Week Four; Sci-Fi Crate

    Week Four marks the start of our first proper modelling project where we were given free reign over texture and somewhat modelling! With our knowledge so far of 3DS Max we had to Model, Unwrap and Texture a “Sci-Fi Crate”. The modelling I found relatively simple, following through the video tutorial with relative ease. This part of the project didn't prove much of a problem, however I did find unwrapping quite difficult and complex at first, not really knowing how to fix the common problems, add and delete seams, etc. After about a day I got the unwrap finished and packed into the UVW Template as tight and economical as I could.

My UVW Unwrap 

    Now we come to texturing. To be honest, I quite enjoyed texturing and learning about what looks good and what doesn't. We had pretty much free reign on what we could and couldn't do for texture, except it had to be in realistic style. When I think of Sci-Fi, I think of matte blacks, greys and blue glowing holograms. 

Diffuse Map

    Therefore I tried to make the texture of the crate match that of my vision, trying to create materials that looked like matte plastic and the panes in the crate to look like glass to house the holograms. For this I had to do a bit of researching on Specular and Gloss maps, but after a few tests with them, found that they were actually quite simple to use and to plug into the material editor. 

Specular Map

Gloss Map

    I did try to make the clasps and hinges out of a chrome material so it'd show as reflective when rendered but I ended up making the plane underneath the crate reflective instead, and spend a long time trying to figure out how to apply it to the elements (Clasp and Hinge) to no avail. 

    I am pleased with the way it turned out, but next time I'd want to spend a bit more time texturing and getting that matte plastic feel of the box instead of a metalic feel.

Final Renders of Sci-Fi Crate