3ds Max Modeling: Bots, Mechs and Droids (Wordware Game and Graphics Library) [Paperback]

I could not agree less with the previous reviewer. All the models in the book are on the cover. If you don't like the models on the cover, then why buy the book. Are they the best bots ever? No. But then the author says on page viii "This book will not teach you to buy the coolest bots ever. If that's what you're looking for, might I suggest two excellent Gnomon Workshop DVDs . . ." The author points the models chosen were not picked to teach design, but rather to give the reader the opportunity to learn the widest variety of Max modeling tools and techniques in the shortest amount of time. To that end he succeeded.

This book is deisgned for beginning modelers, not advanced modelers. A lot of books that teach beginning modeling using models of fish or cartoon characters or wine glasses, or something equally lame. At least this book tries to teach modeling with models that are halfway cool. That said, take a look at the average spaceship model. Yeah it looks really cool, but it's basically a bunch of greebled boxes. It may look cool, but what can you learn from it.

As for mistakes . . . I didn't find any. The book is a little too long, perhaps, but that's because Weimer doesn't skip any steps. This may frustrate intermediate or advanced modelers, but speaking just for myself, when I'm learning to use a new tool, I hate authors who skip steps. Weimer even tells you what hot keys to use and illustrates every step with graphics.

So . . . if you're new to Max modelling and want to learn to use a LOT of tools to build techy models, you'll love this book. If you're looking for something on great designs, like the previous review, you'll probably hate it. The best recommendation I can make to you is to check out the cover and Weimer has posted a number of detailed pictures of the cover mech on 3D Palace ([...]). That's where I first learned of the book.

As an industry professional I have written several reviews for a variety of 3ds Max books. Some are great, some are bad. I'm sorry to say this particular book leans heavily toward "bad."

I had trouble right at the beginning with the introductory tutorial - I couldn't complete it. I do not possess super-vision to see and understand the very murky images, and the tutorial is missing elements. I have bright lights on and my reading glasses and I still can't make out the detail in the murky screen shots. Also, the author (contrary to what another reviewer says) obviously DOES know his subject well enough, however no one bothered to edit his tutorials or the images used. This is a poor product on the side of the publisher who did not bother to edit the text or images.

The introductory tutorial held such promise, too - the robot from Lost in Space is one of my favorite robots, second only to Bender from Futurama. I really wanted to follow along with this tutorial but its giving me a migraine. I'll attempt it again, and I'll be jotting down notes in the book for future reference to fill in the places which do not work properly.

The concepts behind the tutorials are fine - as I stated, the author does know his way around the program - however the publisher never bothered to test the tutorials for accuracy. There are vital points missing, such as on page 17, where the author attempts to teach the reader to bevel a selection of polygons (and does not satisfacturily explain how to grab the polygons). First, he has the reader bevel the set, then without any further explanation he has the reader bevel AGAIN. The resulting model looks nothing like the image he supplied. The stage of reselecting polygons to bevel has been completely left out of the tutorial.

Before that, on page 15, the author says, "Click the Polygon selection mode button and marquee-select the leftmost polygons. Then, holding the Ctrl key, marquee-select the rightmost polygons." The image, however, shows the topmost polys selected (figure I-34) and the next image (figure I-35) shows the topmost and the leftmost selected. So what am I selecting? I am frustrated and I know what I'm doing - I cannot imagine the frustration of a less experienced modeler attempting this tutorial.

Why can't anyone seem to write a comprehensive book on 3ds max modeling without being too easy, too hard or too confusing? And for that matter, why can't any publisher of these books test the tutorials, examine imagery or edit text properly? One of my favorite tutorial books - Deconstructing the Elements - has HORRIBLE images (so tiny one needs a large magnifying glass to follow along). And the "extra" video tutorials on the included disk have a narrator speaking in a fast and rather distinctive Australian accent. Great if you're Australian, however not so great if you can't decipher one word from the next because the narrator speaks too quickly and with a heavy accent. The tutorials in that book are fantastic, but the execution leaves much to be desired.

To be fair in my critique, I have just skimmed the remaining tutorials:

Spider-Bot's images are readable and don't strain my vision; The same goes for Hunter-Killer. Battle Mech is again, murky. It appears that the author chose dark colors for his models instead of more pronounced colors which would have stood out better in this black and white environment. The background is a medium gray; the image lines are slightly above medium gray, and the author works in wire mode. Color images would have been better, especially for sequences when the author refers to red polys or red edges... its all shades of gray to the inexperienced eye. My experienced eyes say, "ouch."

In summary, don't waste your money on this one if you aren't experienced - there are much better tutorials online, or better, well-edited books.

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UPDATE
====================

I neglected to review the DVD which is included with this book - the promises made in the back of the book tell us:

On the DVD:

Full-color, expanded chapter demonstrating how to model an android
Ten hours of video tutorials including a 17-part tutorial from 3-d Palace on modeling a sentianl bot from the movie The Matrix
Full-color versions of the images in the book

HOWEVER, upon exploring the DVD I have discovered that it DOES NOT INCLUDE EVERYTHING PROMISED, furthermore it ONLY includes:

Chapter 4

an images folder with .rar images (which I cannot open)

a materials folder with 3 movies, 3 materials and a Max file

a MATRIX folder with a MATRIX Sentinel tutorial; and a max script folder.

TO THE AUTHOR: You do have skill, sir, in modeling and presumably, animation. However, you have no skill in putting together a tutorial book and accompanying DVD. Perhaps this is the fault of your publisher, perhaps not - in either case, this book does not live up to its promises and is an annoying, frustrating waste of time. The images are too dark to work from, 20% of the text is in a font so small I need glasses AND a magnifying glass to read them, and the DVD contains files which cannot be used. Disappointing all-around.

I demoted my original two star rating to a one star rating.

If you're not a beginner buy this book at your own risk... but you can buy it anyway because perhaps it contains something new or even because it's so massive that you're bound to learn something... or even just to enjoy the DVD and it's extras (like a 3D Palace video tutorial of the Sentinel in Matrix).
For the new guy... this book will teach you a great deal about most (or all) the principal tools used in Max to model, specially mechanical models but even an organic mesh, like the android is shown and taught.
Be ready for some serious reading through the 800 and plus pages... the models may not be pretty but will teach you much... and it's a really good opportunity to see the workflow from someone of the industry...