Default scanline has no way of emitting light unless you also use radiosity. Even then it's not as easy as you would think. You're better off using Mental Ray in Max2k8 for light emitting materials but since you're using 3dsMax9 you're smart to stick with scanline/radiosity. You'll need to use a Architectural Material or the Advanced lighting Override material.
Autodesk 3ds Max Help > Material Editor, Materials, and Maps > Types of Materials > Architectural Material > Advanced Lighting Override Rollout
Since you'll need to run a radiosity solution I suggest setting it pretty low 50-60 while you test it out and higher for final renders. You shouldn't really ever need to go above 85% setting higher often eats up solution time.
It depends on how important it is for a surface to actually do the light emitting? Chances are you can get around it by faking it using some carefully placed lights? But without knowing more about the scene its hard to offer alternatives on how to light whatever it is.
Wuh? Put a map in the Self-Illumination slot of your material, click the "Color" checkbox next to it, and render.
If you want the self-illumination map to emit light, turn on the Light Tracer in the Advanced Lighting dialog and up the number of bounces in the settings.
Also don't forget to add at least one light to your scene, even if you turn it off. It will shut off the default scene lighting.
MoP, That is another way to handle it, but it will take longer to render out. Radiosity runs once and gives quick renders, light tracer can be painfully slow when you start to add bounces. Using Advanced material override or Mental Ray arch/design material gives you much more flexibility over the kind and amount of energy the light is emitting.
I tried the self illumination slot but it seemed like while it illuminated the object, it didn't have a glow around it. I want that fuzzy halo effect . I guess not so much that it is actually emitting light, just that it is glowing. Sorry, maybe I should have said glow map not emissive map.
if all you want is the glow-effect, you could achieve that in post. either with the builtin crappy video-post thingie or with a compositor of your choice - shake, after fx, nuke, whatever. just output a pass that serves as a mask for the glowing parts and colorize, blur and overlay it.
if it's just a still, that would be one easy thing to do in photoshop as well.
Maxs scanline renderer will let you have textures that are unaffected by shadows (self-illuminated), but has no way of giving them a halo-glow esk effect. I've tried to find a way to do this exact same thing several times over the course of several years always with the same end conclusion. And at this point I am 100% sure it is not possible by default.
PolyHertz: Wrong! Read thomasp's post.
You can just add a "Lens Effects Glow" image filter in the Video Post queue, set your emissive material to use a different effects ID, then use the "bright" and "hue" values to control which parts glow more. That's the fastest way (and it is pretty fast, plus it's iterative since you don't need to manually composite stuff in any other application).
Probably doesn't give you as much control as using an external compositor would, but it's easily enough for most glow needs.
Video Post is a PITA though. If you find it too weird, you could also check out Render > Effects > Add > Lens Effects > Glow. Less controls in there, but it avoids the mess that is Video Post.
Thanks everyone. I haven't had a chance yet to look into this again, once I have some time I will try some of your suggestions and see if I can get something working.
Replies
Autodesk 3ds Max Help > Material Editor, Materials, and Maps > Types of Materials > Architectural Material > Advanced Lighting Override Rollout
Since you'll need to run a radiosity solution I suggest setting it pretty low 50-60 while you test it out and higher for final renders. You shouldn't really ever need to go above 85% setting higher often eats up solution time.
It depends on how important it is for a surface to actually do the light emitting? Chances are you can get around it by faking it using some carefully placed lights? But without knowing more about the scene its hard to offer alternatives on how to light whatever it is.
If you want the self-illumination map to emit light, turn on the Light Tracer in the Advanced Lighting dialog and up the number of bounces in the settings.
No need for mental ray or strange materials.
MoP, That is another way to handle it, but it will take longer to render out. Radiosity runs once and gives quick renders, light tracer can be painfully slow when you start to add bounces. Using Advanced material override or Mental Ray arch/design material gives you much more flexibility over the kind and amount of energy the light is emitting.
I tried the self illumination slot but it seemed like while it illuminated the object, it didn't have a glow around it. I want that fuzzy halo effect . I guess not so much that it is actually emitting light, just that it is glowing. Sorry, maybe I should have said glow map not emissive map.
Thanks for the help so far!
if it's just a still, that would be one easy thing to do in photoshop as well.
Maxs scanline renderer will let you have textures that are unaffected by shadows (self-illuminated), but has no way of giving them a halo-glow esk effect. I've tried to find a way to do this exact same thing several times over the course of several years always with the same end conclusion. And at this point I am 100% sure it is not possible by default.
You can just add a "Lens Effects Glow" image filter in the Video Post queue, set your emissive material to use a different effects ID, then use the "bright" and "hue" values to control which parts glow more. That's the fastest way (and it is pretty fast, plus it's iterative since you don't need to manually composite stuff in any other application).
Probably doesn't give you as much control as using an external compositor would, but it's easily enough for most glow needs.
http://area.autodesk.com/index.php/tutorials/tutorial_index/creating_neon_lights_with_scanline/
I have to agree that Video Post is a bit of a bitch to work with at times, not exactly user friendly but it gets the job done. I'd be interested to see how Maya handles that kind of thing...