Sun Tutorial?

[digital NUT]

In fact, I've made a sun before. Now, this depends on what type of sun you want: a shimmering ball in the sky, or a planetary look with fire flowing around it. I would think you would know how to do #1 (lens effect flare / lens effect glow). To create the second on the list, you need to know how to use the noise material.

1. Create your sun object.
2. Open material editor, and choose blend mode (vs. standard)
3. For material #1, use noise. Pick the colors of your sun, and animate the X,Y,Z motions to make it look like the sun's surface is moving.
4. In the other material, add another noise. Use more variant colors to give the sun a more unique look, and animate the X,Y,Z in different directions.
5. Choose the amount of blend, and whala! Your sun with a moving surface.

Hope this helps in the least bit.:bounce:

[digital NUT]

Oh yea, I almost forgot. If you lens effect glow the sun and use: edge only + gaseous, it'll look even more like fire.

[GeneralChaos]

didnt help me at all, was curious what it would look like and im total texture noob, so im thinking to myself....I add noise where now?

[digital NUT]

Wait, who am I helping here? Anyways, give me more specific questions please...:surprised

And uhh, about the noise. Press 'm' to open the material editor.

1. Right under the texture spheres and to the far right, there's a button that says 'standard'.
2. Click that and choose the mode: 'blend'.
3. Now you will have 2 material slots, begin inserting the noise!

Good luck!:thumbsup:

[GeneralChaos]

lol thats as far as I got, how exactly does one insert the noise....yes im complete texture noob. im assuming you do it under maps, but which kind of map for noise?

[Jokafex]

Yea, I'm a tad bit stuck myself.

[digital NUT]

Ok let's see....yes, you scroll down to texture maps section, and you should see a long list of things like: diffuse, opacity, mask....ladidadada. To insert noise:

1. Click on the 'none' next to 'diffuse'
2. A list will come out, select noise.
3. In the noise settings, there will be 2 boxes parellel to each other near the bottom, each having a color next to it.
4. Pick the colors you want, and you're set!

Hope this helps. Ask away if it doesn't!!!:thumbsup:

[feather]

digital NUT
Veteran
are you Blizzard Entertainment??oh`~~~my dear ,i see
you , our very like your game ,may i do friend with you?

[digital NUT]

lol, are you making fun of me, or are you serious? No, I'm not good enough to be in Blizzard Entertainment. I just live really close to their headquarters ( you can see next to my name it says: California, Near Blizzard Entertainment...it's where I live.) Haha, I wish I were with Blizzard!:cool:

[digital NUT]

Here Andy, hope this picture helps.:thumbsup:

http://damnednut.8k.com/images/suneffex.jpg

hehe.

[feather]

SORRY
I CAN'SEE YOUR Location
i am English not good

[Jokafex]

Ok, I got it. Thanks alot for the help buddy.

[digital NUT]

Feather, my location is right under my picture. It says: CA, Close to Blizzard Entertainment. That means that I live close to them, but I don't work for them.:banghead:

[PeteDraper]

might well do this as a q&a for the mag if the original poster is interested!

If so, please send an official question to me at pete.draper@xenomorphic.co.uk with your real name. As this is quite a tricky scene to nail right, I'll most likely span it across 2 issues if the editor says it's okay to do this... ie 1st q&a to get the flare motion right, and the second to sort out the surface texture and glows (etc)

sample animation of flare effects: http://www.petedraper.com/movies/flare_anim.zip 3.95mb

cheers!

Pete

[edaddy]

that looks amazing, i'm curious as to how you did the flare effect...

[GeneralChaos]

pete that would be a awsome addon to the sun.

Chris I was having a hardtime getting it to actually render as a movie that played with the video post on, ill have to IM you later.

[digital NUT]

Damn....that effect beats my crap ass sun 8P.
Well anyways, Pete's right. The sun is pretty complicated depending on what level you want to reach. Mine is probably mediocre at best. And yea, how did you do that flare effect?
Plugin or particle system, or a plug in particle system?:drool:

And more info about my sun.
My sun was designed to give you the surface look of the sun up close. If done correctly, the two blended materials will move opposite directions, making it look like the sun's surface is alive with fire. The added lense effect glow helps in the process of fire.

[PeteDraper]

Originally posted by digital NUT
... how did you do that flare effect?
Plugin or particle system, or a plug in particle system?:drool:


standard out-of-the-box max5

brief rundown:

low number of particles randomly emitted from sphere using volume select (using a noise map to create an animated sub-object selection) with gravity, a little wind to create an arc, plus an sdeflector to kill them once they get inside the sun(to keep particle counts down). Mesher used on these particles. Particle trails emitted from the mesher with a turbulant wind.

voila.

Can't really post more as it would spoil the issue's article. Would the original poster please contact me asap as I can provide a more detailed response to him/her as they asked the original question.

cheers!

pete

[digital NUT]

Ok cool. I'll try dat sumtime.

I've made a project like that before, except I used a sphere gravity and had the partciles circle it.

[GeneralChaos]

say whaaaat lol. What magazine is it going into?

[PeteDraper]

Originally posted by digital NUT
...except I used a sphere gravity and had the partciles circle it.

yup, spherical gravity (and wind) was used

GeneralChaos: it's going in 3D World magazine, UK-based mag that's distributed worldwide (you can pick it up in Barnes & Noble, apparently, in the US). Check out www.3dworldmag.com and some of the previous Q&A's in the education section on my site

cheers

p

[Krypton]

Wow Pete, that's pretty cool. I'm going to have to play around with that as I'm trying to make a sun similar to yours.

[glorious100]

Or you could have look here (http://www.scifi-meshes.com/) at there tutorials section. Some nice tuts there such like the creation of a sun.

[feather]

:)may i know what are you doing work now?
I am a game's 3d design in china

[digital NUT]

Hahaha feather. I'm 14, I don't work yet. I admire Blizzard very much, but am not yet working for them (hehe, my life goal!) You can contact me if you need help on AIM. My screen name is:

sh0t in the baK

Make sure you use a zero for the sh0t. Thanks.:applause:

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