Animate Self Illuminate in 3D Studio Max

david.l.flores

Hello, this is my first post on the forum.


I've been leisurely doing 3d Graphics since 97/98 somewhere
around there. I've always been a computer junkie, but this
is my first post ever on a forum. So lets see how it works.

I am using 3D Studio Max 11. I want a objects surface to become
illuminated though the self illumination option in the material
editor. I need it to turn on during my animation but I can't
figure how to animate it being switched on.

The animation has 10 different objects with 10 different materials.
Also 10 different glows setup in VideoPost.

I have everything animated except for this toggle switch. To be
more precise what I need to do is at frame 0-30 the self
illuminate "color switch" is not checked but at frame 31 it
switches on.

Now I can go the Long way and render in out in segments
then tie it together but I'm sure there's a way to animate it.

Thanks for the help-

david.l.flores

Thanks for the reply. If I want to animate the hue turning on at say frame 30. how do I do it? In the track view, auto key, or dope sheet? I've played with all of these and I can't get it to set the key at all.

Mark Dygert

You animate the percentage from 0% to 100%, or from black to white. The easy way is to turn on autokey, move the time slider to where you want the change to happen and set the parameter.

david.l.flores

Thanks
Yes I can animate the % slider. What I want to be able to autokey is the check box.
Any help is appreciated.

Mark Dygert

You can't animate the check box. You use two keys right next to each other. One at 0% and the next at 100%.

david.l.flores

Thanks-- So final answer the self illuminate check box for color in the material editor cannot be animated. You can animate the percentage slider but not the actual check box.

Mark Dygert

Correct.

Wrath

david.l.flores wrote: »

Thanks-- So final answer the self illuminate check box for color in the material editor cannot be animated. You can animate the percentage slider but not the actual check box.

The checkbox is a flag to use a single RGB value for self-illumination on the whole object. Otherwise it will use the top-level diffuse color/map and the slider controls the amount of self-illumination to apply.

I can't really conceive of a reason why you'd want to animate that particular checkbox...but you could mimic that result by assigning a mix material to the self-illumination material slot, put your RGB color in one, pipe an instance of whatever is going into your diffuse color into the other, and then animate the mix amount. I think what you're really wanting to do though is simpler. Using color as self-illumination is essentially adding that RGB value to the whole object post-lighting...so setting or keying the color to black (RGB 0 0 0) will make it no longer do anything.

Just make sure your keys are right next to each other, or set the in/out tangents of every keyframe to "stepped" and you should get the result you're looking for.

david.l.flores

Wrath wrote: »

The checkbox is a flag to use a single RGB value for self-illumination on the whole object. Otherwise it will use the top-level diffuse color/map and the slider controls the amount of self-illumination to apply.

I can't really conceive of a reason why you'd want to animate that particular checkbox...but you could mimic that result by assigning a mix material to the self-illumination material slot, put your RGB color in one, pipe an instance of whatever is going into your diffuse color into the other, and then animate the mix amount. I think what you're really wanting to do though is simpler. Using color as self-illumination is essentially adding that RGB value to the whole object post-lighting...so setting or keying the color to black (RGB 0 0 0) will make it no longer do anything.

Just make sure your keys are right next to each other, or set the in/out tangents of every keyframe to "stepped" and you should get the result you're looking for.

Thanks I think you supplied me with the info I needed. I will try it out and post my outcome.