3DS Max - Relation Between Modifier Stack And Transforms

[@MiledRizk]

If you have any suggestions or comments, please leave them in the comments section, thank you.

[@themustafajamal]

Thanks for the tutorial!

[@MiledRizk]

Welcome! :)

[@orphydiancg7759]

Are you in the beta program for MAX by chance? Anyway, this might be something very dry for beginners but understanding the way a software operates or its under the hood logic are the building blocks for later juicier stuff. Im gonna have to check the rest of your video as well. Do you happen to take modeling requests? I'm interested on how to approach a hellenistic era historical helmet especially the cheek guards. I'll provide references if you decide to take on it

[@MiledRizk]

I agree that understanding how a software works will give you more control, and eventually you'll love working in the field. Since the beginning i used to look for learning resources that explain things deeply, and not just telling to enter a value here, and press a botton there, and that's it you have the model! Now, for the helmet request, i would love too, but currently i'm into many things, The farm i with with, and my own personal stuff.

[@MiledRizk]

But, anyway, there is no harm of sending a photo reference, i cannot promise anything, maybe i will have some free time to look at it :)

[@MiledRizk]

And no, I'm not in the beta program :))

[@orphydiancg7759]

@@MiledRizk youtube removed my comment with the link...how can I send it to you?

[@orphydiancg7759]

@@MiledRizk did my comment with the link landed in your Helf for approval section?

[@orphydiancg7759]

Forgot to ask: after reset xform it is a common practice to collapse the stack into an Editable poly? If so why?

[@MiledRizk]

Hi, you can also collapse a 2D shape with an XForm modifier to an Editable Spline. Anyway, for your question, it's a part of scene optimization to collapse the stack, basically baking the Modifiers info into the geometry. The modifiers are applied from bottom up, so, for example, when opening a large scene with a huge amount of modifiers, Max needs to recalculate all the modifiers in the order i mentioned to display the final result to you. Also, at render time, just before rendering, Max will recaluculate the stack from down up and load the result into memory to render it. There is more to this subject of course. In some cases, it's better to keep certain types of modifiers, like TurboSmooth, MeshSmooth,... because you'll be still able to go back and change the resolution of the mesh at anytime, also, with these types of modifiers, collapsing them will increase the file size. One last thing, making the stack as simple as possible will help you avoid some mistakes that happen unintentionally, like turning off one of them, changing its order, or clicking a subobject level and selecting a sub-element by mistake, etc,...

[@orphydiancg7759]

@@MiledRizk tell me about the last one about having a sub element selected down in the stack by mistake. Apart from scene optimization, I thought Ive seen people just dont stack an edit poly on top of the xform but often they collapse it just after doing so. I had the impression is some of max way of working or not like a bug and they do this to avoid problems.

[@MiledRizk]

Actually no, you can add an Edit Poly and continue working. It's for the reasons i mentioned before. Also, having a lot of modifiers on a single objects, in addition to slowing down things, it increases the possible crashes.

[@orphydiancg7759]

@@MiledRizk ah I see! about the beta: I think it was about an year ago that some members there asked for a better separation between the modifier that is applied when using the Uitlities panel Reset Xform and the standalone Xform modifier(that with preserve normals) . Initially a modifier with the very same name Xfrom was added to the stack not they changed it to Reset Xform for the utility