Lesson 1

1. Lesson 1 Getting acquainted with Gmax And Build project # 1

2. Step 1: Reset Gmax • Doing this step is optional but it will be helpful to anyone just starting out. • To reset go to the file menu and choose reset.

3. Views These buttons can be found in the Lower right corner. • At various points you will need to change your view of your object. • 1. Is the Pan feature which moves the view left/right and up and down in each window but keeps all angles the same. To use, just left click and drag • 2. Is the Arc rotate, it rotates your view around the model as well as turns the camera’s axis for different views. Again, left click and drag 3. Is “min/max” toggle, this Feature makes a selected Window become the only Visible window or shrinks it Back down when you want to Use all 4 windows.

4. Zooming • 1. Zoom, activate this, then select an object and use the up/down keys to zoom. • 2. Makes all the windows zoom • 3 and 4 both are another type of zoom that isn’t vital but feel free to play with it. Zoom toggles Located above the view buttons

5. Shortcuts • To move the camera to specific vantage points there are various key commands • Keys “T, B, L, R, and F” will move it to the top, bottom, left, right, and front. • A faster zoom can be done using the center wheel of your mouse • To Pan using the mouse alone just click and drag using the center wheel. • If you ever have to undo a view change just go to the view menu on the tool bar and choose undo view.

6. Object Movement • Located on the top menu bar. • 1. Display a list of all visible objects and can let you select them if desired. It also shows sub trees. • 2. This activates your select and move abilities, to move objects just left click and drag. • 3. Rotates objects on any desired axis. • 4. Scales objects, it’s defaulted to uniform scale, for other types of scaling left click and hold the icon to display the other options. When you select and object you will see 2 or 3 axis lines appear. To move it Directly along an axis just click and hold On that axis. You will also see a small Corner appear between each axis, that Lets you move it in both directions at the Same time.

7. Movement Cont’d • At the bottom of the screen you will see 3 boxes. • When you select and object it will list it’s position on the grid. • If you know exactly where you want the object then you can manually enter in the coordinates in the boxes.

8. Misc. Tools • 1. Undo • 2. Redo • 3. Link, used to tie the various nodes and LOD’s together. More on that later • 4. Unlink • 5. Select • 6. This menu (activated by left click and hold) lets you choose various types of selects. I usually keep it at rectangular but you may want to change it on your own.

9. More Stuff • 1. Lets you limit an action to a specific Axis, the last one is another menu for when you want more than one axis. • 2. This is the mirror option, it can flip an object or make a clone as a mirror duplicate on any axis. • 3. Is the align, I don’t use it but it can help move select objects to a point. • 4. Are material/texture related buttons, more on this later.

10. Creating objects, Geometry Menu • This Menu lets you create various objects. • A. These buttons let you choose from creating geometric shapes and creating flat shapes. • B. This menu lets you choose various functions, more on this in a later lesson.

11. Geometry Cont’d • When you select the type of shape you want to make more info will appear under the buttons. • A. You can set various parameters before you create or do them in the edit menu. • With height, length and width segments it’s usually best to keep them set to 1 unless you need them for a complex item, more on that later in the class.

12. Shapes Menu • This menu lets you create flat shapes as well as trace out more complex shapes when simple geometric shapes won’t work for you. • More on how to do this in later classes.

13. Modifier Menu • This menu has similar features to the create menu, but it lets you modify your creations further. • A. Adds on modifiers at your discretion. • B. (Also on create menu) lets you choose a color for your polygon, but it’s not important outside of being able to ID it while working. • C. Lets you adjust L/W/H as well as segments.

14. Extra view changers • If you right click in any window you will get a menu to do things like hide items and convert items into editable meshes. • If you click on the word in the upper left corner of any window it lets you change how you view everything. For example you can see everything as wire frames if you want to.

15. A last word or warning • Gmax crashes easily so save often since it may not always back up lost work.

16. Step 1 • Create a box any way you want. Make sure the all the segments are set to 1. • Now make it down to a size that is allowable by There and suits your needs. Then zoom in to it to get a better view. • The max dimensions for this type of object are 10.00 by 10.00 by 10.00 • When building always try and leave a little head room for each dimension so it won’t cause problems when you export it since sizes sometimes get rounded up.

17. Step 2 • Once you are happy with the shape and everything just right click on the object and convert it to an editable mesh. • As you can see a new menu appears with options that let you play with vertices, lines, faces, polygons, and whole elements. We will do more with these in later lessons. But do feel free to play with them at your leisure. • Next we are going to add on a texture.

18. Step 3 • Now we are going to map this object. To do so we are first going to go to the modifier list and select “UVW Map” from the list. • Then we are going to open up the material navigator by clicking on the Red yellow and blue spheres in the upper right hand corner. • Once you activate it the menu may appear to be minimized on the bottom of the screen, just click and drag it so you can see the full menu. • Go to the file system option on your browse section and find a 256 by 128 image to use or create your own, or use the one I am going to send with this lesson.

19. Step 3 cont’d • Once you find the image you want to use just drag and drop it onto your object. • When you do this it may not appear as your wanted it to because of the way the mapping is set. To change the mapping scroll down the active menu to the alignment section (pictured to the left) and choose which axis to fit it to. Once you have it facing the right way you will probably need to hit the “fit” button right below so it will scale to the model.

20. More on Mapping • You may have noticed that there are various types of ways to map an object, each has their uses for various shapes and so forth but the most versatile one for me is the planar option because it can go over any shape. Feel free to experiment with other forms of mapping. • Also you will see some options saying Length/Width/ and Height. These let you say how big your image is going to be. When you reduce the size you make the texture repeat more and more but you also get a better quality image. That works out very well for some projects. • You will also see tile options, this moves the image around on your object so it can show a specific area for you. Not needed for this project but can be very useful. • To also get the same abilities as the tile option just activate the gizmo by clicking on the UVW mapping modifier that displays over the word editable mesh. Once it turns blue that means you have activated the gizmo.

21. The Gizmo • The gizmo is similar to how you move an object, except in this case you are only moving the image rather than the object. You can move it in any direction so you can have only a specific area shown.

22. Step 4 • Once you are happy with the way the mapping is right click and convert the whole thing to an editable mesh so all the changes stick. • Now it’s time to name the object, all models must have 3 objects; LOD0, LOD1, and LOD2. But you are allowed to put a sub name on it like so LOD0.wall • Since these are simple walls you should not have to worry about cutting anything down to meet previewer’s rules for Flora structures.

23. Step 5 • We are going to make 3 copies of this wall now. To do it in an easy way just hold down the shift key and then move the object to your left or right along the axis. • Now give each wall one of the following names lod0.wall lod1.wall lod2.wall and col (do not put a .wall on that one) • To rename anything just select it and click on the words that appear over the modifier list menu to be able to change the names of objects.

24. The Collision Mesh • The col part of a model is what we call the collision mesh. This dictates what is solid and what is not on a model. • There puts a strict limit on the number of faces you are allowed to use for it. But in the case of a collision mesh it counts whole polygons rather than faces. • Every other limit is actually the number of faces while the collision mesh is the number of polygons.

25. The Bounding box • Possibly one of the most frustrating things in the building process • This object ties all the LOD’s and the col together as well as assigns the distances. • For the most part you will probably just want to merge one from a master model from There.

26. Step 6 • To add the bounding box for this project go to File>Merge • Go to wherever your flora builder templates are, usually in There’s folder in program files. • Select the Flora_Structures file and click ok • You will get a prompt to select what files to merge, choose the top one called “hedge”.

27. Another option • If you don’t like the merge you can always start with the base model and just delete everything but the bounding box.

28. Step 6 cont’d • You will know you have the bounding box when you see a small blue cube appear. • You may want to rename it to something else. I usually call them “Master” since they are the main node. • Now you are going to want to scale this so that it will completely fit inside the model. Failure to do so will result in a bounding box error when you try to submit it.

29. Step 7 • Once you have your box down to the right size you will want to link all the other objects to it. • To do this turn on the link option and then click and drag each wall to the master node you merged in earlier. • When you link 2 objects the dominant one will blink indicating you have linked it. • Once you have all the walls linked to the node open the select by name menu and turn on “Display subtree” • If you did it right the master node should be on top with all the others indented below. Usually it will appear like this • Master • Col • Lod0.wall • Lod1.wall • Lod2.wall

30. Step 8 • Now that everything is linked up correctly you are almost ready to export. • First move everything to the coordinates of 0, 0, 0 • You may have to move the master node first and possibly move it a little bit upwards so it’s inside the model. Some just center it in the heart of the model as well. • Once you have the master node centered you can move all the other walls to 0 0 0 • Now that everything is all combined you can export. Go to file>export. If you are using the gamepack it will export it as a .model file. If it’s exporting it as anything else you are not in the gamepack.

31. Step 9 • Now that you have exported the file check it in previewer under the flora builder and flora structure model. If it doesn’t give you any bounding box errors or polygon errors then you did it right. • If you do get bounding box errors you will have to move everything again. • If the bounding box/master node is too large then you will have to unlink and scale down the node some more the redo the link steps.

32. The End • Thanks for attending, if you have any questions feel free to post them in the forums or ask me via email.