Studio Lighting And Three Point Lighting System with 3ds Max and Vray

One of the cleanest and most common ways of presenting a product is the good old studio lighting. The reason why many product renders choose this approach is due to the fact that it isolates the product. This isolation in turn makes it so that nothing is taking away the attention from the hero model. So basically the basic studio lighting is with 3 lights that act as main, fill and backdrop lights. But even though it’s really simple on paper, making your renders look good does have it’s quirks. Well this video is all about how to make sure you end up with a very good looking final result.

Now if you have gone over the video you will get a better understanding on the studio lighting. You will know how to setup the lights, the reflectors and the backdrop as well. And also if you followed everything that was done, you now have a scene for future rendering.

So if you learned something new here today, all i can ask is that you share this video around. If it helped you there is a pretty good chance it might help someone else too.

So have a good day, and as always keep learning.

Modeling An Infinity Mirror with 3ds Max and Vray

Today’s video ended up as an idea basically because the real product looks rather cool. If you have ever seen an Infinity mirror element you will know what i mean. Basically it’s a mirror that has a strip of LED lights and it looks like a tunnel to infinity. Having said that, the way to make something like this is both genius and simple. In the videos below you will see how to model the Infinity mirror and get everything set up.

Modeling Phase

So after going over the video and following along you should now have the model made and ready to move on to the materials.

Materials and Lighting Phase

Normal progression after the model is made is to make the materials. The materials and lighting is where everything basically comes together. I will show you how to setup both of them with using Vray. So if you want to see me do that, go ahead and watch the video below.

And if you are now reading this, and you went over the videos you have a pretty good idea on how to make this effect. So no need to make this post any longer because it’s pretty straight forward.

All i can add at the end is that if you learned something new here, or you find the video helpful just help spread it around so it can reach more people and hopefully help someone else as well.

The Ultimate Vray Materials Course


Get The Ultimate Vray Materials Course

 

The road to photorealistic renders is a long one and it begins with having great materials. Knowing this fact, we will spend all of our focus in this course to make sure our materials look top notch.

Who would benefit from this ?

This course is meant for people that want to improve the quality of their renders. This means that anyone working in visualization or environment creation. So if your renders have a flat feel to them, and you want to make them more realistic this is the right course for you.

So how does it work ?

Since Material creation is one HUGE topic i have made it into a couple of different chapters. Each of those chapters will cover a different category of materials. As they stand right now we have Fabrics, Leather, Metals, Stone, Wood and Miscellaneous categories. Each material that was created was placed into the corresponding category for ease of following. Below in the videos you can see how some of the lessons are structured like.

First one is a video from the metal chapter:

Next one up is the Wood Chapter:

And third one is about fabric:

So is that all ?

If you are reading this at the time of writing ( September 20, 2019 ) there are 20 videos in the course. But the thing with materials is that as i said is a vast subject. So i have quite a few more videos to add as requested by some of the people who were awesome enough to give me the ideas on the Discord channel and YouTube chat panel. So hopefully by the end this course will be a hige repository of material creation tutorials that will span in the 35-50 video lessons.

Ok, what do i need to know to be able to follow along?

The course takes into account that you have the basic understanding of the user interface of 3ds Max, and Vray. So if you have those installed you shouldn’t have any issues with following the lessons. The way they have been structured is to make them easy to follow even for a beginner.  What is worth noting here is that the lessons were recorded with 3ds Max 2018 and Vray Next 4.20 so if you are using a different version you might see some minor cosmetic changes.

Sounds cool, where do i get it?

The course was placed up on Gumroad and you can get it from the button at the start of the post or the one bellow. The way it works is you will get access to download all the videos and files, and you will have access to all the files there posted now as well as any future updates to the course.


Get The Ultimate Vray Materials Course

 

Any questions ?

If you are still interested but have some questions you can always reach me at any of the links bellow.

YouTube Channel:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FWcV9We7DCh6IF-maSrrA?

Facebook Group:

https://www.facebook.com/DkCgi

Discord Channel:

https://discord.gg/P9B3ujY

Email:

[email protected]

Vray Lighting For Architectural Visualization

So here we are, the very first Premium Tutorial from DKCGI is alive. Right at the beginning i’ll leave a link where you can get the tutorial.

Get The Vray Lighting Course

Vray_Lighting_Premium

Who is aimed for?

Well since you are here reading this, there is a pretty good chance this is aimed at you. Namely this course is meant for people that are working with Vray, and Architectural Visualization.

Ok then, what do i need to have and know to follow along ?

Fair question. Anyone that has ever watched any of my YouTube tutorials you will know that i always try to explain everything. I’ve done the same thing in this premium tutorial as well. This does mean that you will need a functional knowledge of the 3ds Max User Interface. So pretty much anyone should be able to follow along.

As for the software version, i’ve used Max 2018 and Vray 3.6 in the videos. The Max scenes have been saved so they can be opened with 3ds Max 2011. As for the Vray version, as long as you have any of the 3.x versions you are good. If you are using a prior version of Vray, then the lesson theory will still apply but you will need to dig through the menus for the options.

Sounds good, what topics does the course cover ?

Another very good question. The way that i made this course it will cover all the most common scenarios for lighting.  This means we will go over topics like :

Setting Up a Daylight Environment, Using Light Portals, Setting Up Sunlight lit scenes, Lighting Up your scenes with HDRI, Multiple Different types of Lighting Fixtures, In depth look at Global Illumination, Using Materials to help with lighting and also using Environment Effects to help with lighting your scene.

Ok i’m still reading and it does sound interesting, where do i get it ?

Now this is the question that i got so many times on the live streams on YouTube. As i said it there i’ll write it here. The course has been made available thanks to Gumroad and that is where you can get it. It’s actually pretty easy, once you purchase the course you will be able to download all the files and they will be yours forever. So if you didn’t click on the button at the start of the post here it is again to get the course.

Get The Vray Lighting Course

Everything sounds great, anything else ?

Well yeah, the thing with Gumroad is that i can add files and videos to it in the future and you will get it without having to pay anything extra. This means that i can update this course with new tricks and tips and you will always get it first.

So that’s pretty much it honestly, except for one thing. This one goes out to everyone that gets the course. I would like to personally thank you for directly supporting me. What i would love is that after you get the video, leave a rating on it. Also if there is anything that is missing or you would like to see explained feel free and reach out to me either on the YouTube Channel, the Facebook group or directly on Discord.

So having said all of that, i hope you all enjoy this course and learn bunch of new tricks and techniques.

Once again at the end.

Thank you very much for supporting me.

Creating a Quilted Leather Chair model in 3ds Max

In today’s post we will take a look at how we can create a Quilted Leather chair. After finishing with this tutorial you will know how to approach any similar model. This whole topic will be divided into four phases.

Modeling The Backrest

     In the first part we will see how to start with the modeling of the back rest. First thing that we will notice here is that we won’t be modeling from a blueprint, but rather an image. Knowing this it means that we will have to deal with a bit of a perspective distortion. Since this is a simple geometry to create we will start off with a simple plane. But instead of me explaining what you can do is check out the video below and see me doing it.

Modeling The Seat and Legs

     In the second part of the tutorial series we will focus on the seat and the legs of the chair. Similar like in the previous video we we do some basic box modeling techniques. Since there isn’t really all that much to explain you can go ahead and check out the video below.

Modeling the Quilted Leather

     Now for the third part we go a bit deeper on the modeling front. For this we will start by selecting the surface that will be covered by the quilted leather. After this we will add a quick UVW unwrap so we can use SlideKnit. I have covered how to use this script in a previous video, but shouldn’t be hard to figure it out. After we have that we will create a base for the quilting and wrap it around the surface. All in all you will see me use a few tricks on how to fix up some issues and problems. So go ahead and check out the video below to see me do it.

Unwrapping The Model

     In the last part of the series we will go over how to unwrap the model. For this we will use Unfold3D and will see how to get the model ready for texturing. Since this is a pretty straight forward topic as well check out the video below.

Final Thoughts and Resources

     This was a fun model to create, and it did have some challenges but in the end we made it. I did use couple of scripts so here you can go and get those scripts.

Vertex Cleaner / Shiva 3D

SlideKnit Script

And also i would like to leave the reference images that i was using if someone wants to follow along.

03 04 05 06 07

Modeling a Chandelier with 3ds Max and Vray

Today we go on another modeling tutorial adventure. For today’s topic i have chosen a model that received a request a while back. That was how to model a specific chandelier.

Modeling Phase

Like always, modeling starts with setting up a blueprint to follow. So if you want to follow along with me, get the image from below. Now the actual modeling for this chandelier model took a bit longer then what i initially expected. Due to this  i decided to split it up in two parts. In the first part we will go over how to create the cage of the chandelier. And then we will also create some of the elements for the inner parts. So check it out in the first part of the video below.

In the second part of the video we will continue with creating the rest of the elements. That being the crystals, the light bulbs and the holders for them. You will also see how to get the crystals perfectly aligned on the handing part of the chandelier. So check this out in the second part of the video below.

Texturing And Materials

When creating modeling tutorials i usually don’t go over the materials. Main reason is that to me it seems very simple, but i’ve received some requests so here it is.

Generally when creating materials for a model, first thing you do is separate how many materials will you need. After this you need to go ahead and address those material needs. In this model it ended up being three materials. The metal, the crystal and the material for the light bulb. Before doing any of the materials though you need to see if you have to do UVW unwrapping. For this model, i got away with doing the simple UV mapping with the UV Map modifier.

The metal material will show you how to control the reflections and color of the shader. The crystal material will how you how to get that colorful refractive look that makes crystal unique. And the shader for the light bulbs will show you a few tricks on getting that glow effect. So all in all if you want to see how i did it check out the video below.

Final Thoughts

So if you followed the videos now you know how to model a chandelier like this. It was fun creating it for me, and all i can say is i hope it was helpful to you. Also if there is anything that you would like to see me create a tutorial about leave a comment on the YouTube channel and i will do my best to help you out. So until next time i leave you with the blueprint for the chandelier.

Chandelier

 

Creating rounded edges in 3ds Max with VRay

The idea

Here we are for what is probably the last post of the year. This post actually came up as a sort of a way of me making it easy on myself. I had to explain how to help get smooth rounded edges without adding extra geometry. And on top of that there needed to be some randomness to the edges roughness. With this in mind i decided to create this tutorial that might help some of you ou there as well.

The Video

For the video i actually decided to go with a simple model of a table and bench. I’ll go over the difference of using chamfered edges over sharp edges. After that we will see how to get the illusion of rounded edges without actually adding in extra geometry. We will see how using a VRay Edges Texture can be used in the diffuse and the bump slot. And later in the video we will also see how to take this one step further and add variation. All in all it was a simple, yet fun video to make so i hope you guys enjoy it.

Conclusion

After watching this video you probably have an idea of how to use this in your future projects. And with this we end today’s post and this year’s last video as the date this got posted is 31 of December. So as i am finishing up this post i would like to wish everyone a Happy New year and may the next year bring you happiness and prosperity.

Adding Dust and Aging Effect with V-Ray

Today we have a new post, and the videos that will be part of the post will be a part of a new “category” of posts that i want to do. Namely i want to have videos that will be a sort of a quick tip type posts. The idea behind these kinds of posts will be to take a certain theme, or a question that i’ve been asked and dive straight to it without any additional explanation. The idea for this came from a few readers that asked for more direct approach to the issue which would result with shorter videos and more directed videos. Now i am well aware that these types of videos can’t be made for all the topics that i choose to cover, but for certain things it might actually work quite well.

For the very first crack at the quick tip video i chose to make a video and answer a simple question, How to add aging or fading effect to your V-Ray materials? This is a very basic thing that you might want to know as it’s always a plus knowing how to add some variance to your model, and in the approach that i will show you in the video you will see how you can get that result by using a procedural mask and VrayDirt material. So if you want to see how you can do this type of thing procedural opposed to unwrapping it and manually making a distressed texture then check out the video below.

The second video covers a topic that’s a bit similar to the first video, but instead of adding procedural damage or fading we will see how we can add some dust to our model. After that we will see how we can setup a second texture ID channel and use it to help us with giving the dust a more natural “disturbed” look. So again if this is something that you would like to know and you aren’t really sure how to go about doing it, then check out the second video.

Ok so if you’ve watched the videos and are still reading this then i would like to ask you guys to leave your comments either here, or on YouTube and tell me if you liked these shorter quick tip type tutorials. And for now that would be it, like always if you did enjoy them like and share them around and keep coming back for more.

Studio Lighting in 3ds Max and V-Ray

In today’s post we are going to deal with one of the fundamental things that anyone that wants to work with CG should know, and that is how to light up your models. Now i have to go and say it right from the start, lighting on it’s own is one colossal theme to tackle and if you really want to know how it works, then you will probably need to invest some time into some proper professional photography knowledge. So having clarified that i want to say that this post is going to be more about the technical part of Max and V-Ray and how to get the lights inside 3ds Max to behave like real life lights would do. So enough with the intro and lets jump down on explaining and watching the videos. Initially it was supposed to be one video, but instead of making it one long video i made it into two parts so it’s easier for you guys to follow it. (Yeah i know i’m good that way)

In the first video we will explain very briefly what a studio scene is, and then we will see a few examples. You will see me reference an image of a model lit up in different scenarios, and you can get the link to the reference image here. After the brief intro we will create a simple backdrop. Then we will go about creating light sources, control how the reflection is going to look like, how we can modify it so it ends up looking like a commercial body spray can, and we will even explain a bit about the three point lighting solution. At the end of the first video we will even explain a bit about the importance of the warm and cool lights. So if this sounds like something that you would like to see check out the video.

In the second video we will continue on the same scene as previously but that is where all similarities end. We will start by explaining what a reflector is and how and when would we use one in our scenes. After that we will explain what a diffuser is and how to construct one that we can use in 3ds Max, and right after that we will explain what a light box is and how to construct one as well. With the introduction of the diffuser and Lightbox we will end with with issues in the lighting of our scene that will derive from the GI pass so we will also go over how to deal with those issues and get them to provide us with a clean render. So all in all it should be an interesting video to watch, so if what you read up here sounds like something that might interest you go ahead and watch the second video.

And with this we are coming to an end of our post for today. It was fun making these videos, and depending on the feedback i get on this video i might make a few more about lighting as that is a theme that seems like an endless pit of information that always has something new to offer.

So like always subscribe, like and share and i’ll see you all in the next post.

Creating Custom Floor Textures in 3ds Max and Photoshop

Today’s post comes as a direct result to a request i got about making a real world scale floor texture. It sounds pretty straight forward when you say it like that, i mean you get the project with the texture for the floor but then comes the realization that the image that the client sent you is something more in tune to a thumbnail, then an actual size for a high quality texture. On top of that he or she might want to have a different color in the pattern of the texture. This is where things can get a bit complicated as you are basically left with a task in which you need to deliver an end result but you don’t have the resources delivered to you, but rather you have to make them yourselves. Once you get to this point in the project, you might start thinking that you are in trouble if you don’t know how to make those high quality textures. Well this is where today’s post comes into play and will explain exactly how to go about dealing with this issue, and hopefully resolve it. Now when i had the initial idea about this video in my head it was a fast 20 min video, but as soon i started recording i actually came to a bit of a revelation as the theme was a tad bit bigger then i initially thought, so in the end i decided to split this into three logical parts opposed to having one huge hour and a half video. Since we do have a bit to cover lets get started with it.

In the first part of the video we will setup the image that we will create (you can choose any design that you might need for this part) and then we will start with the outlining process of the whole thing. After that we will see how we can get the outlined object scaled so we have a realistic scale model, and in the end we will render out a template which we will be able to use in the process. So this is where you would be advised to go and see the video for yourself.

In the second part ( and i do know this is a bit of a longer video ) we take the template that we made in 3ds Max and we bring it into Photoshop. Now i did my best to keep the video as newbie friendly (n00b fR13ndly) so that everyone can follow along even if you are not too proficient with Photoshop. We will cover a bit of layering management, some masking as well as some hand on paining and effects adding. All in all this ended up being a long but in depth video which will leave us with a fully customizable template that we can later use for any type of floor. Also you will hear me mention a few times that you can use this exact process to get Marble and stone floors which is totally true and applicable. But enough with the explanation, go ahead and check out the video.

In the last video we take what we made in Photoshop and we dive back into 3ds Max and see how we can use all those textures. Now the emphasis in the third video is put on using Real World Scale and to explain to you how you can get your textures to use real world scale referencing rather then the default tiling option. So go ahead and check out the video for yourself.

And with this we are coming to an end of our post for today. We covered quite a bit of different things and even though i didn’t expect the videos to be that long in the end i kinda enjoyed making them and i really hope you guys will enjoy watching them and even learn a few new things from them.

So like always subscribe, like and share and i’ll see you all in the next post.

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