How do you setup material slots in 3DS Max for a UDK environment?

LANKUS MAXIMUS

Hi guys.

Prepare yourselves for an extremely noob-standard question...

I have only ever made individual props and small scenes at University. I am looking to create my first 'proper' environment using 3DS Max, UDK and Photoshop.

Is there a particular way that i should setup my 3DS Max scene in terms of my approach to texturing/materials?

I'm assuming it would be incorrect to just use individual standard slots for each static mesh as i would soon run out considering i am aiming to create a large exterior scene that will be populated with a large number of props....

Would i go about this initial setup by creating a multi/sub-object material system or some other way?

Again, my apologies for such a primitive question. I am familiar with the import/export processes, along with unit setup and creating my lightmap's.
I've just never created a large environment/scene with multiple objects in it.

I appreciate any help i can get. I can finally start working on my environment once I have my approach confirmed! :poly124:

r4ptur3

UDK is all about modularity. You are going to want to split your scene up into repeatable objects. Each UDK scene is typically made with thousands of instanced objects, each with their own material(s) (vs. one giant mesh with tons of materials on it). I think UDK only supports up to 8 materials on any given object ... so yeah, you would run out quickly. Try to think of each building as a collection of parts -- windows, doors, walls, stairs -- instead of one giant mesh.

LANKUS MAXIMUS

Thanks for the reply r4ptur3.

Oh yeah definitely. I've been blocking it all out on the grid. I will be using a lot of modularity within my environment's.

I meant more in terms of the actual texture allocation within 3DS Max. Because I have only ever made individual props, I tend to just create a standard slot in the material browser.

Even with modularity, I was just wondering If i should create several standard material slots when i begin texturing my props, or if there is another approach.
As it looks like there is a limit of 20 material slots...

Thanks for the reply dude!

r4ptur3

I would just treat the modular level pieces as big props. It might help to open up one of the levels that comes with UDK to see how Epic handled it. The Necropolis is a pretty good example. Some pieces use tiling textures ... some are unique. Some assets use material instances (the same material, but with different parameters). It varies depending on what the asset needs.

I wouldn't just make a ton of material slots if you do not need them. Most of the assets (aside from characters) I have ever seen have anywhere between 1-4 materials on them. You shouldn't need too many to make a convincing modular piece.

You also might want to think about making a master material and several instances of it. You can instance almost any material you want if you master material is robust enough.

LANKUS MAXIMUS

That's great. i'll look into the Necropolis map and research the use of a master material.

Thanks a lot for your feedback. It's very appreciated!

BradleyWascher

Ok so lets anwser some questions:

1. 20 map slots in in 3ds max:
- Those 20 are just preview slots and actually 3ds max supports an unlimited number of material slots fyi ( This will never be an issue though)

2. Texturing a building exterior:
- You can handle this in several ways modular or modular combined(better for lightmap seams) Now lets say you have a modular wall piece and it has a glass window and a wooden window frame. All you would do is create a multi-sub object material. You would then create 3 slots in that material, one for the brick wall, one for the glass, and one for the wooden frame. You then would select the different faces on your model that would use that material and assign it.

Now in regard to creating the actual textures for environments you have 3 options. 100 percent tiling textures, texture set's ( multiple tiling and non tiling pieces all baked to a single flat texture), and 100 percent unique bake( more rare for large environment pieces).

Now when building environments it depends on the environment but creating some modular pieces in 3ds max and using those to create your building inside of 3ds max before you export it to engine and actually better (modular combined) This will not only make you sane and give you cleaner light maps but will also take your vert count and instances counts way down engine side. I see alot of new environment artists get really stuck on the supper small modular approach and sometimes its really not needed, so dont be afraid to explore a little with combining and creating different meshes created with multi-sub object materials.

Hope this explains it a little bit.

|*BILLY$CLINT*|

r4ptur3 wrote: »

UDK is all about modularity. You are going to want to split your scene up into repeatable objects. Each UDK scene is typically made with thousands of instanced objects, each with their own material(s) (vs. one giant mesh with tons of materials on it). I think UDK only supports up to 8 materials on any given object ... so yeah, you would run out quickly. Try to think of each building as a collection of parts -- windows, doors, walls, stairs -- instead of one giant mesh.

You can have more than 8 materials on one mesh. Not that you would want to but you can. I have seen objects her at work that had up to 15 and one had 20(There was a bunch of duplicates material ID's but still 20 are you kidding me). They were fixed as soon as I figured this out as when you got them all in screen at once there was this massive GPU spike. But like you said it's best to only have one and possibly two but really no more than that.

r4ptur3

yeah I think the coders hard limited us to 8 at work -- and even then I felt like it was a little glutenous.

LANKUS MAXIMUS

Thanks a lot Brad. That was really informative. I appreciate it

Billy + r4ptur3 - Haha, Yeah no way I'd ever need anywhere near that amount, literally just meant the material slots, not the maps or anything... Thanks for your response. Really helpful