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FIGURE 28.5

The SAT Export dialog box lets you specify what type of object is being exported.

Summary

Body Objects provide a critical bridge between CAD objects and Max. Body Objects can be imported using the SAT format or Max objects can be converted to the Body Object type. Body Objects can be combined using several Boolean features and can be exported back to the CAD package. This chapter covered the following topics:

• Importing CAD objects

• Converting Max objects to Body Objects

• Applying modifiers to Body Objects

• Using the Join Bodies and Body Cutter tools

• Exporting Body Objects

The next chapter is really hairy. In fact, it is all about adding hair, fur, and cloth to your models.

Chapter 29: Adding and Styling Hair and Fur, and Using Cloth

IN THIS CHAPTER

Understanding hair

Growing hair and setting hair parameters

Styling hair

Understanding cloth systems

Creating cloth panels using Garment Maker

Using the Cloth modifier

I want to start this chapter with a bold statement, “Bald Is Beautiful.” I make this statement because I have a brother who, upon discovering his hair had started thinning, decided that bald was the way to go. But, after seeing far too many 3D models that were bald because of the unavailability of a decent hair plug-in in Max, I can also declare that “Bald Is Boring.”

Now that Max has hair and fur, I expect to see the level of realism for a number of Max artists, including myself, take a quantum leap forward.

Creating cloth isn't that difficult. In fact, with a plane primitive, you can easily create a perfectly straight blanket, towel, or flag. However, animating cloth that drapes realistically over a character is very difficult and best left to dynamic engines like reactor.

Although you can still animate cloth collections using reactor, Max also has a separate stand-alone cloth simulation system aptly named Cloth that you can use to create deformable cloth and to animate it as well.

Cross-Reference

The hair and cloth systems in Max are dynamic, meaning that they are affected by forces in the scene such as wind and gravity. The dynamic nature of hair and cloth is covered in Chapter 44, “Animating Hair and Cloth.” •

Understanding Hair

Although a section titled “Understanding Hair” sounds like it would be taken from a beauty salon guide, the way Max deals with hair is unique and needs some explanation. Hair, like particle systems, deals with thousands of small items that can bring even the most powerful computer screeching to a halt if not managed.

In Max, hair doesn't exist as geometry but is applied to scene objects as a separate modifier. This level of separation keeps the hair solution independent of the geometry and makes removing or turning off the hair solution as needed easy. It also keeps the viewport display from bogging down. The Hair and Fur modifier is a World Space Modifier (WSM), meaning that it is applied using the World Space coordinates instead of local ones.

The other half of the Hair and Fur solution is a render effect that allows the hair to be rendered. This render effect is applied and configured automatically when the Hair and Fur modifier is applied to an object. This causes the scene with hair to be rendered in two passes. The geometry is rendered first, followed by the hair.

Note

Hair can be rendered only when a Perspective or Camera view is selected. Hair cannot be rendered in any of the orthogonal views. •

Another similarity to particle systems is that the hair follicles can be replaced by instanced geometry, so you can create a matchstick head character by replacing hairs with an instance of a matchstick.

Tip

Using instanced geometry with a fur system is a great way to create and position plants and ground cover. •

The materials that are used on hair are defined in the Material Parameters rollout in the Modify panel instead of in the Material Editor. Many of the hair parameters have a square button to their right that lets you apply a map to the parameter.

When the Hair and Fur