Assigning Materials to Objects

Introduction to Materials and Mapping

Understanding Ambient Color and Light

 

Autodesk 3ds Max Tutorials > Materials and Mapping Tutorials > Introduction to Materials and Mapping > 

Creating Basic Materials

In this lesson, you create variations on the Standard material type by changing basic parameters such as color, glossiness, transparency, and shader type.

• The files for this lesson can be found in the tutorials/intro_to_materials folder.

Set the diffuse and specular color:

The Blinn shader has basic settings for color, glossiness, self-illumination and transparency.

1. Open intro_materials2.max.
   NoteIf you see the File Units: Mismatch dialog, choose the option Rescale The File Objects To The System Unit Scale.
2. Press M to open the Material Editor. If necessary, set the display to 5 x 3 Sample Windows; press X repeatedly until the sample spheres are largest.
3. Scroll down to the third row and click the center sample sphere; the material's name includes the string “Default”.
4. Rename this material using the editable name field above the rollouts. Call it myorange material.
5. From the Material Editor, drag myorange material onto the Orange object in the viewport. The orange in the viewport turns gray.

   

6. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, click the Diffuse color swatch to display the Color Selector. Change the Diffuse color to dark orange. Then close the Color Selector.

   

   Both the Diffuse color and Ambient color change to dark orange, because the colors are locked together. In the viewport, the Orange object's color changes to dark orange.

   

7. In the Specular Highlight group, experiment with the Specular Level parameter by dragging the spinner up and down while observing the sample sphere. Then set the Specular Level to 100.

   A highlight appears on the orange. The highlight gets stronger as you increase the Specular Level.

   

8. Experiment with the Glossiness parameter by dragging its spinner up and down while observing the sample sphere. Then set the Glossiness to 40.

   As Glossiness increases, the highlight gets smaller and more focused. This is how you control the shininess of an object.

   

9. Click the Specular color swatch and change the Specular color to a bright lemon yellow.

   The highlight takes on a yellow tinge.

   

Use wire and 2-sided:

You can use the Wire material option to make an object render in wireframe.

1. On the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, turn on Wire.

   The surface of the orange displays in wireframe, rather than as shaded faces.

   

2. Open the Extended Parameters rollout. In the Wire group, change the Size to 2.5.

   

3. Render the scene. The orange renders with a thicker wire.
   TipTo depict an object turning to wireframe, animate the wire thickness.
4. In the Shader Basic Parameters rollout, turn on 2-Sided. Now you can see the object's back side through the front wires.

   

5. Turn off 2-Sided and Wire. The object turns solid again.

Add self-illumination:

Self-illumination makes an object look as though it's lit from within. Use Self-Illumination to save rendering overhead when you want to create lights that do not need to illuminate surfaces, such as running lights along the perimeter of a spaceship.

1. On the Blinn Basic Parameters rollout, set Self-Illumination of myorange material material to 100 percent.

   The dark areas of the orange brighten, making the orange look incandescent.

   NoteIf you see a black color swatch instead of the spinner, turn off Color.

   

2. Right-click the Self-Illumination spinner to reset the value to 0.
3. Save your file as myorange.max.