Book Image

3ds Max Speed Modeling for 3D Artists

By : Thomas Mooney
Book Image

3ds Max Speed Modeling for 3D Artists

By: Thomas Mooney

Overview of this book

Production of 3D art is an exciting medium, but the task of modeling requires intense attention to detail, so speed and efficiency are vital. This book breaks down speed modeling workflow in 3ds Max into stages you can easily achieve, with a focus on hard surface modeling and methods you can apply to your own designs."3ds Max Speed Modeling for 3D Artists" will help level up your 3D modeling skills. It focuses on hard surface modeling, and shows the range of tools and techniques in 3ds Max 2013.This book shows content creation methods aimed at 3ds Max modelers preparing to show their skill to the industry. The key feature of modeling that artists must exhibit is speediness while preserving technical accuracy. The author helps you follow set project guidelines while pushing creativity and outlines the entire workflow from concept development to exporting a game-ready model.The book begins with introductions for new users to the interface and modeling tools, and progresses to topics aimed at users already familiar with 3ds Max, who want to improve their content creation process. You'll also see ways 3ds Max content is used with other applications, like sculpting software and game editors, and learn features of speed modeling, efficient workflow, re-use of content, and tips on getting more done, more quickly.By the end of this book you will have learned key topics in modeling, ready to face professional level work with elan.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
3ds Max Speed Modeling for 3D Artists
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

ProOptimizer


The model used in the previous chapter will serve our purpose. It has 28K polys and could be skinned directly, but it's a nice trick to first skin a low-resolution version and then copy the skinned data to the high-resolution model. For this we'll use ProOptimizer , which is a modifier that decimates unnecessary polygons according to the user's specification.

Creating a low-resolution model prior to skinning

This section takes us through the workings of the ProOptimizer modifier, which is useful for polygon decimation of a mesh so that you can quickly give it a target poly count.

  1. Open the file \Packt3dsMax\Chapter 10\Creature_SkinStart.max and select the main mesh Creature. Press Ctrl + V to paste it in a clone and be sure to set the Copy and not the Instance option. Hide the new model.

  2. Convert the model in the scene to an Editable Poly, and in the Ribbon click on the Selection tab, and at the Polygon sub-object level (press 4) click on Select by Half (using the symmetry axis)....