2024-2025

Quarter 1

End of Quarter 1 Reflection

This quarter I learned a lot. We went over many tools such as: Splines, Pro boolean objects, basic and detailed surface modeling, animation, etc. I can actually model now, instead of like the beginning of the year. back then I could barely put raw ideas into the computer, and it was a mess of shapes in a super chaotic fashion all in order to barely form a silhouette of my reference. Now, with a given idea, I can turn a simple 6 sided block into a full tank, or into a retro-style spaceship. I can more accurately display my ideas into a digital form, and my skills are growing each model.

There are always issues of course, I always find small road blocks or setbacks - modifiers are limited in their power, and interact in undesirable ways for my purposes. For these things, I had to rely on more basic tools and processes, doing things manually. Unfortunately this made things seem more artificial and simple. This makes me have to pray that some random modifier in the selection will help that. For example: when I made a hose recently for my final basic modeling project, I was hoping I could use bend modifiers to create the snake-like structure. When I tried, the modifier could not give the result I wanted, and I had to start over. I selected the end of a cylinder each segment, extruding it continuously. I had to snake it around into the desirable shape. It resulted in a slightly choppy, segmented hose that looked like an old bad 3d video game from the 90s. Fortunately, a modifier existed called MeshSmooth, and this did what it sounds like, smoothing out the edges and making it a more desirable shape.

Next quarter, I hope to refine my current skills. I want to discover new techniques in modeling. And I want to create a masterpiece I never dreamed of making before, something complex, but well thought out. With 3 quarters left, I hope at some point I will be able to go back to previous creations and improve them, or have them contribute in future scenarios like a space battle, or a screwdriver screwing into a bolt. I hope to be able to make an extremely complicated model in a day, using tools and techniques extremely efficiently. I hope to know the ins-and-outs of how most modifiers work, and just gain a deeper understanding of the program.

Quarter 2

UVW Mapping Reflection - 1/27/25

My whole experience with UVW mapping has been unfavorable, but definitely important for my overall skill. The process can be very complicated and time consuming, but it's hard to ruin a project completely. A material can easily be readjusted to the perfect style, the template can be shifted around however necessary, and materials can be applied to anything you choose. 

Most often, my challenges were simple human error, repeating processes for each template, like with them mech. Another struggle I faced was designing a map for the models. Learning to understand how photoshop worked took a long time, we spent two simple assignments in December just learning how to work with it. For one, we made a simple wooden crate. Me and my friends kept going back and forth, trying to get our designs right, figuring out how to add more details. Once the creating process for the material was done, it was straight forward. We assigned each side of a cube with an ID, put each side's design into the tool, plugged them into the right nodes, and hopefully, you would have a clean box. Occasionally, the sides would be rotated the wrong way. This could've been solved a few ways, one of them was through Photoshop, just rotate the image a little. Another way was to do it in 3DS Max itself. In the Physical Material's options, near the bottom of all the adjustments you can make, there's an option to rotate the image.

I wouldn't say I'm proud of any skills this unit, but I am glad I learned how to use it. The use of photoshop also made me grow lots of skills in that region, which can be very useful for future projects. Whatever future models we create, I'll be able to give them my own personal textures and designs. The ability to model is worthless if you cannot add a design and texture to the model or scene, and this unit wraps my whole skill set into a useful package.

End of Quarter 2 Reflection

Throughout this quarter I have learned how to use a UVW map, how to design a material in photoshop, and how to apply designs to a map. These are very important skills to have, because in order to make a realistic model look real, you need to add texture. A street is a very simple model, but to add bricks, depth, puddles, and tire tread marks, you need to know how to make that in a material, and you need to know how the UVW map pulls everything together. 

The best assignment to learn how to understand UVW mapping was the Tank. It was a simple model, but the template was complicated. I had to redo the design a few times in order for it to turn out well. Eventually, the design turned out okay, and the camouflage design turned out fairly accurate. 

Next quarter, I hope to further learn how to design sets and create more realistic models and designs. I hope to be able to make a medium scale environment, and a model in that space. I hope to further my understanding of how lighting interacts with different models and their textures, in order to create more realistic renders and scenes. This will also assist with the quality of my future animations, when we eventually reach that unit.

Quarter 3

Rendering Techniques Reflection

The lights and shadows changed the outcome the most, as well as the resolution. These made the style and theme of the picture shift a lot. Many slight adjustments are needed to get a great render solution.

The rendering process was lengthy and annoying. For my second and third arnold renders, they had to be left overnight to render. I couldn't use a quick render to see what my final product was going to look like so I could tweak it. I had to hope that everything was perfect and tweaked enough, and then spend the rest of the day rendering. Many of the lower powered renders took only a minute, but for the high quality quicksilver and scanline renders, they would take over an hour. I could leave to go help a friend, chill and talk to them, come back, and they would only progress by a few percentages.

The lighting and resolution had the greatest effects. Lighting can go wrong in all sorts of ways, in some of my renders, the shadows would be shifted weirdly, colors would mix wrong, and light would reflect unrealistically. I had to tweak random settings until one would fix the problem mostly. But sometimes, the next day, a problem would just go away on it's own. 

I think Arnold produced the best results, the Arnold lights had a unique style that was also easy to work with. I think it preformed better because it focused on chunks of the picture, going over repeatedly until it was finished, and it put more power into chunks that needed it, versus an equal amount of power for a reflection and a stale wall.  

They were all pretty easy to use, but the transition from Arnold to Scanline and trying to understand how the lights interact differently was hard. Arnold lights are easy to use, but photometric lights can cause lots of issues if you slightly adjust one setting too far. That was what I found to be the most difficult when setting up a render.

Scanline has an unfavorable approach to shadows. I don't want to use it unless I'm trying to make my render look a more digital quality. Quicksilver was poor. It was unfavorable because it was giving off strange hues and blending colors and poor shadows. Arnold gave a bright happy fuzzy look to the lighting, which is interesting.

I would use Arnold for childish lighting or even a casino- it gives off a colorful, luring, and innocent vibe. Scanline is a realistic, security footage style render. It captured how light worked fairly well, but also is more dull than the others. Quicksilver is just a quick easy render, maybe useful for vast scenes with lots of far away lighting and shadows.

Snow Day 3pt Lighting 

This image was crazy difficult to get. For my materials, I used a candle for warm lighting, and two little flashlights. For a contrast with the candle I had a bottle of Windex, which gave me a cool blue lighting. Then I had the third flashlight to give me the neutral white spotlight on the right side of the picture. The candle could have been a little closer, however holding the bottle of Windex, aiming a flashlight through it perfectly, and taking a picture through my phone all at the same time made me not notice how weak the candle light had gotten. I had to do this picture in my bathroom, because it was the only place in my house without strong natural light.

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Snow Day Game Asset

For this model I decided to make a simple video game style spaceship. I used spare Legos to make a prototype. They were pretty easy to use, and I have an abundance of them left from my childhood. I built it going for a slim space ship kind of look, referencing halo ship designs, as seen from the top-down perspective in the tail. For the rest, I was improvising as I went.

The only difficulties I faced were missing parts. I wanted a symmetrical look and some colors didn't match, so I had to improvise the design and go a different route. As you can see however, I didn't care much about it having different colored pieces. 

This wouldn't be a hard ship to recreate in 3ds Max, the cockpit is a simple cone, the wings could be a box or flattened out cone as well. The body is a simple box, adding a few extra details on top. The rear engine is a simple cylinder. The only complicated thing to do is all the smaller pieces I added in for detail: pipes, vents, wires and supports, safety lights. For much of it, I would have to edit the polygons to create a better blend of all the shapes, but it doesn't use many small pieces or details, so I wouldn't need to go too in-depth or use lots of polys. 

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Exploring Cameras Reflection (3/12/25)

The Lens size changes the field of view of the render. It zooms the subject in closer or out far away, without needing to change the distance of the camera.

A clipping mask is very useful. If there is something going on behind the scene and it's too busy. the renderer will waste time focusing on that. It makes the renderer more efficient.

Target cameras and free cameras are both very useful. You can use a free camera to work with an evolving scene, where you need to move around a room and capture every detail. Target cameras are very useful for locking into an object, so that no matter where the camera is, it can still focus on that one subject.

They cause the render to change in zoom, distortion, and the brightness.

I prefer target cameras because they're easy to use, and I could use them for a car racing scene, or sport scene, or really any quick pace scene. 

Video Game Scene Reflection (3/12/25)

This is my recreation of a scene from Halo: Reach. To get to my Final scene it took many hours of work. I had to make realistic mountains, fire, accurate moonlight, and I needed to map and give everything a realistic enough material. 

I ended up having to learn 3ds Max's particle system for the smoke and fire, making it realistic enough without having my computer light a fire in itself. My moonlight ended up being a point light, looking down on the entire space. I had to appropriately balance the power and color, so it would show the depressing dull color of the original scene. I decided to make much of the fire pure light, covered up by the mountain range. Many point and quad lights went into the fire, showing off small details in the ship. decided to use Arnold for my renderer. It provided the best lighting for the fires and atmosphere, but scanline and quicksilver could have worked to give the render a more digital feel like the original.

Learning how to create the smoke was a challenge. We hadn't learned how to use particle systems in this class, so I had to look it up myself. I had to make an appropriate amount of particles to simulate heavy smoke, but I also needed to capture the raging fire below reflecting off the smoke.

If I had more time, I would make the mountain range a little more accurate to the original, and I would've given the ship more details similar to the original, the remake looks much more like a beginner's design than I'd hoped for, and there's many parts I didn't have time to replicate.

Basic Animation Reflection (3/20/25)

Adjusting the time configuration will change a lot with your animation. If you don't account for something, your FPS, playspeed, and video length will all be messed up. You need to make sure you account everything.

• What challenges did you face when keyframing the different transformations?

Keyframing was fairly simple. They state where a specific movement starts and ends for an object on the timeline. At first I struggled with good timing, making sure the animations started when I wanted. Sometimes the next animation would start before I wanted.

• How did the frame rate (15 fps) impact the smoothness of your animation?

The frame rate was slow and did not blend well. If I increased it, it would look great. I decided to keep it at 15, because more frames means more renders.

• Which animation mode did you use and why did you select it?

I used set key, because I prefer more control over my work. I would use auto if it was a lower level of animation, or I didn't have a major preference for the outcome.

• How does this exercise relate to animation techniques used in game design? 

This exercise relates animation techniques in game design because they both use certain frame rates, and the animation is broken down into individual movements. These can all add up to produce a realistic fluid game animation.

Editing Curves

Animating 4 Corners Reflection