Product Description

The book will provide insider tips, traps, and techniques on how to create 3d assets for use in computer games and simulation systems. The book will consist of a series of tutorials, starting with simpler models and moving up to more complex builds. As the book comes to us directly from successful game artists within commercial game development circles (Gahan + contributors) aspiring game artists will also find keen insights on how to get ahead in the game industry, i.e. how to prepare your personal portfolio to provide an edge in this extremely competitive world of game development.

The strength of this book is that it teaches all of the important game modeling elements of 3ds Max: character modeling, environment modeling, mapping. The book covers how to model, texture and animate credible game characters and levels using 3ds max. As readers move from tutorial to tutorial, they will be building their own portfolio of high quality work.

The DVD contains countless examples of what's hot and what's not in 3D modeling and also enough support images and photos to keep the budding artist busy for months; Features:
-step-by-step project files for each chapter
-all the relevant texture files and source photos used to create the texture maps applied to the 3D projects.
-extras: panoramic skies, small scene objects and a many texture maps and models so that artists can create whole scenes very quickly without starting from scratch each time.
-royalty free stock photos that artists can use in their own texture maps, models and scenes.
-additional material on the book's bonus website at www.3d-for-games.com

--Author Andy Gahan is a seasoned professional and leading industry expert. Gahan is a key member of an award-winning game team recently scoring number 1 hits in Japan, Europe and America with the Playstation 3 smash hit MotorStorm.

--Game Modeling techniques offered with artist's potential portfolio in mind. Find out what Art Directors and Managers are looking for.

--Essentials of 3D game modeling covered - Characters, Vehicles, Assets and Scenes - including lighting and rendering.

--DVD contains countless examples of what's hot and what's not in 3D modeling and also enough support images and photos to keep the budding artist busy for months.

--Find additional tutorials and even contact the author on the book's website at www.3d-for-games.com

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #13080 in Books
• Published on: 2008-09-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

About the Author
Andrew Gahan is a leading industry expert in next generation consoles and digital gaming. His roles have included Senior Artist, Lead Artist, Art Manager, Art Director, Art Outsource Manager, and Producer. Andrew is an expert in all gaming tools for commercial game development, including: 3ds Max, Maya, Photoshop, XSI, Gen Head, Z Brush, Mud Box, and Poly-boost (as well as other 3ds max plug-ins). During this time Andrew has worked on 14 standalone published games as well as sequential spin-off products; as well as developing a number of military training systems for the Warrior - Armoured Fighting Vehicle, Harrier and Tornado aircraft. In the last decade Andrew has been involved in recruitment and development of artists, including theoretical and practical training. Andrew has been a freelance consultant helping companies to develop and improve tools and applications that are used by artists in the digital gaming industry. Andrew is currently a visiting speaker and advisor at Liverpool John Moore University for the MA digital games course; and is an external advisor at the University of Bolton, supporting the development of their forthcoming 3D related courses. Andrew has judged the Independent Games Festival for the past 2 years. He has been a visiting speaker at Liverpool John Moore University since 2005, and will also be a speaker at the University of Bolton for the forthcoming 3D Games Modeling course. Andrew Gahan has given numerous media interviews, of which a recent selection is given below: 15 December 2007. Interview with Gamasutra magazine Media consumption: MotorStorm's Andy Gahan. Television interview for 1-up.com with Pete Smith (Executive External Producer, SCEE (Sony)) in San Francisco, during GDC (Game Developer Conference) in the Sony Store for the launch of MotorStorm. Television interview for GamerTV with Pete Smith (Executive External Producer, SCEE (Sony)) in San Francisco, during GDC (Game Developer Conference)

Customer Reviews

A must-have for anyone interested in getting into the industry!
Firstly let's have the summary first - this is a great book. I'd been looking for something to give me the specific practices and techniques that are the industry standard for some time and this is finally it!

This is a well rounded book from one of the top artists currently working within the cutting edge of the games industry. It covers a range of practical and likely game assets at both the entry and top skill levels and delivers it all from a technical and creative perspective.

There are plenty of gems of knowledge throughout the book that will continue to make it useful as a reference guide for anyone, and it is clear when it features opinion as well as fact. This is all very cool stuff.

The later chapters of the book build on the experience and knowledge given at the start and although they continue in a step by step guiding fashion it doesn't really `hand-hold' or patronise the reader through it.

Even non-game artists will find something of use here, everyone can get some good info from the wealth on display here.

AND! I've not even mentioned the superb DVD or the related website!

Maxed out for games
As someone who is looking to get into university to study computer graphics with a view to go into the games industry I bought this book with high hopes. Unfortunately two things will strike you when you start. One is the authors assumption that you are familiar with the 3DS Max tools and where they are. The second thing is the seeming lack of picture reference to follow. As a novice I found it hard to follow the text only descriptions of what to do. There are some pictures but they are very inadequate as a descriptive help tool. I would say this book is more for students that are on or already ready to leave university and want to add some game specific content to their portfolio. Not recommended for casual novices.

You need this, no matter what you want to do with 3ds max
An incredible book! The author treats every subject with care and puts an emphasize only on the important stuff that one has to know in order to become a great artist. Of course, this is not the ultimate tutorial, further reading is recommended, but if you are serious about becoming a 3d artist (of any kind) , you have to have this book! You will learn lots of cool modeling and texturing techniques, there are also instructions on how to use photoshop to create your own opacity and normal maps. I found the latter as being the most interesting and useful since normal and opacity maps are essential in order to create realistic and convincing worlds without using too much geometry. Before reading this book however, I would recommend playing a little bit with photoshop, just to get used to the different tools and toolbars. The author will base his explanations on this kind of knowledge and it could become confusing if you don't know anything about photoshop. Wow! Don't worry, you don't have to know everything. Just a couple of simple things like, scaling images, layers, moving them , rotating them, and also play around with the magic wand tool and Clone stamp tool. Those will be used a lot. In conclusion... what can I say? Great book! And Andrew, we're all waiting for a second volume! PS: As was stated by other reviewers, the DVD is a great collection of photos (almost 2GB !!!) taken in an abandoned hospital! It also contains the necessairy tutorial files!