Week One: Modeling Tricks
In week one, you’ll learn the most vital tools for organizing your scenes, then move on to speed modeling with textures. By the end of this lesson, you’ll be able to model a realistic building complete with windows and balcony in just a few minutes.

Week Two: Materials and Mapping
Get the most from the Material Editor with decals, people, and trees. In week two, you’ll learn how to unwrap texture maps for seamless material application, and make tileable textures, realistic textures from photographs, and a two-minute eyeball.

Week Three: Lighting
Lighting is easy and fast when you know a few key principles specific to 3ds Max. Most scenes need less than five lights, but how do you set them up? Week three, covers interior and exterior lighting, Mental Ray lighting, and shadow time-savers and troubleshooting.

Week Four: Mental Ray
Mental Ray materials give you the most bang for your buck, but only if you can create them quickly and render them efficiently. In week four, you’ll learn how to make basic and custom Mental Ray materials, and improve the realism in your scenes with Mental Ray shadows and depth of field effects.

Week Five: Reflections and Rendering
Reflections add realism, but can also jack up your render time if they aren’t done right. In week five, you’ll learn to create flat and curved glass, mirrors, and jewellery to make your scene pop. We’ll also cover a few general rendering tricks.

Week Six: Animation
Keyframing is fine, but controllers are where it’s at. In week six, you’ll get your objects moving in no time with little or no keyframing. You’ll also make gears spin, make objects follow a path or look at other objects, and control linked objects to get your animation right with a minimum of mouse clicks.

Week Seven: Character Animation
In week seven, we whiz through the most essential tools of the Biped module. Learn the right workflow so you can start skinning and animating Bipeds in a quick and painless learning curve. Make the Biped surf or drive a car in addition to walking.

Week Eight: Logo Treatments
Who doesn’t need a good logo animation? Make a 2D logo 3D, shine a volume light through the holes, or work with “cardboard cut-outs” to make a spectacular treatment in no time. In week eight, we’ll also cover the classics that appeal year after year.

Bonus Week Nine: Wiring and Scripts
In this bonus lesson, we’ll go over the basics of parameter wiring so you can start using it to control your animation. Make objects follow each other on a path, set a 3D clock by typing in the time, and make wheels spin automatically based on the distance they travel.

Level of Ability
The class is for any version of 3ds Max after v9. This class is perfect for the casual user. this workshop is aimed at the Intermediate level, or for those with at least a six months experience with the program.

Other Requirements
Students need to be familiar with web navigation and browsing, as well as email.

Students need to be familiar with using a bulletin board system (such as CGTalk.com).

Software and Hardware Requirements
Students must have access to a machine with the necessary hardware to 3ds Max animations.

A web browser and internet connection is required. Broadband is mandatory as the tutorials will be both video and text based.