VRay for 3ds Max: What is it and how it works.

VRay is the engine that makes your scene looks realistic. It is the magic that makes it look really great. It is the final touch of your amazing render.

But in order to make this magic work – it, of course, must be mastered.

While I was looking for ways to make my renders to look better, I mostly ran into the "read and do" tutorials. They guide you through the settings step by step but don't really explain what each of the settings and buttons actually do. Now don't get me wrong, these tutorials are great and usually work for me, but at times I felt really frustrated for not getting a more detailed explanation about how things work on a deeper level.

So I kept digging and searching for something to give me a true knowledge about this engine.
And you know what? I found what I was looking for.

I found two sites that give you a full explanation about how the VRay engine works.
The first one is VRayElite where Joe Pizzini gives an overview on all the settings. If you click the images you will find an official VRay manual with ALL the theoretical info.

Another site is Aversis where everything is explained in a very simple and understandable language. The writer also gives you some useful tips for the effective usage of these.

On both of these sites you will find some wonderful "read and do" tutorials.

Don't skip them.

How to make your object glow

One of my students came to me with a project that included some neon light in her interior.
Since I had no idea how to make a neon effect, I, as always, started the search. Among those simulating the neon effect I ran into this simple tutorial that allows you to Make the object glow.


I did learn the technique and found it really useful while making this Christmas tree.
See how the decorations glow? Nice, huh?

If you'd like to learn how to make such a tree – you are welcome to go to this Making of a Christmas tree tutorial.

Have fun :)

3ds Max – a Modifiers war: Loft VS Lathe!!

A couple of days ago I was browsing through Tutorialized and and found this amazing Umbrella tutorial for 3ds Max. Very simple yet very informative, it offers another – and I'd dare say – more creative way of modeling.

I actually did model an umbrella, but on the way I realized that a second part of this tutorial is a perfect way to model many other things.


So I've made this Wooden Candle Stick.

It took me about 15 minutes to make it (sounds like a part of a 5 min cake recipe) – no prior sketches, just playing with dots.
I could, of course, use Spline + Lathe Modifier, but this way was more fun.

To model a Candle itself I highly recommend to used this Candle Video tutorial – but you must register before you download the video.

Let there be 3D!!!!!

This blog is to become a collection of links that are related to theoretical and practical applications of Computer Graphics and Animation, including tutorials, galleries, articles and sites. Since I was (and still am) eager to know as much as possible about 3D CG, I created my own list of essential CG info resources. As my list was growing, I found it equally hard to find the necessary material either on web or my computer. So the main purpose of this blog is to create a collection of all the info that I ever found useful (for me) without the need to search for it whenever I decide to use it again.

The first link will lead you to Tutorialized, a well known website providing all-kind and all-level tutorials including 2&3D graphics, web design, video editing, programming and many more. Since I'm basically self taught (except a short course in college), I practically (still) live there. If you're not familiar with this site, check it out. And if you're new to CG – this one is made for you.