My first MaxScript =D (using my Japa-col)

[ScreamingFox]

My first MaxScript, a Yari (Japanese spear) maker.. The user will be able to choose any part of the Yari, etc.. I made it today and a 'release' version would be much much improved (things like images on the buttons, etc, etc..).. Got very happy with the results

I will make the Japanese Wakizashi/Katana, and the Japanese Naginata creators, along with the Medieval European Sword and Spear scripts =D.. (i have to make the medieval european parts still.. and improve the Japanese katana/naginata/yari models )...

On this script i used some of my old Japanese weapons parts collection (the 'Ten Thousand Swords and a Hundred Thousand Spears' (but the collection did not had the script to go along with it.. xd, just the models, etc.. just a collection of models of parts, with some benefits (blades, hilts, guards, etc, etc.. all ready to import (they come on the right spot and size, etc..)), etc.. =D





REMOVED

@<i><b><a href="http://forum.ragezone.com/members/440911.html" target="_blank">Edit</a></b></i>:

Now with the possibility of 'double sided' spears, and the ability to add a new part easily.. I will have to remake a lot of parts to be able to apply the 'LOD' and other stuff properly, etc.. now the subdivisions and LOD only work on the blades and hilt..:z..

 

[ScreamingFox]

First sword scabbard =D (it is not quite finished XD)..

(Tachi Sword form, shobu-zukuri blade with nodachi tsuka on ambidextrous mount with modern tsuba)
(obs: Except for the 'wood' (procedural map), all the materials are yet without diffuse map, i am yet trying to learn to make the script 'generate' texture stuff like a good glossiness map, etc.. so the user can choose (on the plugin panel) material characteristics, etc.. All parts have the SM and Mat ID separation, and a script generated multi-sub material with 300 different materials for the parts (on the end, the user would choose to bake (will generate a render to texture) or just attach the parts.. I am also making a 'arm soldiers' feature, so the user can arm a full army with random weapons (weapons generated with random parts, so all soldiers would have a different weapon (ex: generate weapon by soldier (swordsman, spearman, etc..) link and align to the hand bone (user will have to chose between right or left handed) of characters.. since the pivot will be exactly at the holding point, all soldiers will hold their weapons correctly).. xd)

The scabbards will bend along with the blade region (a scabbard will accept any curvature of the blade) .. The new script works as a 'primitive' on 3dsMax (create the weapons like a 'box','cylinder', etc..) at the left side creation panel .. will post some more images later.. (ah, and this new script will make any weapon, not only spears =D)

 

[drksage]

:O thats sick! the blade looks nice (dont like the blue handle though). Did you create all the models? Does it take a lot of time to create 3D images? I wanted to try and learn to create some things (like cities and blades), but in Blender.

 

[ScreamingFox]

Yes i made the models, they are an 'update' of some weapon parts i made a couple years ago.. For now that 'blue' is just a color really, but i will improve it also (the user will be able to choose the color/aspects of parts and elements of those parts)...

I also am getting very satisfied with the new models, since they all have a nice Smoothing Groups separation, i can use it very lowpoly (to export to games) or high poly (with turbosmooth respecting the smoothing groups (for blades, for some other parts the (surface) smoothing is a bit more complicated) for rendering and etc.. ..

About images, an image such as this sword render, it is quite 'instantaneous', since it has only this sword in scene and no lights..

(took like, 1 second (just changed the tsuba (guard) on the lower one)

But some images such as landscaping and architectural visualization a render can take a lot of time to render, like this examples:

(took 2 hours to render)

(took 45min to render)

(took 5 hours to render (on 'Linear Workflow' (to printable HDR on high resolution).. this one is a JPG so it is kind of 'dull' on the lighting..)



But the 'rendering' time is mostly a 'time to relax'.. If the render takes half an hour or less, you can watch is as it render, but for more time consuming renders i like to leave the pc rendering and go to sleep ..

 

[Mucski]

So animated movies take 5 hours to render 1 frame? No wonder they need 1 year to complete one o.o

 

[Rey]

So animated movies take 5 hours to render 1 frame? No wonder they need 1 year to complete one o.o

And then, we watch it in 1~2 hours O_O

__________

ScreamingFox : You should sell images like that and work for big companies.

 

[ScreamingFox]

Mucksi: Hehehe... Yeah that's right .. But surely it is because my pc is weak.. But high quality renders can really take days even on a 'very powerful' home computer or even a 'super gaming' pc..... probably an heavy 'star wars' scene, such as the scenario from the "Anakin vs Obi-Wan" scene would probably take several days to render on my pc (i mean, to render each frame )XDDD...


And it is not very common, but i know that a much 'powerful' (intense processing demanding) render can even end a weak pc D= ("a glorious end with smoke and sparkles mwahaha" XDD)...


For more 'expensive' (time consuming and complex) productions, it is really expensive.. As you have perceived, it would be very impractical to do a movie rendering it on just one computer..

But, fortunately, for these sort of situations we can use the 'Network Rendering' or 'Render Farms'..


A Network Render uses a group of pcs to render, one being the 'master' and the others being 'render slaves'.. on an hypothetical and 'perfect' situation, with 2 pcs, the render would be 2 times faster, with 3 pcs would be 3 times faster and so on..

A "Render Farm" is a paid service on which you send your complete 3d scene (with all the model and texture files, etc..) and they, with a building filled with rackmount computers, render it very very very fast.. The 'Industrial Light and Magic' has like a brutal great corridor filled to the ceiling with 'power (rackmount) pcs' that render their stuff.. So, if you have 'the power', any render can be very fast, etc.. A render farm that i know renders stuff 90 times faster than here at home.. You kind of 'buy hours' on a render farm (you buy 'the processing time', not a quantity of rendered frames, since some scenes are way heavier than others), etc..


For an animation production with a strict deadline, the minimum price to charge is 200 USD per second, due to the RenderFarm expenses and lots of other stuff..

 

[Rey]

@ScreamingFox

200USD ea SECOND ?!

 

[ScreamingFox]

Yes 200usd a second (as far as i know)... Since one second of animation would have between 16 and 33 frames (people usually use 28 frames per second) and each frame has to be rendered, that is why it is kind of expensive.. If i would make an animation of an architectural scene, remember that 1 frame here could take 5 hours to render.. And 1 second would have 28 frames, and also, when rendering, it is best to leave the pc just rendering, so, for an animation it is more expensive really, since it is prohibitively unpractical to render at home (in this case, a render farm would be mandatory, or else the rendering of 2 minutes could take months/years..)


But of course for a more simple scene/animation, i could make cheaper than that, since some stuff would render fast, etc.. ..

 

[Rey]

DAMN ! the creator will be a millionaire lol !

 

[sunnyboy]

They look flawlessly beautiful

 

[ScreamingFox]

@sunnyboy: Thanks.. but not yet, but that's the intention =D..

S3CT0R: Not so much, since most of the times these kind of productions are made by a team, and usually it is like a 20 second or 1 minute (rare) and for advertising.. Some times it is even a quick logo presentation for an example, which is a few seconds.. It usually has deadlines so most of times in order to do the job on time people do it on teams.. So this 200 a second is for stuff like the team's workforce, for the time, for the computer's "stress", for the renderfarm, etc.. Animation is really an 'expensive' thing.. A model, a rig, a scene, a character, all would be much cheaper than an high quality rendered animation..

Oh, but for cinema it could be more than 'merely' 200 a second, movie producers are very 'millionaires' hehe..(ex: At 200 a second, on an 80 minute production it is 960k (remember that it would be kind of 360000 frames, each one taking 5 hours to render on a regular pc (would take approximately one million and eight hundred thousand hours to render.. (impracticable.. a renderfarm on such a case is mandatory)) on my calculator.. not so much for Hollywood (would be much for me of course hehehe) =D)

 

[ScreamingFox]

O think i will make yet another part for the weapons, being the 'scabbards' (as of now the scabbards are added as a 'blade decoration'), so the user can make lots of different scabbards, etc..

I researched a bit about tachi scabbards and incremented that fist one.. But i will probably separate those pieces when i make the new scabbard logistics, etc..

(without diffuse map (ex: only colors, without texture yet))

 

[ScreamingFox]

Starting the 'medieval European' blades ;b

('ink and paint' render)

obs: In the historical versions some blades does not present the central line (a strongly defined central line) but on the plugin all blades which does not present a central line will have a version with it (the 'central line' or 'shinogi' on Japanese terms..).. I am making according to some Oakeshott books and drawings ..




Edit:

Type 'x' sword test

Type 'x2a' test

(attempt at an Indian hilt xd)

(discovered a nice 'material effect' to make 'effect meshes' or even 'lightsabers' XD)

(further testing the 'aura' material =D)

 

[ScreamingFox]

Testing some texturing techniques

(textures only ("game-ready"), without reflection, etc..)

(on image:
- Naga Sword
- Tulwar
- Fantasy sword with generalistic Indian style..
)

Edit: This 'Naga-Sword' hilt is very interesting .. Looks like the user can 'punch' with these.. This one has a 'mean', heavy looks.. nice to a monster or over-muscled crude supervillain (dual-handling of course XDDD) =D

 

[Rey]

Amazing, you might want to work with big communities to get $$$

 

[ScreamingFox]

Ah.. Thanks ... But those models are really mediocre.. I could assemble hundreds of thousands of such weapons with my collection (will coordinate it with a plugin, so a user can assemble any kind of melee weapon,etc =D..)..

I just got a little excited with some texturing techniques =D.. XDDD..

 

[Rey]

You may want to think twice then