[]Aratex[]

Does anyone know of a way to create a snow effect without actually buying a plug-in with which to do it? I'm poor... :\

[aNoah]

Snow... hmm
Create a particle system. There is one that is called "snow" I believe. I used it a couple of times, but I don't like it all that much.

If you want a better effect, you make a superspray particle system and mess with the settings. That's all I can think of on the fly.

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-aNoah
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[]Aratex[]

Err... Sorry, I should've been more specific.... I meant a snow-like texture, not actual falling snow..

Any ideas? I don't just want to go with a shiny white type thing.. There's more to snow than that... Sparkles of different colors and such...

[Flinthawk]

Well, just off the top of my head I'd try to make a noise map in Photoshop...just take an Airbrush set to Dissolve and spray some black over a white background. Then apply it to your texture in the Specular Level, Glossiness and maybe your Bump channels and see what you come up with. You could probably take that map and put some color into it like some very subtle, very light blues, purples and pinks, etc. and try putting that map in the Specular *Color* channel. Note: these channels correspond to 3DMAX 3.1. I know 2.5 has a couple differences in the mapping channels...just forgot what they were. I haven't tried any of these suggestions but they would probably be where I'd start.

-Flinthawk

[]Aratex[]

Sounds like a whole lot of good ideas, Flinthawk... Thanks a lot... I'll get on it and see how it turns out..... I'll be sure to whine some more if it doesn't work out...

[Danny]

Aratex,

look at Bradon Davis' snowscape image/scene. He came up with a real cool way of making a snow covered arctic 'hilly' landscape where it looked as if strong wind had covered one side of the hills with snow while leaving the rest uncovered. Done with the aid of the Top/Bottom material if I remember correctly. He rotated his landscape model (along with all of his lights/camera/etc.) in such a way that the side of the hills that were to be covered in snow where face upward, hence they would be represented by the top submaterial in the material editor. Perhaps the pic/scene is available on his website somewhere.. Lemme check..

Right.. this is his webpage: http://www.3dluvr.com/brandon/

Here's the image: http://www.3dluvr.com/brandon/images/snowscape-print2.jpg

And here you can download the scene I believe: http://www.3dluvr.com/brandon/scenes/snowscape-noclouds.zip

Hope this helps.. If you do intend to use this method, etiquette dictates a credit for Mr. Davis..


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[]Aratex[]

Wow, thanks... This could be just what I'm looking for....

[]Aratex[]

Oooh.... Sounds very simple, plant42.. I'll be sure to give it a shot...

I think the noise bump map sounds like a better alternative to a random airbrushed bitmap bump map like I've been trying to use.. Ironically enough, though, it never crossed my mind... :-\ I'm learning, though...

[Loud]

Yeah, definatly use the Top/Bottom material. Also I would use a cellular specularity map to create the effect of individual crystals reflecting light in random directions. If you wanted it to be really shiny, like new snow that has been melted by the sun you could also put a material ID on that specularity map, and use Video Post to create hightlights on the reflected crystals, with different colors and all.

That's what I'd do anyway, you might be looking for a different type of effect.

[]Aratex[]

Actually, Loud, that sounds awesome... but I'm not quite smart enough to do all that yet... This is only my 4th ever project with Max.... I'm still learning... I'll see what I can do, and I'll be sure to post the results of what comes out..

Thanks to everyone who had a suggestion.. You've all been very helpful.

[]Aratex[]

Arg.... Talk about a frustrating few hours...

Loud, do you think you could explain that in more detail? Tutorial form preferably, but if you're too busy, just explain as much as you can...

[plant42]

Hey, I just made a snow texture.
Similar to what's already been said. Add a noise map in the bump channel (use the noise that looks like irregular chips). White/blue diffuse color, a fairly hot highlight, say 95% opacity, and about %20 self illuminated (the ice crystals bounce around light and illuminate themselves).
Add the same bump map to the specular channel to create some glittering highlights.

[Flinthawk]

Here's a scene I threw together in a few minutes after I read some of the great suggestions on this thread. Just use the Top/Bottom type texture. For the top texture I just made it Standard white and added a Dirt bump map and gave it some specularity. Then for the bottom texture I gave it that same dirt texture but put it in the Diffuse Map slot. Fool with the spinners on the Top/Bottom...I got something like Blend: 12 and Position: 80 to make this scene work. This isn't great but I had to put a few minutes aside just to try this out. Hope you find a method that works for you.

-Flinthawk

[]Aratex[]

Hmm... That is nice-looking, Flinthawk.. Good job.

I'm still looking for a good way to get the sparkles of ice crystals to show up.. I tried adding a Video Post highlight to the snow's specularity map, but I can't seem to find a happy medium with the settings... It's either way too bright or totally invisible.... Any ideas/suggestions?