making a black and white image out of 3d max

[cavalcantipaula]

Hi everyone, I am in need of some help here!! I am trying to convert my 3D max perspective into a black and white contour line drawing. I have no clue how this can be done. One guy in my class has done it. He said nobody knows how to do it, only him...and he is not willing to share with us how. too bad...maybe someone will be able to help me. He said he did in 3Dmax, but...I am not sure if he exported to another program to create the black and white perspective. Does anyone know what I am talking about, and would like to give me some input, pleaseeeeeeeeeee... I am trying to do that so I can place in my SPEC book, that requires the drawings to be unrendered. So...anyone???:?

[Cad64]

So he won't share huh? That's not very nice. :glare:

Ok, I'll tell you how to do this, but you have to promise me that you're going to go into your class tomorrow and tell every one of your classmates how to do it.

1. Open your Render Scene dialog
2. Make sure you have Mental Ray selected as your renderer
3. Select mental.ray.hidden.line.contours from the "Preset" list box at the bottom of the dialog. This will open another pop-up dialog, so make sure both presets are selected and click "Load"
4. Hit "Render" and you will get a black and white contour line rendering

[Cad64]

Another way to achieve a similar type of rendering is to use the "Ink 'n Paint" material. Set the Paint color to white and leave the Ink color as black.

You will then need to apply this material as a Material Override in your Render Scene dialog 'Processing' tab. Check the 'Enable' box and then drag and drop the material from your Material Editor to the Material Override button that will become accessible once you check the 'Enable' box.

Now hit Render and see what happens.

[cavalcantipaula]

oh my god, it is so easy the first way you said. I tried right away and ....it looks amazing. That is what I wanted and thank you, thank you , thank you... Next time I go to class, I will share with everyone, no doubting. I will try the second approach as well, it seems a little more complicated, but I like the look it gives too, I search "paint 'n Ink" I found really helpful things. I am new at this, so...you don't even know what you can really do, or exist in 3d max. So..again...thank you so much!!:shock:

[Cad64]

:lol: Glad to help, and yes, it is pretty easy to create this effect. I don't know why your classmate was being so secretive? It's not like this is some big mystery and only he knows the answers. :roll:

Don't be like him. Distribute this information and help your fellow students. And be sure to come back if you need any further assistance. We are here to help, unlike some people. :P

[cavalcantipaula]

I have tried the “pain n’ ink” approach. It is much better than the other one. It gives a crispy edge in everything, but when I click the button “render”, I see it rendering black and white, BUT…as soon as the rendering is finish, it disappears! It gives me a blank page. It doesn’t’ stay there so I can save. Does anyone know why this is happening? Is there a button I have to click for the rendering to stay on my screen?

[Cad64]

Does the render window stay open or does it close after rendering? Is it just the rendered image that disappears?

[cavalcantipaula]

It is just the rendering image that goes away. The rendering window stays, and the rendering screen turns all white. I don't know what is going on!

[Cad64]

Not sure, probably something is set incorrectly in your render settings?
Can you zip the file and post it here?

[arch15]

Just wondering whether you guys found out what was wrong with the rendering settings. I have the same problem when I render with the ink 'n paint in 3d max, the rendered image just turns to white even though it shows the black and white image during the rendering process... By the way, any idea if there is a chance to get the effect of the mentalray.hidden.line.countours-render directly in Autocad as well?

[Cad64]

Well, I'll ask you the same thing I asked the other guy. Can you post your file so I can take a look at it? He never posted his so I was never able to find out what was wrong.

Also, what version of Max are you using?

[arch15]

Hi again, it took me a while to get back to you, sorry. But here is the file finally and a test print using the hidden line contours renderer. Actually I prefer this way to get the white model but as you can see from the test print not all contours of the objects will show, melting them together very often, which just looks wrong specially for the landscape. I don't know if it is possible to avoid that somehow so I get a similar result as in the reference picture I attach along.
Again, working with the ink 'n paint will just give me a blank sheet... Any suggestions there?
I work with 3d max 2009 by the way and the drawing was imported from autocad.

[Cad64]

Well, I don't really know why you're getting a blank screen? It renders fine for me on Max 2011.

In order to get all the contours of the objects to show, you need to increase your sampling quality.

In your "Render Settings" dialog, "Renderer" tab, under "Sampling Quality" set "Samples per Pixel" to Minimum 4 Maximum 16 and for "Filter" choose "Mitchell". Or, if you really want to dial it in, set Minimum to 16 and Maximum to 64.

[arch15]

Thanks for the hints. I figure I must have my 2009 version configured differently or something, because all I get is the blank page. Well I guess, I might have to check on this on a new thread.
Anyway I changed the render settings. But while the contours are much precise and sharp now (thanks for that), some of them still won't show at all, so the volumes keep melting together (see attached image). Something tells me it has something to do with the shading since the melting happens there when the ground and the volumes or volumes sides next to each other have the same colour. I tried to assign materials with different colours and so on but it won't have any effect on the rendered image obviously and even unchecking shadows everywhere in the settings won't get me any further. Other suggestions there?

[Cad64]

I haven't got time to read through everything in this pdf, but take a look. I think it addresses the problem you're having: http://au.autodesk.com/?autodownload=../orig/class_questions/thread__872/DV214-1.pdf&mystem=../orig/class_questions/thread__872/DV214-1.pdf

[arch15]

YES! YES! YES! It worked! Thank you sooo much! I followed that one tiny step from your pdf and the contours showed. So I just had to go to camera effects under the renderer tab in the render settings and adjust the settings for the contour contrast shader. I assigned the shader to a sample slot on the material editor and changed the value of the z-step threshold from 1000 (!) to 5 and I finally got it. YES!

I also figured why I got the blank page for the ink'n paint override. From the approaches you suggested to get the black and white image I had tried the one using the hidden line contours renderer first. So when I moved on to the ink'n paint override I forgot to change the renderer back to the normal mental ray....

Well there is the prove, we are all just one small adjustment away from making things work!

Thanks again for your help!

[Cad64]

Excellent. I'm glad to see we finally got this issue sorted out once and for all. :thumbsup:

[NotTheGuest]

Kinda late here, but a really easy way to get a black and white image in the 3ds max renderer is:

1. Hit f9 to render
2. Press the monochrome button (to the right of the RGB channel selector)
2. Press the copy image button (next to the save image button)
3. Open up Microsoft Paint (or whatever image editing program you have at your disposal)
4. Press ctrl. + v to paste in your black and white image.

Bam, black and white image. :shock:

[Cad64]

Well, that's not really what the OP was trying to do. I know the title of this thread says "black and white image" but he wasn't really trying to get a black and white render. He was trying to get a contour line render.