the process is similar. You just have to be careful about the measurements. So two types of methods: for production, or hobby. Depend on witch kind you may be precise or not. So I choose to make my room but to fill it with fancy interior models so it will not be exact just a dream house of me :-).

Let’s begin.
BASE MESH

1. Open Maya

2. File/Project/New
Name the project, Choose location, and then click Use Defaults below, Accept

3. File/Save scene as
It should point in your project directory you choose above
Choose file name and Save

4. Window/Settings and Preferences/Preferences
Go to Settings tab. Choose you’re working units. In this case I choose cm and degrees.

5. Display/ Grid [] (option box)
Here in the attributes of grid you can choose the size and the intersections of the grid very useful. My settings are Length and Width 500 Units because I am on cm it will be 500 cm(5m) in one side and 5m in other so sum of it I will have big square with 10x10m. Grid lines every 100 units so I will have 100cm(1m) line then do black(darker color) for this line. And last but not less important Subdivisions 10 so now I will have every 10cm line so 10lines will make 1m choose lighter gray for this line color. (If you mess up the scale just select all. Group it, center pivot and scale it according the grid.)

6. Ok if we see that some of grid is intersecting and we see part of it. Just go View/Camera Attribute editor. In Camera attributes change Near Clip Plane to 0.001 and Far Clip Plane 10000.000 not too much because it will slow down rendering just to see all the scene.

7. Create/ Polygon primitives/ Cube (for overall shape)
Place it on the grid don't have to be exact you can move it later.
Go to Chanel box this is found the last button on right or just press twice ctrl+a.
In INPUTS/PolyCube1 below the Shapes put your Width, Height, and Depth.
Go to side view and move the cube up to the origin so it lays on the grid.

8. You have to be in polygon tab Normal’s/Reverse (this will fix the normal’s (lines showing with way is up located orthogonal on the every face because it has two sides and you could render both but it is more expensive for render time))

9. Above we fixed the render but we have to fix our preview too so select cube then press control+a (bring in attribute editor). Render Stats/Uncheck Double sided and maybe it is reversed the preview if not check opposite. So now we see only the faces which have normal’s facing to the camera (us).

10. Now if we ready with initial set up let’s delete our creation history so it will make manipulations cleaner and faster but we then can't change the values in INPUTS field. We will put the button on our shelf to get access to this tool more easily because we will use it a lot. Hold Control+shift then go to Edit/Delete by Type/History. Ok we now have the button just click on it with cube selected once to actually do the action.

11. If you want some hallway or garden now it is time to build it.
Duplicate the box and scale it up in Z and X. Then you can get rid of the faces you don't need in the duplicated box and left with just the walls for the hallway.

12. We will add the resolution for the walls and we don't want it to be in the ceiling and in the floor. So select up and down face of the cube we've made. And Do Mesh/Extract.

13. Name it properly. Scale the ceiling to reach the hallway. And turn the double sided in the Render stats of attribute editor of the ceiling so we don't see it select it and control+h to hide it.

Scale the floor also. If you have a lot of resolution in just one of walls you can extract it too.

14. Delete history

ADDING RESOLUTION

15. Make a cube and scale it and use it as templates for the door move it in the position of the door.
Duplicate it and move it for every door in the room. Duplicate it and scale it down and use it for the window also.

16. Make resolution with insert edge loop tool. Control+shift + Edit Mesh/Insert Edge Loop Tool make it on the shelf. Then click on the icon. Click to make an edge and make an outline of the door and window template see picture. Then delete unduly faces.

17. Use primitives to make steps for the doors if you want you can even try cloth or fur for them. You can use Cut faces tool, to make resolution for deleting the primitive in the exact place.

18. We have to fake reality and cg it perfect mathematical reality is not so we will use tricks. First make "trim" piece from the primitive like cube add some subdiv level 3 maybe use insert edge loop for little bit detail and model it vertices to shape you want delete the unused faces so you have this on picture. Then scale it and place around the room where floor and ceiling meets walls also in the hallway. Second we will use tool called bevel later on to smooth out a little bit the perfect crisp edges of 3d.

Refining the Windows

19. Select/Border edge tool and select our outline of window. Extrude edges out a little bit to simulate thickness of the wall. Do the same for the door.

20. Make torus or pipe polygon primitive. In the Inputs lower down Section radius 0.2,Twis 45, Subdivision Axis 4, Subdivision Height 4 for the torus, Height 2, Thickness 0,4 Subdivision Axis 4 , Subdivision Height 1, Subdivision Caps 0 for the pipe. Say we use pipe rotate y -45 then position it in your window and scale it. This is used for the frame of the windows. After you've cover up or down portion just go to vertex mode and move vertices down or up accordingly to make things nice. Duplicate and make another frame scaled down to hold the window.

Make a plane polygon primitive and position it to the window then go to hypershade and make blinn material and bump up the little transparency setting of the blinn. Assign material to the window plane and you can see though it Voala ;-).

You can make also a persienne. It is very easy make a simple cube scale it down and wide. Place it up of the window rotate it a little bit this will be your reference. Then do duplicate special [] . In the options just change translates in Y -6 in my case so each copy will be down with 6 units from above. And choose number of copies. You will do it couple of times but when you're satisfied just rotate and voala because it parent every one will rotate just like a real persienne.

You could add additional geometry (handle/other)to the window with insert edge loop tool and extrude found on edit mesh. Improvise. Make cylinder polygonal primitive increase subdivisions along the height like 4. And Move vertices to reshape it.

You can make it Subdivision shape (ctrl+shift to add to the shelf) Modify/Convert/Polygon to Subdiv (But be careful your mesh has to be all in quads(faces with 4 vertices no tries(face with 3 vert) no N-gons(face with more then four vertices)) you can do this by using split polygon tool and delete edge/vertex (for clean delete(because otherwise you will be left with 2 vertex if you delete an edge) found in Edit mesh toolbar). When you convert it press 3 to visualize with higher mesh. You can go back and for if you place Modify/Convert/Subdiv to polygons (but it options has to be Tessellation method: Vertices, level 0) button of your shelf. It is fast way for modeling the subdiv surface. Also if you want to keep detail like edge you can go and use insert edge loop tool and move the edge near to the other and then again on the other side or offset edge loop tool and to make two edges accordingly. This will make edge sharper and if you convert it will keep the detail. The sharpness depends of how close are the edges together. For soft detail you can use bevel it will duplicate the edge average it with the near one and scale it a little bit. In subdivision there is tool called Crease found in surfaces tab/ Subdiv surfaces, they are two types partial (little softer) and full (hard) detail on the edge or vertex. There is third method it is called polygon proxy mode. It is the same as the subdivs but it is on polygonal object. Just smooth object controlled by the low division’s cage. It is nice because uses subdiv functionality (which is smoothness of nurbs + partial detailing of poly) but also more fast method for editing. The proxy is found in the Polygon menu. There is tool called Crease Proxy Edge tool. It is nice because you use slider to point how much of detail you want to keep/sharpen. Ohm lets beck sorry for the little improvisation ;-).

19. Adding a bevel wherever you want. You want to have beveled edges a little but on every surface because there're no sharp edges in the world ;). So let’s start with windows.

Clean up your meshes, history, go to outliner in Window and name everything group it and place the pivot point where you want(with insert key then click again insert) or center it in Modify/Center Pivot, Freeze transformations if you want to.

20. Refining the door. We have a wall depth from the last extrusion we have also the frame from the window so now we just have to duplicate the frame. Then click Shift+p to unapparent and go out of the window group. You can make the door subdiv surface but there things to make a note if you do that. You have to make two edge loops in each corner to hold the shape.

Then you can make a handle. With insert edge loop tool and extrude and you know now how to keep the shape and you can do a small part from a primitive or copy one from the windows... Copy your plane glass from one window and move it into position. Add another edge around the door to hold the position a little bit. Select all parts of the door. Group it into one piece called door. Center the pivot. And move it to the base of the door so we can rotate from there.

So now we have a basic shape for the room let's begin to put some stuff in it.

21. Begin with box for the frame scarp scale it and place it where you want. Then with insert edge loop tool make a divisions for the frame and for the open space then extrude inward faces almost to the other face and there we go we have a nice framework where we can put our stuff. When you are adding resolution be careful to be almost the same width and when it is in the straight piece it is ok to bump it a little bet so don’t worry if you not deform it and also if it is not curved. Add bevels. Attention: If you bevel outer edge you have no problem but if you bevel inner edge you will get one tri and one n-Gon (5vertx). You could fix it with split polygon tool this is when you export it to special render or into game intdusty. And draw an edge and delete other so refining the topology.

Modeling a sofa.
Grab all and add it to the layer and turn it off.

Continues...

Subsurface Scattering human skin shading on Maxwell

2007-06-25T10:31:00.000+02:00

Shot at 2007-07-06
Ok guys. Because of the delay with displacement maps in Zbrush I want to point your vision on other topic "Physical Real human skin shading on Maxwell render"

Last days I found a lot of information about this and very useful so i get some of Gnomon Free tutorials section :Gnomon Skin Shading with Mental Ray. So I watch it then I found the shaders in Maxwell Materials site:skin material from which i take the base texture and human skin material. So I combined it a little of all and get the colors from my skin (still has to be touched but i wanted to show you what I came up with).
Lets begin. First a little test with Maxwell attributes:

Then I made a mental ray shader from gnomon and want to transfer it into Maxwell material. So see the relations between materials attributes+sss: Maya attributes and Expertrating.com: Maya attributes and Maxwell:Material Definitions and Arroway Textures. So now we have the basics we can start:
1. Create Maxwell Material
2. We will have 5 layers for now 3 for skin and 2 for specular (1st for overall specular, 2nd for what i call wet spots (like lips) or if we have wet body out of water.
3. HERE IT IS:
*Epidermal level
*Sub dermal level
*Back scatter color
*specular
*specular second (wet spot)
Ok for start I will show you some test renderings you can all do this with this shader I will provide for download below:

4.Here are the attribute settings for every layer:

4. Here is the final composition for now. Hope you like it!!!

Download Maya scene here for Maxwell render
Download Maya scene here for Mental ray render(You have to install Mix20layer to work this script is in zip file. Many thanks to creator:Jan Sandström here is Jan Sandström website)
Last version for now with real settings:

Here is fine tunned version for Maxwell render human skin shader

You have to wait 30sec before downloading because it is free file hosting.
AND FINALLY THE MAXWELL STUDIO FILE WITH HAND MODEL AND SHADER FOR ALL NON MAYA USERS:Download Human Skin shader
Last settings for now:

PS: This is just a base shader so you can change colors and attributes to suit your needs. ATTENTION: If your color map is too bright color correct it in Photoshop if not just break connection with Transparency of the first layer: Epidermal level and make it dark color or none because your object otherwise will become transparent not only scatter object. Just darken the transparent values also you can play with sss values because every scene/object is different so is the scale of it. I wanted to place this shader in Maxwell materials site but they have strict rules to use only their scene and I can't use it with Maya. And I wanted Maya for the special sampler info node which attribute facing ratio gets different data points depend of the surface direction on the camera and you can then use it for illumination for Fresnel effects like car paint. Every one texture is the same for now just for testing purposes but I tend to type in all notes section in Maya which texture has to be where so see scene file. You can do a lot of thinks with this shader. Skin creatures, humans, make different uses of it Is free license so if anyone want to develop it further please be my guest it suits my needs for now. Post you comments, critiques below. Or in my mail: sinmania@abv.bg also if you do a research in any 3d sphere I will be glad to help you or give you privilege to post in this blog.

Resources

2007-06-22T22:35:00.001+02:00

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2007-06-22T19:33:00.000+02:00

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Zbrush 3 Maya 8.5 Maxwell render 1.5 workflow dislpacement

Subsurface Scattering human skin shading on Maxwell Render

Zbrush 3 - Maya 8.5 - Maxwell render 1.5 workflow

2007-06-05T06:58:00.000+02:00

Hi guys. These days I try to learn about my exams but this topic is very interesting so I wanted to discus it. Also I've pointed some workarounds with displacement and normal map exporting from Zbrush.

I. We will start with Maya simple object like poly cube. Using polygon tools for modeling: extrude, split polygon tool and etc.. found on Edit Mesh submenu in Polygons menu. Make a base mesh if you like you can do it even In Zbrush with Zspheres with MakePolyMesh3d or just use the new Rapid option with already nice sphere in edit mode and most used tools for sculpting (even you can use edge loops, creases) provided for you from Pixologic .

Ok after we’ve done the base mesh we will check our uv’s so we can go different ways here. To use our default mapping methods(spherical, automatic etc. then use UV texture editor you can do a finer adjustments with cut, saw, move uv’s) found in “create UV’s” subpanel or by downloading a plugins from highend3d.com for layout UV’s even if you plan to do your uv’s using Zbrush it is also a possible way.
So now we will do File/Export selection. With ObjExport ( .obj file format) we will choose a directory and name it something_lowpoly leave other options default state. If you have morph objects/versions like different facial expressions or blendshapes of your model you should export them also in separate obj files.

II. Ok go beck now in Zbrush. Go Document/Double to have a little more room to work. Then Tool/Import and import your obj. file. Then you click and drag. After that it is important to click Edit so you will not lose the 3d information. Then Alt+LMBclick around your model to center the character all the movements in Zbrush are with Alt+ mouse click (LMB, RMB, middle mouse button). Go to texture and check your UV’s with uv to texture.. After we see it we can get rid of it with click on texture and choose texture off and then if we aren't happy from this txt... and want new placement do: AUVTiles- Adaptive UV tiles to make a nice layout texture in Zbrush with even uvs.

If you have make uvs from maya you can skip this but if you don't you can use the methods from Zbrush - we will use AUVtiles. We should choose to flip uv here in zbrush or in Maya because the programs mess with texture direction. Create a texture if you don’t have (texture/set res width, height 2048, new). Do Morph Target/StoreMT to save your low res model for later use. Then do geometry/divide 4-7 times to get the smoother mesh. If you made the base with Zspheres you start from this dividing. So now we can use Zbrush capabilities to make details first rough and smooth (divide) edit smooth edit etc..

You can paint texture if you like with colorize on texture panel and use Projection master (Turn off Colors and fade, on Deformation and Normal) found in Zplugin (also there are new tools like ZProject Brush that are amazing Tutorial:ZProject_Texturing, Material Capture function or even if you like to paint Tutorial:_Making_a_Head).

Now is time to use your morph targets (that are with the same Uv’s and vertex number) if you want. So just lower down your sDiv do minimum =0 or Lower res button and then do tool import again but this time choose your morph target you will see that the details will be repaint even with new facial expression if you don’t continue. For creating the displacement you can get
DISPLACEMENT EXPORTER from Pixologic site (or not ;). Lower your sdivisions to minimum in geometry and switch it with your saved Morph target (Morph target/Switch) =>better than making brain new with Cage button if you not stored one with morph. If you go from another application like maya you can use your older lower res model exported obj before just import it.Use Zplugin/Max map size 2048 at least careful higher maps-big waiting and make a smoother detail, lower-make lack of detail so it is tricky, DpSubPix 2-4 –higher more time wait, Export options- there is a quick codes for all settings so here is one DE-HAEK-EAEAEA-d32 with d32 on. Here also is flip setting in Zbrush. Click close and Create All. Ok I’ve tried this method but it won’t work in Zbursh 3 for me it work in Zbrush 2 I think all plugins from Zbrush 2 wont work to Zbrush 3 so. Here it is the secret first export tool in obj from Zbrush 3 and import it In Zbrush 2 do the same up and it works and makes the tiff image. The second way is mixed uses this plugin but it works …. So here it is with lower mesh go to tool Displacement/DPSubPix 2-4, DPRes 2048 and Creat DispMap then wait in alpha select your new created alpha and then click Dexporter, DEoptions are the same as above in name include alpha_depth_factor located below in the menu alpha for ease or type it down in notepad. You can also save with Export option but only on low range file format. Del higher and export your lower mesh to obj.

Making Look of Image for Reference in Zbrush if you want

1. Document: Set to 2048 x 2048
2. Document: Resize
3. Draw your object on the canvas
4. Press “T” to enter edit mode
5. Position it to best reflect the detail of your model or the area of interest
6. Materials: select a fast shader
7. Increase the resolution to the highest level.
8. Press “T” to exit edit mode
9. Draw: Press Perspective (do not hold shift down while pressing perspective)
10. Draw: Distortion: set to 18
11. Press “W” to enter Gyro mode
12. Press “Q” to drop it to canvas
13. Color: set to black
14. Document: Press Back (makes the back of canvas black)
15. Light: Turn off the light to the right.
16. Light: Remove all ambient from remaining light
17. Light: Position for best viewing of displacement
18. Render: Press Shadow
19. Render: Press Best
20. Press AAHalf on right of canvas to anti-alias the image
21. Document: Save As to save a Zbrush document for later adjustments
22. Document: Export as TIFF (This will be used to compare against the Rendered version)
23. Keep a note of how many polys your model was at it highest resolution.

Another method for preview and edit your disp map in Zbrush:

1. Sdiv 5 times your lower res
2. Select your alpha and click Make Tx
3. Clear your texture to white color
4. Turn off quick edit mode
5. Display properties/Dsmooth 1 at least, Dres 6
6. Displacement/mode, intensity (get from alpha/Alpha Depth Factor)
7. Select your alpha and click Make Tx again
8. Texture/crop and fill
9. Darker (negative inward), lighter (positive outward) displacement
10. Some programs require adjusting of maps some two displacement maps so:
11. Alpha (Alpha adjust curve is the place) they’re presets in Zbrush 2 folder/Zcurves simply load them and export with Ep option on found near the export button. Most used positiveDisplacement, NegativeDisplacement.ZCV
If you don’t have Zbrush 2 here you can download the scripts http://files-upload.com/272075/Zbrush2scripts.zip.html
12. Make Modified alpha, Make tx, Crop and Fill to view it.

ADJUSTING YOUR DISP MAP IN PHOTOSHOP

1. Make sure that you have Color Management OFF – (Edit/ Color Setting)
2. Convert your image to 16 bit, RGB
2.1 Do Autocontrast for normal map, for bump do the same steps but in zbrush level 3 subd of the model and without this auto contrast.
3. Save out with separate name

III It is time for Maya.

One way is to export the two obj. low and high poly with details and imported in maya or to use already created disp high poly model and make a low poly transfer which is very useful for games or slow computers. With option on importing obj: Create multiple objects=false, then assign lambert or other material to low poly do 2 layer one for low one for high and then do on Rendering tab Lighting/Shading/Transfer maps… Pick Add Selected to target meshes -a low poly object and pick add selected to source meshes high poly object and choose normal to Output maps because Maxwell doesn’t support Displacement maps yet. Then choose a file format like Tif, object space in map space, assigned shader and choose maya common output Map width,height=2048 at least. Transfer in object space, sampling quality high (8x8) fill texture seams 3 and then Bake and close. Then you can use this to other renderers like a normal map. This all can happen without using the displacement maps created in Zbrush. Use Maxwell render to render it.

Other is to Import the new cage OBJ file that you exported from Zbrush.
Convert it to Sub-D, or poly smooth it twice.
New feature of Maxwell is to implement the materials of other renderers so you don’t have to make new materials and assign them but if you want you just do assign new material: Maxwell material. Just click on the checker board near the bump texture on attribute editor. Choose file, locate your displ map and go beck turn on Use Bump texture as Normal map. Well you can export normal maps from Zbrush with Zmapper script but it won’t work yet for Zbrush 3 so here is an alternative Post about normal maps in ZbrushCentral, and also make them in maya with above method.

So what is the difference –disp maps –displace material, normal and bump illuminate differently and create illusion of displace but normal are better bump maps require additional information describing how the bump intensity range maps to global space distance units, normal maps do not. Deep explain about Normal,Bump and Displacement maps

Maxwell renderer settings:
First things first. IF YOUR MAXWELL RENDER CRUSHES WITHOUT ANY REASON ON A SAMPLING LEVEL AND YOU HAVE TO RESTART CHECK:
1. IF YOU'VE DONE OVERCLOCKING OF THE CPU IN BIOS OR MANUALY LOWER IT(I have to lower mine with 10frequency so now I work on 2200+ real 1800+ not on 2800+ real 2000 and it is slow but still no crushing)
2. RISE YOUR PAGING FILE IN /CONTROL PANEL/SYSTEM/ADVANCED/VIRTUAL MEMORY
3. FREE UP SOME HD SPACE
4. SEE YOUR PROCESSES IN WINDOWS TASKMENAGER AND CONTROL THEM BUY START/RUN/services.msc and msconfig.
5. CLEAN YOUR SPYWARES AND ANYOTHER UNUSEFULL STUFF
6. TO MAKE NICE IMAGES USE NOISE REDUCER LIKE NEAT IMAGE download
7. TO MAKE FASTER RENDER DO 2 PICTURES LIKE SAMPLING 10-11 THAN COMBINE IT IN ONE MSI USING DIFFERENT SEED VALUE.
Tips about combining different images here.
MORE HERE INFO:
maxwell tutorial
Maxwell tips and tricks
Create small scene: Plane , then other 2 for lights, put your object in the middle. Turn off the enable default light. Choose resolution, increase render time, set global scale factor to 0.1. Go to Environment/sky options choose none or you can use hdr. Assign materials to planes first 2 planes choose add emitter and one of presets correlated to color type choose overall color and then just set watts to 50. To plane you can set some defuse material with white color from the wizard or browse gallery also you can set a texture to reflectance 0® but be careful to be file not procedural because Maxwell doesn’t support it. Choose reflective material for your model and it’s time for render check and calibrating the scene. If you use checker texture you can set It to be pure white in preview/MXI with Film ISO (choose from 100,200,400) and shutter (move to make it 242 check in paint program) sliders also use tone mapping settings if you want but it is no recommended for pros for finar adjustments for the mood and check it with Photoshop if it is more rgb 242 it is bad not 255 because this in nature doesn’t exists. Ok we are ready to go render and see the beauty of all. Bye

For more info about Maxwell:
Materials
Video tutorials
Maya Plug-in video tutorial

If someone have tried the method just tell me for corrections.
Here’s the link of three different ways for maya integration with mray/turtle also with mudbox:
Maya integration with external software
ZbrushCentral thread about this topic:
ZbrushCentral: Maya integration with external software
And another in Maya for (Mental Ray):
Maya and Mental ray integration
Video tut: Maya and Mental ray integration video

And pure software renderer:
Zbrush + Maya software render
If you have slower machines use bump maps:
Bump maps from Zbrush

And a great tut from start to finish of:
Maya / Zbrush Godzilla Multi-UV Set Tutorial

Exporting High Quality Nomal Maps:
Tutorial: Exporting Normal maps

FEW NOTES:
Ok so now I'am testing all methods but.. still not true success. First I found a node in the connection editor of the Maxwell material called Displacement map. And it was interesting to me so I opened ConEdit end there was a lots of nodes Displacement Used, Texture, Gain, Offset, Smooth interp, Height. Normal displacement will come from out Alpha of the texture but it is one value. So I am testing the proper connection. But yesterday I found a post in Maxwell render forum that displacement future is not implemented yet and it will be in the next free update so I gave up. And the second thing I tune Is to adjust the displ, normal, alpha image popper for the Maxwell render to make a nice bumps. Bump value can only be up to 100. And normal has the correct depth but it seems from my renders that It require fine tuning maybe to transfer displ map to bump we will see. Another my problem is that I found that while was gone 1 year my account is still there but can’t post to Maxwell forums maybe I’ve done something wrong don’t know It says “Sorry, but only users granted special access can post topics in this forum.”  so I can’t post to guys to solve the problems and to make nice tut so I make the posts here to my blog. You can find me in the entire web with username: sinmania. Thanks for big reading guys. If you want to help you’re welcome I hope it was interesting to you. Updates SOON!

THIS POST IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION!!!

Math modeling basics

2007-05-25T12:44:00.000+02:00

Before all 3d is about representing reality or vizualizateyour imagination. To do this it uses objects - simple shapes(called primitives - cube, box, sphere, also curves and other....) that right everything is math( but don't worry 3d people separate in two basic species: mathematics(programmers), artists ( creative designers) so if you want to make something you can do it without math or without you are a Picasso.

So what we need for our first project is a scene with objects this process is called modeling. First to make an object I have to tell you that they are different methods for modeling (polygonal, Nurbs, SubDiv…) and don’t matter how you reach the goal it matters to reach it so I know people that use one or another they have all advantages and shortcomings It’s all taste of the 3d artist except in production when it is taste of the budget and boss;). This is the same for the 3d packages like (Maya, 3ds max, Lightwave….) so what to do I recommend you to download the tryouts (demos) from the official sites and to see which you like most interface and functionality except if you want some special features. Today the software is so fast growing so doesn’t matter which it matters who use it and also it something wonderful called plug-ins ….
Ok let’s back. I will save you the details.
Download this program:
Top mod download
If you want some info it is over here I love this software it is just simple and so powerful many 10x for the creator Associate Prof. Dr.: ERGUN AKLEMAN

ERGUN AKLEMAN web site

Well unzip it (extract it) with some program like winzip in your hard disk. Now it is the hard part start the program topmod.exe and go into the 3d world. 3D stands from three dimensional space difference from 2d/3d technical is the Z axis(depth) except X and Y but now it will sound strange but I have to tell it. If you draw something in the piece of paper it will be 2d because the piece of paper is 2d it is not thick the same it is with computer. You still can draw on a sheet “cup” which is 3d in the real world but the paper is 2d so it represents the cup in 3d even if it is still 2d picture and we lie our eye. A good artist may make it look like 3d with tricks. Well the same is with the 3d too but the sheet of paper is our monitor. So we have our 3d representation (visualization) on an imaginary 3d space in computer. Then we give the computer to render (calculate) 2d pieces (pictures) of it.
We have our 3 axes red/green/blue and now we will do like all professionals we will go File/Open ;) and choose one object for example cup.obj located into obj1 folder. Do group basics and see what it is: operations with edges?!?! – Lines between squares that cup are made of. Well this type of modeling is polygonal. Where 3 or 4 dots (vertices) connect with lines every 2 dots put 1 line well this little plane surface that is made is called polygon they are all sorts of them but we like for animation and aesthetic purposes to be 4 dots (quad) with 4 edges come from one dot not more if they come 5 or 3 this is very common question what should we do? Well just try to rearrange topology (mesh, object structure) try to get much less and the last move to non-visual (rendarable) or no significant with movement place like behind the year for the human character or so.
Resume: Object-polygon-edges-vertices
We are now in edges level and can do what we want to get new detail.
The main tools are: Insert, delete, collapse, subdivide, connect, transform.You can use them to get rearrange basic shape detail, to make slight changes but very important
The next level is extrusions: This is main operation for poly-modeling they are several types. With it you can make everything just has to get imagination. Imagine that this is clay and you pull it and remodel it so if you want from cup you can get a vase from this. Ok from here we do remeshing so everything to be nice and smooth because in the nature there are no sharp edges only beveled(rounded):). Well I recommend going for 4-converstion-schemes and doing some of them because we will keep quads. If we like the shape we can export it to another program or renderer and make the finishing steps but with this little program we can do even more. GO to high genus modeling- well here is some operations that are not standard and I like to recommend it for you. There are 4 types of them some automatic some not but are very fancy. This last too steps I do it reverse so first make high genus steps then remeshing because it make a little faster for my computer to calculate.
After we've done our first object let's export it. Do File/Save (defaults) or (with normal’s). Choose where to place it in filename and type the name with extension "obj"
For example:.../desktop/test.obj
Next step is to import it in 3d package such as Maya, 3ds max I will use Maya for this example. Make a plane since we started with polygonal objects so we make poly plane. Maybe another for wall or you can use your imagination to make a scene (half dome/ 1/4 sphere extruded for example) and some plane or sphere for light source also you can put anything you want.

If we finished with modeling than next step we will do is choosing a render. Let’s say the simplest for configuration render: Maxwell. We now should make the global settings (note: If you don’t see in “Render using: Maxwell render” you should do:
1 -Install the renderer 2- install the conversational plug-in for Maya-Maxwell
3 – Go into windows/settings and preferences/plug-in manager
4 – Scroll down to Maxwell.mll and check loaded)
These are mine:

Then we do a test render with lower resolution 640x480 for example.
If we like we can go to next step putting materials like painting egg with stamps. So right click on object hold and scroll to assign new material / Maxwell Material also you can use Hipershade. Well my materials are from browse library maybe with few adjustments:
If you use textures you have to make placement nodes and to project them right.
Then you just have to make new camera or use perspective and turn on resolution gate from view/ camera settings and find nice spot. Bring up the resolution and render. Wait……. It is slower but this is Maxwell the quality is compensating it. After finish save the picture tiff or tga even jpg if you want but it has artifacts so stick with raw file format before two. And go to Photoshop. Well here you can experiment. First duplicate a layer then you can make mask, adjustment layers, do some hand retouch, contrast, brightness, add some effects it’s all called post processing. Well If you go for animation of the math model I don’t recommend Maxwell maybe Mental ray or something cheaper, also there you have to use combustion, shake or other software for compositing the movie(avi) and post processing. That’s for now if you have any questions/critiques I will be here waiting ;). See ya!

More about here one of the greatest artists of math modeling:
Maxwell forum topic

First time with 3d

2007-05-25T11:59:00.000+02:00

Hi guys.

Well it is always hard to start but it is fun though. So I want to make things right and to came where we want (the final project) with less words as possible. I now that practice is the best teacher so with little theory and more doing we will be on the top. Here I will show you my everyday basis with brief examples but accurate to understand as much of 3d. As I teach myself as a newbie I will guide you in this fantastic world so anyone who wants can join is welcome - more people more phun. So sit back and relax if you want to share ideas, posts, tutorials just tell me.
e-mail:sinmania@abv.bg

PS: Here will be all sorts of posts so sorry if they aren't all professional.

OK for start see this:
3D tools Compare Chart
So you can choose what tool suits your needs. When done get it's trial version to see if it really fits you if it does you may consider buying. After buying software choose hardware that is compatible and also buy it if you have money: Hardware. Ok now we are ready to start run your 3d software program and click F1 if it doesn't work go to help by using the menu. Read it all or just the things you want to do than make the examples. After this done with the help go in internet use Google.com and type your software name + Tutorials. Example - "Maya tutorials". Choose one of many and start doing it. You can do some stuff your own not only follow the tutorials. Than make your first project. It will not work at first but after a while it will. If you wanto to give up just use another tutorial and try again maybe this one is not right for you. Then go to the section of the FORUM and ask your questions or post your WIP (Work in progress) work.