Welcome back to September, even though it's the 1st of November as I type. This next little bit covers the continuation of the leaf construction, and actually implementing it withing 3D Studio Max.
Now, considering the chaos I went through with making a leaf for May, it would seem quite suicidal to try it again here. I mean, if you think about it, I would have to sit at my desk for hours, trying to fine tune a maple leaf shape in 3DS Max, and then making the mask fit perfectly onto it. Sounds like fun, doesn't it? Luckily for me, some browsing found a few handy tutorials... one of which has made this whole process a whole lot easier.
The tutorial can be found here:
My thanks to the awesome creator who made it! Give it a look, the tricks in there might help out with your 3D work too. I also show how it's done below, if you want to have a read of that too.
Okie dokie, the first thing we need is the texture (The leaf that made beforehand), but also a 'mask'. For those not familiar with the concept, a 'mask' is a useful tool which acts as a screen/cover. It allows you to control what can and cannot be seen. In a picture in, say, Photoshop; Instead of erasing a segment of the picture to hide it, you create a 'mask' layer, and can edit it from there. The immediate advantage is that you can tweak the visibility without actually deleting any of the original image. There's a lot of other awesome stuff you can do with it (Like fading). The 'mask' image has all the visible bits in white, and the bits you want to hide in black.
What's this? I'm making a box!? That doesn't look like a leaf... I mean, if you put the map on...
... exactly. You have a box around it. That's not a really good leaf is it?
Fear not! Here is where the mask layer comes in! Go to the parent (default) layer in the material editor of the same material slot as the textured image. Scroll down to the 'maps' drop-down menu. From here, there are several channels, one of which is 'Opacity'. This one's the good'un! Select it and load in the mask... and...
Bingo! The mask layer has now made the outer bit of my leaf (the white bit) completely transparent! Only downside is that the sides of the box are still visible. No worries. In the 'modifier' panel, simply selecting 'UVW mapping' should take care of this.
There we go! A nice leaf! You realise that this was made in about 5-10 minutes. Compare that with building the shape from scratch. Now you see why I chose this method!
Time to add a little bit more texture. Obviously, leaves in real life aren't sheets of paper with a leaf picture on them. Lucky for me, they're bumpy, crinkly and refuse to stay flat. Step one is to add a 'bump' texture to the leaf. A little playing around in photoshop creates a decent B&W leaf image, which will be used for bumping. The important bit is to bump the veins.
It's not much, but it's added a little something to the image. I'm not done yet!
'Bend' Modifier to the rescue. A really simple tool on this. Bending the box negatively on the x-axis helps to 'fold' it upwards. Perfect for the leaf shape! Almost there...
Some finishing touches were put into the leaf with some editing of the vertices. After converting the box to an editable poly, it was then a simple case of picking the vertices out and moving them a bit. The most important bit was to lift the top of the leaf. The 'bend' had lifted the side segments, but the top was still flat. The edit vertices tool helped to rectify this. And there is is! A crinkled leaf ready for the rest of the scene.
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