Autodesk Contributors - 3ds Max 5.1 Tutorials: Welcome to the World of 3ds max 5

Tutorial

Accessing Materials

Materials in three different places

When you work with 3ds max, you access materials from three different places: from the Material Editor, from scenes, or from an external collection of predesigned materials called a material library . The next exercise shows you how to load materials from a material library into the Material Editor.

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

Load a material library:

1. Reset 3ds max.

   Answer Yes if you receive the dialog asking if you really want to reset the program.

2. Open intro_materials.max .

3. Press M to open the Material Editor.

   The sample slot in the upper-left corner has a white border around it, indicating that it is active.

   

4. Right-click the active sample slot. From the right-click menu, choose 5 x 3 Sample Windows. The sample palette redraws to display 15 slots.

   
   

5. In the Material Editor toolbar, click Get Material.

   The Material/Map Browser appears.

   

6. In the Material/Map Browser > Browse From group, select Material Library.

7. In the File group, click Open.

   The default Material Library, 3dsmax.mat , is displayed.

8. In the Open Material Library dialog, navigate to the \tutorials\intro_to_materials directory and choose still_life.mat .

   The names of the materials appear in a list.

9. In the Material/Map Browser, click View List+Icons from the top row of icons.

   Thumbnails of the materials appear next to each name.

   

Transfer materials to the Material Editor:

1. In the Material/Map Browser, select the material named orange .

   A thumbnail of the Orange material appears in the preview window.

2. Drag the thumbnail from the Browser to the active sample slot in the Material Editor.

   The material appears in the sample slot. The name orange appears in the drop-down list just below the palette.

   

3. Click the next sample slot to the right. The slot becomes active.

4. In the Material/Map Browser, double-click shiny apple . The shiny apple material appears in the second sample slot.

   

5. Scroll the Material/Map Browser to the bottom of the list.

6. Drag the wood countertop material from the list to the third sample slot.

   The third sample slot activates, displaying the wood countertop material.

   

Get materials from a MAX file:

You can just as easily get materials from MAX files as from material libraries. The procedure is nearly the same.

1. Activate the next sample slot to the right of the wood countertop material.

2. In the Material/Map Browser, check that Browse From is still set to Material Library.

3. Choose Open from the File group.

4. Pull down the Files Of Type list and choose .max instead of .mat .

5. Navigate to the \tutorials\still_life folder, and then select Still_life_animated.max .

6. Double-click the material named leaf .

   

   The leaf material is transfered from the MAX file to the Material Editor.

Get materials from objects in the scene:

There is a material already at work in this scene, but it is not in the Material Editor. It is applied to all the objects in the scene, so that they look like they are all made of the same substance. You transfer the material from the scene to the Material Editor using the eyedropper cursor to sample the material.

1. Activate the fifth sample slot in the top row of materials.

2. In the Material Editor, click Pick Material From Object.

3. Use the eyedropper to click any object in the viewport.

   The material, beige putty , is displayed in the sample slot. Because the material is currently assigned to objects in the scene and in the Material Editor, the corners of the sample slot display triangles. In 3ds max parlance, this is called a "hot" material.

   Note: If the triangular corners are hollow, this indicates the material is assigned to the scene. If the corners are solid, it means the object that has been assigned the material is currently selected.

For practice:

1. Transfer the rest of the materials from the material library into the Material Editor. Arrange them in a way that makes sense to you.

2. To copy and move a material, drag the sample to a new slot.

3. To remove a material from a sample, press Reset Map/Mtl to Default Settings.

4. To view more sample slots, use the scroll bars at the right and bottom of the sample palette, or change the right-click settings to 6 X 4 Sample Windows.

   Note: While the sample palette can show you 24 samples at any one time, there is no limit to the number of materials you can assign to a scene. Once a material is assigned to an object, that sample in the palette can be reset and a new material created.

5. Pan the sample palette by dragging inbetween the slots.

6. To examine a material up close, double click the sample slot, or right-click the slot and choose Magnify.

7. Save your file as mymaterials1.max .

Tutorial