[untouchable]

I remember when I couldn't make a beam in MAX(2 days ago  ). But now I can, so I have decided to create a MAX beam tutorial and post it here.

Here is the final product:

 

Hope this is helpful.

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"The Darkness shall  befall us all."
-Commander William Wright
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"G.O.D" of Dark Alliance
The Darkness is Coming

[an0n]

Fade the edges. Reduce the fall-offs intensity (presuming your not using two thingies).

[an0n]

Come to think of it, you might be better off using a cylinder gizmo for the fall-off. That way you could relax the limits and make it fade to black better.

[Nico]

The easiest way is to use a single cylinder, and give it a glow in the video post. No damn volumetric light that takes hours to render, that way.

[KillMeNow]

heheh the wonders of lightwave - beams are sooooooooooooo easy, even easy to animate - lightwave rules for space stuff

[Nico]

Well, with my way, I make my beam in 30 seconds, and it's animated ( I mean, the glow varies and all). There  

[an0n]

Yeah, you use a gizmo and animate the turbulence of the fog.

[KillMeNow]

each to there own i guess =)- pretty much everything i possible one way or another with all the higher spec packages

[an0n]

*does happy dance*

I've got 3D Studio MAX 4! Can't see much difference to r3 but the non-applicable buttons going grey is a nice touch.

[CP5670]

I need to try making a beam using this.

I have both 3D Studio MAX 4 and Lightwave 6.5 but I somehow could never get accustomed to LW's interface, so I'm working on learning MAX instead.

[NeoHunter]

 

Originally posted by an0n:
*does happy dance*

I've got 3D Studio MAX 4! Can't see much difference to r3 but the non-applicable buttons going grey is a nice touch.

I have 3D Studio Max R4 too. I thoought 3D Studio Max was not made by discreet in the first place until R4.

Anyway, I have been playing around with 3D Studio Max but still cannot really master it though.

[an0n]

Kinetix make 3dsmax. It says on the box. Or at least I think it does.

The way to master any program is to try everything. Click every button and see what happens. Do this for about 3 days and you'll be able to do pretty much anything.

[an0n]

 

Originally posted by CP5670:
I need to try making a beam using this.  

I have both 3D Studio MAX 4 and Lightwave 6.5 but I somehow could never get accustomed to LW's interface, so I'm working on learning MAX instead.

Yeah, I hate that it's got seperate programs for animating and modelling. I could never stand using LW. If I find a model that's in LW I just convert it in 3d Exploration and then fix any procedural problems.

[Nico]

 

Originally posted by an0n:
Yeah, you use a gizmo and animate the turbulence of the fog.

nah, i just animate the glow  

Never could figure who really made 3ds... First, I think it was Autodesk. Then there was Kinetix wThe only real difference I've seen between max 3.5 and max 4 is the gizmos, that can you can now pull edges directly on the screen ( and that little round to move the map w/o moving the gizmo). One thing that piss me off, it's that in 3ds3, you pushed Tab and you could scale or move thing on just one dimension, and this is gone in the later 3dsmax... if the options, still there, I can't find it.

[KillMeNow]

i'm the other way around i got 3ds max 4 and lightwave seven(hehehe and maya 4 unlimited) but the layout and modeler in lightwave is a very easy system as the modeler is designed purely for modeling so is very nicely set up for that where as layout is better suited for animation and they connect via the hub so any updates you make in modeler are instantly applied in layout so there is no problem

and unlike max all the commands are very accessable in lightwave cause you know that in modeler you only got hte modeling tools

but nevermind i shall not bother to argue to hard this topic is clearly a max supporting one  

[Styxx]

3D Studio was made by Autodesk up to version 4. The first MAX was made by Kinetix, an Autodesk subsidiary. It stayed that way up to MAX r4, when it was handed over to Discreet, a Kinetix subsidiary it seems.

[an0n]

3D Studio is the origin of the .3ds file type. Autodesk mad .dxf if I'm not mistaken. I still think that with the possible exception of Maya, MAX is the best.

[KillMeNow]

i disagree but my opinion i hate max love lightwave but there you go - but anyway you say maya have you ever used it? just cause its got a good repuation can mean nothing - i haven't really done much with it yet but i might later - and your forgetting the other really big expensive package softimage xsi