sdfresh

Great, well then we're done. Thanks for your help on this, much appreciated. Adam

That is pretty darn "simples".... To be honest I've never worked with V-ray sun or shadow bias and so i am not quite sure how I ended on this odd number. The only rational I can give is that the more into the negative I went with this figure the better the lighting looked and the very best was exactly around the figures where the pixelation started. For instance in these negative values the highlights (or rather the lack of shadow) behind the central twisting piece disappeared. By that i mean it was all shadow rather than seeing the full light and shadow. So, with this is mind do you think it would be better to simply more the sun until the desired effect was achieved. Or to tweak the bias to the same end. Either way, thanks for clearing up this anomaly... Much appreciated

Sorry I thought i saved it as a 2010. Obviously not. Twist.zip

OK, makes sense. Would be really interested to see you take on this as it's beyond me at the mo. As I mentioned the scene is pretty simple so hopefully you'll find a simple fault. Zip file should be attached below. Twist 2.zip Twist.zip

I know, for another application I would probably pull my hair out trying to achieve this effect. Sod's law it raises its head when I dont need it. The spot seems to be irrelevant as the shadows persist even when it's deleted. I also have a sphere (inverted normals) around the object with a light material applied to give reflections that also seems to be irrelevant. This leads me to believe it has something to do with the antialiasing filters or the light cache or most probably the sun itself. Stuck!

Does anyone have any idea what these faceted highlights are caused by. I am using 3ds Max 2013 with V-ray and have a simple V-ray sun and sky lighting system with one additional standard spot. They are not affected by materials values as far as my tests have gone but can be greatly reduced by increasing geometry resolution. They can also be influenced by adjusting the shadow bias on the sun. I am happy to load the scene if it helps. Many thanks, Adam

So it looks like our military grade server also wont let me upload anything from here either. Ill have to do that from my dropbox at home too.

OK I've attached a couple of quick, rough sketches of the job at hand. This is not a particularly good example of the type of challenge I'm looking to overcome but at least it gets us started. Andy, your 5min example by comparison is a great example. If this method allows us to create forms such as these that are "preconceived" rather than a result of "happy-accident exploration" then this will certainly do the job. I mention "happy-accident" as more often than not I would have to conform to strict brand guidelines that dictate the exact tonality and shape of any logo included in the sphere. This can then be built upon and intended to create any swirling forms that give the invisible sphere body. Essentially I need to be able to start with a clear design in mind and achieve it through the model.... I hope all this makes sense. Andy, I cant download your model at the moment as im sitting within our military grade (no joke) secure server in the office so ill download later and try and reverse engineer your work. I have attached the sketches and an example of an "M" logo that should be included in the final outcome. All input is very much appreciated.

Right, thanks for your posts. Corey, the split, quad maintained sphere is a good and ill give it a go. My only concern with this route is the deformation that will certainly occur with the splines when projected towards the poles and extremities of the sphere as well as maintaining the 360 continuity. Andy, your ref image looks perfect, how did you achieve this? Presumably not with maps as you have an apparently extruded form here. I am quite happy to create maps in photoshop but I don't have an a clue how to accurately set up a spherical map. I'll download your max file and take a look. Scott, this nicely builds on the other two posts and ill check out this modifier and post some results.

Hello all I have been having some trouble finding a workable solution to a set of problems. My travels have brought across such searches as "splines around the surface of a sphere, "shapemerge", compound objects and "ploydraw"". Either I do not understand these tools to the necessary extent or they didn't quite work for me. I am trying to find a way to logically "wrap" editable splines or maps around a sphere (which may or may-not be seen) in order to create extrudeable, mapable geometry. They key requirement for me is to have the spline or map remain in a logically editable state so it doesn't fry my brain or result in wild trial and error when editing/ experimenting with the form as it is for a corporate logo. The second challenge is the best way to map or light the scene to create a semi 2D look within an editable/ animatable 3D world. I have attached a couple of examples of what I am trying to achieve. Thank you in advance, Adam

Thanks Victor, this certainly seems like the most precise method so ill give that a go. Daniel I did actually try this initially and found the best results came through using V-Ray displace 3D mapping, continuous whilst referencing the map in the material itself. Even then the results were a little fuzzy and it took forever to render. Im sure It would have rendered faster if I had actually created the mesh. Appreciate the comments. Thanks

Hello, Im trying to create a realistic material to achieve the random slatted wood effect seen in this product http://www.wonderwallstudios.com/ Im going to use on the inside surface of a sphere to create a wrap around effect and will render in 3ds 2011 using vray 1.5. Attempts so far whilst just testing with white displace and no wood map have either looked very fuzzy or take forever to render. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks, Adam