Render Engine: 3D Studio Max Render Engine: Bryce I bought a book in Phoenix, Arizona, Mastering the Art of Production with 3ds max 4. These are snap shots of a full animation production I created back in 2008. My hope and dream career was to work in animation. I even went to school in Phoenix Arizona to learn animation and get a degree in animation. I was only there for one quarter and $#%# happened. My dream died! I came back to Colorado and looked for a job. I still had a strong passion for doing animation and an awesome tool for doing animation with but lacked the talent or skill. I have never met anyone who does animation in my life so could not learn from their experience. I found a book in Arizona that detailed how to create this character and props in 3D Studio Max. My first experience with creating models and animation was with Lightwave around 2000-2001 using books. I have also done animation with Bryce and of course Poser using my learned experience and 2D animation with Flash. I have also created models in Hexagon and Blender. I spent approximately 4-5 hours a day for 6 months creating this 108 second commercial about Brand X battery. Each model took about 3-5 days to create. I also had to use MaxScript to write code to create the morphs for the character and MaxScript to write the code for the Rover to drive and for the tracks and wheels to turn. The code for the Rover was so that all I had to do was push the Up, Down, Left, and Right arrow keys and the Rover would move and tracks and wheels would turn automatically. Check out Rover Test Animation {3D Max Commercial Part 2}. Very Cool! Some of the code was wrong in the book but I had some schooling with programming and in a few days I was able to debug the code and get it working properly. Did this on more than one occasion. I did a lot of my own work in this animation. I created and animated the background in Bryce. The Bryce background is actually a projection in 3D Max and the Alien, Remote and Rover are in front of the projection. You have to be very careful how you position your camera in Bryce and 3D Max to work properly. 3D Studio Max has a shadow catcher that allows you to create a shadow to make it appear the object or character is in the projected background. The book does not mention anything about this and I just used my imagination and knowledge of 3D Max with the next step. I created a bunch of tiny spheres in 3D Studio Max and imported them into Bryce. I changed the spheres to bright green in Bryce for a stark contrast and created the Bryce background around the spheres. 3D Studio Max has a tool that allows you to do Motion Capture and Camera Matching to make the camera move with the projected background in 3D Max and appear that the object in front is actually in the background with the added shadow catcher effect. 'MOVIE MAGIC'. If not done right the background will do one thing and the character would do something else and it can look really strange. It took a lot of trial and error to get it right. Several days or weeks, can't remember. I have also done a lot of test animation such as with the Rover. You can see how the tracks and wheels work in the Rover Test Animation part 2. You will not the see the tracks and wheels turning in the completed animation because of resolution and distance to the Rover. I should have done a close-up of the Rover but unfortunately did not. My computer in 2008 was an antique compared to what I have at present and rendered at a 320x240 configuration. For the Alien character I created every bone for the body, hands, fingers, legs and feet and rigged it to move. Took a lot of trial and error to get it to work properly. In the picture provided the Top Left Image are the bones, top middle are the morphs, top right is the MaxScript code written to create the morphs. Took a while to write the code for everything. Each model had reference images for creating the model as Remote Control shown middle second row. I created the textures for the remote in Photoshop and applied it in 3D Max. The bottom images show the green spheres in Bryce used to Motion Capture and Camera Match the Bryce animation. Every time you see the Bryce background animation move there you see the Capture and Matching the camera in 3D Studio Max. I made two exact animations in Bryce, one with the spheres and one without so that after the camera is Matched all I have to do is replace the background animation without spheres for final render. Be sure to click on 'Open Full Image' Thanks for looking...