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How do you make realistic metal in 3ds max?

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Message 1 of 6
fdfxd2
22886 Views, 5 Replies

How do you make realistic metal in 3ds max?

I have been trying and trying.... But nothing seems to work.

--My last resort is to go to a resort
5 REPLIES 5
Message 2 of 6
Pyro777
in reply to: fdfxd2

I've been where you are. (And still am a little) Metal is probably the most challenging material for me to create.  Much of it relies on the enviroment that the metal is reflecting.  What sort of metal are you trying to make? Aluminum, brusjed stainless, galvanized, ect, ect? Is it in a scene with other objects or is it a stand alone product shot?  A little more info and I can probably give you some decent advice.


Dean

Max 2019
Win 10 64-bit; Dual Xeon E5-2699 v4 @ 2.20 GHz; 64 GB Ram
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080
V-Ray 4.02.05.00001
Message 3 of 6
samab
in reply to: fdfxd2

Metal comes in many types and conditions, so it's hard to give specific advice without a specific question. But if you look almost all the way down the first page of the forum, you may find this thread. Check out the tips that I link to in my post, and read the rest of it if that happens too be to look you want.

Message 4 of 6
fdfxd2
in reply to: samab

OK. I am trying to make steel. Highly reflective. And thank you.

--My last resort is to go to a resort
Message 5 of 6
fdfxd2
in reply to: fdfxd2

bump
--My last resort is to go to a resort
Message 6 of 6
jeff
in reply to: fdfxd2

The most important thing with metal is that it will not look like metal unless it is reflecting something. So, step one is to turn on the background color checkerboard texture in your material editor. Now, that will only show on the material sample (sphere) if you are using Mental Ray or ray-traced materials. You can also simulate metal very quickly with a reflection map on a standard material, even with the scanline renderer. Here are some topics to check out in the help docs:

Reflection Map

Environment Map

 

hope that gets you started,

JB

 

Max since 1992 (3d Studio) · Win 10-64 · Wintel workstation · 64 GB RAM · nVidia Quadro RTX 4000 · BB render garden via Deadline

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