3D Studio Max

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Early history & Releases

Overview

Modeling

Polygon modeling

NURBS or Nonuniform rational B-Spline

Surface tool/Editable patch object

Predefined primitives

Predefined Standard Primitives list

• Box
  Box
  
  Box describes a variety of containers and receptacles. When no specific shape is described, a typical Rectangle box may be expected. Nevertheless, a box may have a horizontal cross section that is square , elongated, circle or oval; sloped or domed top surfaces, or non-vertical sides....
  —box produces a rectangular prism. An alternative variation of box is available—entitled cube—which proportionally constrains the length, width and height of the box.
• Cylinder
  Cylinder (geometry)
  
  A cylinder is one of the most curvilinear basic geometric shapes: the surface formed by the points at a fixed distance from a given straight line, the axis of the cylinder....
  —cylinder produces a cylinder.
• Torus
  Torus
  
  In geometry, a torus is a surface of revolution generated by revolving a circle in three dimensional space about an axis coplanar with the circle, which does not touch the circle....
  —torus produces a torus—or a ring—with a circular cross section, sometimes referred to as a doughnut.
• Teapot
  Utah teapot
  
  The Utah teapot or Newell teapot is a 3D computer graphics model which has become a standard reference object in the computer graphics community....
  —teapot produces the Utah teapot. Since the teapot is a parametric object, the user can choose which parts of the teapot to display after creation. These parts include the body, handle, spout and lid.
• Cone
  Cone (geometry)
  
  A cone is a dimension geometric shape that tapers smoothly from a flat, round base to a point called the apex or vertex. More precisely, it is the solid figure bounded by a plane base and the surface formed by the locus of all straight line segments joining the apex to the perimeter of the base....
  —cone produces round cones—either upright or inverted.
• Sphere
  Sphere
  
  A sphere is a symmetrical geometrical object. In non-mathematical usage, the term is used to refer either to a round ball or to its two-dimensional surface....
  —sphere produces a full sphere, hemisphere, or other portion of a sphere.
• Tube—tube can produce both round and prismatic tubes. The tube is similar to the cylinder with a hole in it.
• Pyramid
  Pyramid
  
  A pyramid is a building where the outer surfaces are triangular and converge at a point. The base of pyramids are usually quadrilateral or trilateral , meaning that a pyramid usually has four or five faces....
  —The pyramid primitive has a square or rectangular base and triangular sides.
• Plane
  Plane (mathematics)
  
  In mathematics, a plane is a curvature surface. Planes can arise as subspaces of some higher dimensional space, as with the walls of a room, or they may enjoy an independent existence in their own right, as in the setting of Euclidean geometry....
  —The plane object is a special type of flat polygon mesh that can be enlarged by any amount at render time. The user can specify factors to magnify the size or number of segments, or both. Modifiers such as displace can be added to a plane to simulate a hilly terrain.
• Geosphere
  Geosphere
  
  The term Geosphere is often used to refer to the densest parts of Earth, which consist mostly of Rock and regolith.The term originally applies to the four nested geospheres identified since Meteorology with the states of terrestrial matter: solid , liquid , gas , and plasma ....
  —GeoSphere produces spheres and hemispheres based on three classes of regular polyhedrons.

Predefined Extended Primitives list

• Hedra—produces objects from several families of polyhedra
  Polyhedron
  
  |}A polyhedron is often defined as a geometry object with flat faces and straight edges .This definition of a polyhedron is not very precise, and to a modern mathematician is quite unsatisfactory....
  .
• ChamferBox—creates a box with beveled or rounded edges.
• OilTank—creates a cylinder with convex caps.
• Spindle
  Spindle (textiles)
  
  A spindle is a wooden spike weighted at one end with a circular whorl; it may have an optional hook at either end of the spike. It is used for spinning wool and other fibers into yarn....
  —creates a cylinder with conical caps.
• Gengon—creates an extruded, regular-sided polygon with optionally filleted side edges.
• Prism
  Prism (optics)
  
  In optics, a prism is a transparent optical element with flat, polished surfaces that refraction light. The exact angles between the surfaces depend on the application....
  —Creates a three-sided prism with independently segmented sides.
• Torus knot
  Torus knot
  
  In knot theory, a torus knot is a special kind of knot which lies on the surface of an unknotted torus in R3. Similarly, a torus link is a link which lies on the surface of a torus in the same way....
  —creates a complex or knotted torus by drawing 2D curves in the normal planes around a 3D curve. The 3D curve (called the Base Curve) can be either a circle or a torus knot. It can be converted from a torus knot object to a NURBS surface.
• ChamferCyl—creates a cylinder with beveled or rounded cap edges.
• Capsule
  Capsule
  
  The word capsule, or encapsulation, may refer to:* Capsule , a cover or envelope partly or wholly surrounding a structure.* Capsule , a type of dry fruit like the poppy, iris or foxglove....
  —creates a cylinder with hemispherical caps.
• L-Ext—creates an extruded L-shaped object.
• C-Ext—creates an extruded C-shaped object.
• Hose—a flexible object, similar to a spring.

Rendering

The default rendering method in 3DS Max is scanline rendering. Several advanced features have been added to the scanliner over the years, such as global illumination, radiosity, and ray tracing

Ray tracing

In computer graphics, ray tracing is a technique for generating an digital image by tracing the path of light through pixel in an . The technique is capable of producing a very high degree of photorealism; usually higher than that of typical scanline rendering methods, but at a greater computation time....
.

mental ray is a production quality renderer integrated into the later versions of MAX, and is a powerful rendering tool, with bucket rendering, a technique that distributes the rendering burden between several computers efficiently. The 3ds Max version of mental ray also comes with a set of tools that allow a myriad of effects to be created with relative ease.

A third party connection tool to RenderMan pipelines is also available for those that need to integrate Max into Renderman render farms.

A third-party render engine plug-in for 3D Studio MAX. It is widely used, frequently substituting the standard and mental ray renderers which are included bundled with 3ds Max. V-Ray continues to be compatible with older versions of 3ds Max.

A third-party high-quality photorealistic rendering system created by SplutterFish, LLC capable of fast ray tracing and global illumination.

Another third-party raytracing render engine created by Cebas. Capable of simulating a wide range of real-world physical phenomena.

A third-party photorealistic renderer with plugins for 3ds max.

A third-party photorealistic rendering system created by Next Limit Technologies

Next Limit Technologies

Next Limit Technologies is a computer software company based in Madrid, Spain. Founded in 1998 by engineers Victor Gonzalez Sanchez and Ignacio Vargas, the firm now creates cross-platform particle simulation and light simulation software for fluid and rigid body modeling, and accurate visual rendering....
 providing robust materials and highly accurate unbiased rendering.

Another third-party rendering plugin. Capable of overcoming 3DS rendering memory limitations with rendering huge pictures.

Features

MAXScript is a built-in scripting language, and can be used to automate repetitive tasks, combine existing functionality in new ways, develop new tools and user interfaces and much more. Plugin modules can be created entirely in MAXscript.

Character Studio was a plugin which since version 4 of Max is now integrated in 3D Studio Max, helping user to animate virtual characters. The system works using a character rig or "Biped" which is pre-made and allows the user to adjust the rig to fit the character they will be animating. Dedicated curve editors and motion capture data import tools make Character Studio ideal for character animation. "Biped" objects have other useful features that automated the production of walk cycles

Walk cycle

In animation, a walk cycle is a sequence of Film frame representing a walk movement. Walk cycles are important, because when a walking person appears in an animation, the walk cycle simply can be looped over and over, without having to animate each step again....
 and movement paths, as well as secondary motion.

Scene Explorer, a tool that provides a hierarchical view of scene data and analysis, facilitates working with more complex scenes. Scene Explorer has the ability to sort, filter, and search a scene by any object type or property (including metadata). Added in 3ds Max 2008, it was the first component to facilitate .NET managed code in 3ds Max outside of MAXScript.

3ds Max supports both import and linking of DWG files. Improved memory management in 3ds Max 2008 enables larger scenes to be imported with multiple objects.

3ds Max offers operations for creative texture and planar mapping, including tiling, mirroring, decals, angle, rotate, blur, UV stretching, and relaxation; Remove Distortion; Preserve UV; and UV template image export. The texture workflow includes the ability to combine an unlimited number of textures, a material/map browser with support for drag-and-drop assignment, and hierarchies with thumbnails. UV workflow features include Pelt mapping, which defines custom seams and enables users to unfold UVs according to those seams; copy/paste materials, maps and colors; and access to quick mapping types (box, cylindrical, spherical).

Two keying modes—set key and auto key—offer support for different keyframing workflows.

Fast and intuitive controls for keyframing—including cut, copy, and paste—let the user create animations with ease. Animation trajectories may be viewed and edited directly in the viewport.

Objects can be animated along curves with controls for alignment, banking, velocity, smoothness, and looping, and along surfaces with controls for alignment. Weight path-controlled animation between multiple curves, and animate the weight. Objects can be constrained to animate with other objects in many ways—including look at, orientation in different coordinate spaces, and linking at different points in time. These constraints also support animated weighting between more than one target.

All resulting constrained animation can be collapsed into standard keyframes for further editing.

Either the Skin or Physique modifier may be used to achieve precise control of skeletal deformation, so the character deforms smoothly as joints are moved, even in the most challenging areas, such as shoulders. Skin deformation can be controlled using direct vertex weights, volumes of vertices defined by envelopes, or both.

Capabilities such as weight tables, paintable weights, and saving and loading of weights offer easy editing and proximity-based transfer between models, providing the accuracy and flexibility needed for complicated characters.

The rigid bind skinning option is useful for animating low-polygon models or as a diagnostic tool for regular skeleton animation.

Additional modifiers, such as Skin Wrap and Skin Morph, can be used to drive meshes with other meshes and make targeted weighting adjustments in tricky areas.

Characters can be rigged with custom skeletons using 3ds Max bones, IK solvers, and rigging tools.

All animation tools—including expressions, scripts, list controllers, and wiring—can be used along with a set of utilities specific to bones to build rigs of any structure and with custom controls, so animators see only the UI necessary to get their characters animated.

Four plug-in IK solvers ship with 3ds Max: history-independent solver, history-dependent solver, limb solver, and spline IK solver. These powerful solvers reduce the time it takes to create high-quality character animation. The history-independent solver delivers smooth blending between IK and FK animation and uses preferred angles to give animators more control over the positioning of affected bones.

The history-dependent solver can solve within joint limits and is used for machine-like animation. IK limb is a lightweight two-bone solver, optimized for real-time interactivity, ideal for working with a character arm or leg. Spline IK solver provides a flexible animation system with nodes that can be moved anywhere in 3D space. It allows for efficient animation of skeletal chains, such as a character’s spine or tail, and includes easy-to-use twist and roll controls.

In addition to reactor’s cloth modifier, 3ds Max software has an integrated cloth-simulation engine that enables the user to turn almost any 3D object into clothing, or build garments from scratch. Collision solving is fast and accurate even in complex simulations.

Local simulation lets artists drape cloth in real time to set up an initial clothing state before setting animation keys.

Cloth simulations can be used in conjunction with other 3ds Max dynamic forces, such as Space Warps. Multiple independent cloth systems can be animated with their own objects and forces. Cloth deformation data can be cached to the hard drive to allow for nondestructive iterations and to improve playback performance.

Autodesk Vault

Autodesk Vault

Autodesk Vault is a data management tool integrated with Autodesk Inventor Series, Autodesk Inventor Professional, AutoCAD Mechanical, AutoCAD Electrical, and Civil 3D products....
 plug-in, which ships with 3ds Max, consolidates users’ 3ds Max assets in a single location, enabling them to automatically track files and manage work in progress. Users can easily and safely share, find, and reuse 3ds Max (and design) assets in a large-scale production or visualization environment.

Uses

Films

Videogames

Licensing

External links