Technical Talk

Topic	Replies	Latest Post
I want to learn to model well enough to make a TF2 hat. I have little to no knowledge about 3D modelling, but I'm very very good with all versions of Adobe Photoshop. Anyone want to suggest what program(s) I should use as a beginner to this stuff? Note:…	1 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
Specular map master thread - The hidden art behind the awesomesauce. In here I hope we can discuss cool tips n' tricks and show examples of good spec maps. To start it off. Do you have any examples of awesome spec maps and what are your thoughts on the subject? :) …	27 Last	THE 5 Jun 2010
Mental Ray Plugin rendering problems So, just recently, a scene that's been rendering just fine in Maya's Mental Ray plugin, will no longer render. It will only show up as a wire frame snapshot whether I push the render button, the IP…	3 Last	wailingmonkey Jun 2010
XNA tutorial/guidance I'm not sure if this is in the correct area but I was looking for possible guidance on what I need to start muttling around with the xna dev kit. The most I have dipped my toe into is reading the do…	3 Last	Nysuatro Jun 2010
Another Normal Mapping Question Hey guys. I know theres so many normal mapping threads floating around here and there, Ive looked at so many articles on the technical stuff...Im just now starting to do alot of personal work for p…	1 Last	r_fletch_r Jun 2010
Max transform gizmos gone I tried pressing x and that doesnt work, and its checked to on in the gizmo preferences but it still wont show up... Halp?	9 Last	Michael Knubben Jun 2010
tire tread tutorials needed I'm interested if anyone knows of a good link to a tutorial on building tire treads in Max/Maya. I'm looking to build a tractor model and it would be helpful to gain some knowledge on the most effici…	3 Last	thedd Jun 2010
Can anyone help tell me whats missing from this tutorial? Hello, I am trying to do pretty much this tutorial. [URL]http://chrisholden.net/tutor/arch01.htm[/URL] The stairs part. My understanding of it. Is he builds the stairs as one object. The dirt m…	3 Last	Piflik Jun 2010
Specular Pass Question? I've rendered out a load of Passes in Render Elements, Max, Mental Ray, so I can understand how they all 'fit' together. My A&D Level Specular pass shows information but the A&D Output Specular/A&D…	20 Last	Playdo Jun 2010
Keep your faces planar? I read somewhere that you want to keep your quads planar for game models or else it won't render right in a game engine. Is this true? It seems impossible. It would rule out vertex positioning by …	4 Last	Burtzum Jun 2010
Hair&Fur need HELP!!! Hi all!:) I need somebody to give a nice link or or just tell me how to create something like this [IMG]http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/9021/hair1bo.jpg[/IMG]	8 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
Learning Zbrush Ok, so I just got zbrush last night, and its amazing, I absolutely love it. However, I sorta suck :P. I am modeling a face to start my learning process. So far I got the basic shape pretty nice I thi…	13 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
PSU life expectancy / PC tried to self-destruct So last night, in the middle of a game of TF2, my PC loses power suddenly, accompanied by the faint smell of singed electrical components. Subsequently, the power button was unresponsive. While I w…	15 Last	DataCain Jun 2010
Standard Directional Light not working? Max 2010 Hey guys, I'm just trying to do some simple vert lighting via radiosity and it seems my directional lights have stopped working. It's weird, they worked for a while, then, some directionals would st…	4 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
Alpha Usage I have a pretty straightforward question for anyone with the knowledge.. What is the best solution performance-wise when using alpha? Is it okay to have a small bit alpha'd on a large texture map? O…	3 Last	Jonathan Jun 2010
Engine Suggestions for Indie. (Or why UDK and Unity Failed) Was asked to post anonymously. And for any who can guess who this might be. Please keep to self (or ask them if it is privately versus publically). Unity: We couldn't get the master server to work.…	13 Last	TSM Jun 2010
Real quick tree texturing question Hey, apologies for dropping threads simultaneously but the questions are unrelated. When UV'ing a tree, is the main trunk/bark texture usually placed in the same 0-1 as the foliage? I know how to…	12 Last	Justin Meisse Jun 2010
Tileable Cliff texture Any tips on creating a nice tileable cliff texture? Such as: [IMG]http://deelekgolo.codebrainshideout.net/Pics/2010-06-21_1019.png[/IMG] My attempts in Zbrush didn't go so well since the wrap tool do…	1 Last	Will Faucher Jun 2010
3ds max box de-select? Ive been wondering if this is possible? Can i use the box select to deselect faces/points etc also?	6 Last	McGreed Jun 2010
Lightmass issues Hey, I was testing out a few props I'd made in UDK today, to see if everything was working properly. And I just came across quite a few problems. First of which is this: [URL="http://img823.imageshac…	4 Last	Minos Jun 2010
On surface modeling (3Ds Max) Tried search: nothing found. Is there any good solution to create new geometry based on reference mesh? For example if you have a cylinder and you want to model something to it's surface - how do i …	15 Last	NyneDown Jun 2010
Mudbox AO problem Hi all, Just made a tilable texture in Mudbox 2009. Turns out my Mudbox 2009 version couldn't bake AO's (no option under Maps anywhere). I've saved the file, and opened it into Mudbox 2010. I now c…	6 Last	snow Jun 2010
UVW Unwrapping Spacing hey guys i have been wondering for some time what is the hole point of leaving no space when Stacking the Unwrapped UV´s...	6 Last	Rock Bottom Jun 2010
3ds Max 2010 - Any Explainations for the Samples on DVD 2 Hi aggain, as the Max users of you shurely will know on DVD 2 there is a bunch of nice Sample files. The only problem I encounter is that they do not tell me that much. Ofcouse I can open them and tr…	6 Last	THE 5 Jun 2010
Female Topology help Hey there all. I'm not sure if this should be in TT, P&P or WAYWO, so apologies in advance if I put it in the wrong one. Anyone who read my last blog post, erm... Polycount post, will know I'm figh…	6 Last	Tom Ellis Jun 2010
Normal map seam Yes, like thousand of others i have a problem with my normal map. I cant understand why i have this seam (No black seam btw). Every smoothing group has its own uv-shell, but it doesn't blend well, on…	15 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
[HELP] TF2 Viewmodel model compiling Hello First of all, I'd like to say that I am new here, and if I have posted in the wrong topic please redirect me :) Now, my problem is that I can't compile my model. I am making a new shotgun to c…	5 Last	DwarfVaderRus Jun 2010
meshtools script hey all i was wondering if you can still get/use meshtools with 3dsmax 2010? i wanted to try that solid chamfer tool to add some support edges thanks	9 Last	SyncViewS Jun 2010
MEL: scriptjob preSelection highlight event? Is their a way to make a scriptjob in mel activate every time the cursor is over a different component? I thought it had an event for this but I'm not seeing it now. Just want to put together a simpl…	1 Last	PolyHertz Jun 2010
max uvunwrap madness the default uv channel is now 2 instead of 1 when applying uvunwrap. driving me nuts. tried deleting ini file, deleting uv channels but no avail	5 Last	Ruz Jun 2010
Hard Surface Normal Maps (First off, I've read just about every Normal Map tutorial out there, and either haven't found the solution, or haven't seen the one cause of this problem. So if your response to this is a tutorial, …	7 Last	Eric Chadwick Jun 2010
Texturing with Mudbox (Success, Workflow, Tutorials?) Pretty much all in the title. How many of you are texuring in Mudbox these days? I saw a quick demonstration on how "easy" it is; but there was little discussion of how much pre-planning there was. …	9 Last	Mortague Jun 2010
Baking Troubleshooting Hello, I am having some trouble, when I have a lower poly object such as the example below I find it very hard to get a good bake on items such as belts etc. Please see below. [img]http://img291.…	6 Last	Mark Dygert Jun 2010
Materials Hello, it might be a stupid question but is there a way to put on and off every materials in 3DS max Viewport with a single click or shortcut ?? i'm pretty sure It woluld be possible with a Script b…	4 Last	DataCain Jun 2010
is there asellect hidden / visible polys script? so say i got a object made of a shit ton of objects, and i want to delete all the polys that are on the inside of the object that can not been seen, i dont need the mesh to be seamless or anything. …	2 Last	Rhinokey Jun 2010
Batch Rendering so I'm batch rendering my model, but when I do it, it removes the textures, rendering regularly doesn't remover the textures, anyhow here are the settings HD 1080 Frame padding 4 Saved as a tiff …	3 Last	cw Jun 2010
problem with keying animation with attribute holders I created Dummy objects to hold attributes which controls the reloading of a double barrel shotgun that i rigged. but somehow the movement coulldnt be keyed.i was wondering if there is something i fo…	4 Last	cw Jun 2010
Problem with max viewports max has been screwing with me all weekend...everything from showing super low resolution textures in the viewport to randomly changing my color scheme and UI...i fixed all that Now textures won't up…	13 Last	se7ered Jun 2010
Rendering Setups/Lighting? So I'm working on an environment and I'm having a lot of fun with it, but when I went to render it to see how it looked I realize I have damn near no idea what I'm doing when it comes to making rende…	2 Last	doeseph Jun 2010
Normal Map problem that has been bothering me for ages! If someone could help me out with this I'd be eternally grateful. Thats right: grateful forever and ever. I'm doing some normals for this model: [URL="http://img4.imageshack.us/i/modelys.jpg/"][IMG…	25 Last	bluekangaroo Jun 2010
When NURMS system is better/needed ? Could anyone explain me when is better to use NURMS? I use 3d max long long time (using toorbosmooth by creating hipoly objects) and I've never used this tool.	2 Last	divi Jun 2010
Wacom Wriggle Problem I did do a search for this but I didn't find the answer to my problems. In a nut shell : [B]my wacom Intuos3 tablet pen cursor is wriggling on the spot. [/B] I did a simple picture to demonstrate w…	16 Last	Malus Jun 2010
PARTICLE FX for games? hi guys i was wondering on how you create fx for games, particle fx based or volumetrics and fluids. i have these idea that there is an emitter that emmits planes that are always facing camera and th…	4 Last	Mark Dygert Jun 2010
New CrazyBump Beta (1.2 Beta 4) Hey y'all, I've just posted a new beta test of CrazyBump: [URL]http://crazybump.com/release/CrazyBump12beta4.exe[/URL] The main new feature in this release is the "Focus" control. Please test i…	14 Last	Emperors Teeth Jun 2010
Normal map compression(?) artifacts Hello there polycounters, I've been trying out UDK today, and I'm loving it so far! Now I've tried to import my (subdivided for UV-tiling) plane with normal maps and the lot, and the first snag I re…	8 Last	Divine Rage Jun 2010
Normal map baking - problem Hi. I want to bake my normals for a weapon model. this is highpoly model: [IMG]http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1008694/Forums/Polycount/NormalMap%20Baking/HP.jpg[/IMG] this is Lowpoly model: [IMG]http://…	11 Last	Adam L. Gray Jun 2010
Photoshop Advance Actions Questions Does anyone know if there is a way to create an action that looks at the outmost folders in my my psd and saves out 3 images at once using those names? Like i got my psd arranged like normal, diffus…	2 Last	raul Jun 2010
Where to find 2d patterns? Hey, I've been looking around for leaf patterns in an elvish/celtic style, but I can't seem to find anything that suits my needs. Would anyone happen to know where to find these? Here is an example …	1 Last	SnowGhost Jun 2010
3ds Max scene scale adjustments So, I'm finalizing the proportions of the scene I'm working on in Max before moving on to the optimization stage, and for some time I was fighting with Max's grid snapping. I had originally set my g…	10 Last	danshewan Jun 2010
Cannot Weld (Max2010) This -might- be a beginners mistake. I but I have never seen anything like this. I had 2 halves of a pipe. Did Symmetry on them, and selected and erased the outer edge, after welding. The inner edg…	4 Last	Mark Dygert Jun 2010