(After buying the book "3D Studio Max F/X"
by John Bell I found out that this tutorial is
pretty closed to his description of Warp Speed.
It was not my intention to take his work, and as
I got this idea from a friend on net I guess it
is originally from Bell (well I am not sure, but
... just to be sure, OK!!??). So please buy
Bells book (it is very good!!), or use the
tutorial here if you can't afford it!!)
As part of one of my animation the first
scene will be focusing on empty space, just
stars and maybe a planet or a sun. Suddenly
there is a opening in the void, a warp in the
fabric of space, a tunnel of light where a ship
is passing through. The space warps will look
something like this animated gif.
I think I have managed to get a nice space warp
effect. If you get a "wobble" in the animation
it could be that your browser don't handle big
animated gif files properly. Internet Explorer
does have this fault. Netscape have no problems
at all. Well .. that is after my experience. I
use them both!
Objects:
The effect was made with two expanding cones;
they are morphing from nearly nothing to 1000
units long. I gave them a spin, one clockwise
and the other counter clockwise, 720 degrees in
100 frames. The most important thing is that
they are not parallel in there movement. First
cone is morphing out in 50 frames and then back
again. The other one morphs out from frame 25 to
75 and quickly retreat the last 25 frames. Both
cone have there normals flipped and the cap
removed so when I give them a materials this is
visible on the inside of the cone. The materials
is also given a low opacity so the stars shines
through. It is also important that the cones
have there receive and cast shadow check boxes
unchecked. There is also a omni light in front
of the tunnel. To place a light in front of the
animated tunnel, and not from some Max default
source, gives the illusion of the transparency
cones and the self illumination of the flare
maps a better effect. In the camera view under
you can se the two cones as wire frames in frame
60, when one goes spinning out and the other one
retreat.
Materials:
The two cones are given texture made with
RealLenzFlare, a plug in for max. The texture is
animated as two 100 frames *.flc files through
RLF in a basic phase expansion and streaks angel
rotation.
Material manipulation: In short:
Diffuse = black, Ambient = black, Falloff = out,
Type = additive. The *.flc are placed as diffuse
map and copied to opacity map, both at 100 %.
These are the two flare materials maps
(200x200):
The stars in the background is made with the
free video post plug_in Stars, a star field
generator made by Tom Hudson.
Harald J. Martinsen of TMP. 31.10.97
harmarti@online.no
 
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