This week I’ll be showing you how to use the submerge (lume) shader in 3dsMax and mental ray. It’s an easy way to make your scenes look like their underwater while harnessing the power of caustics and global illumination. Try these techniques in conjunction with the waterbox we made last week for a really great one-two punch!

Also, you may have noticed that I included a transcript of last week’s video.  I’m going to try adding that in to the mix for the next few weeks to see if people find that useful.  Remember that you can always pass this page through Google Translate to get the transcription in your desired language!

I’m on vacation right now, but I’ve queued up this Monday Movie so that you can start your new year right!  This week I’m showing you how to create a water box in 3dsMax using the mental ray renderer.  For those of you who don’t know it, a water box is a great way to practice your rendering technique and for learning how the different settings work in mental ray.

I found this caustics tutorial recently, though I know it’s been around since about 2004.  What’s nice is that it’s already in PDF form so it’s easy to download and print.  Written by Mario Malagrino for the Florence Design Academy, this tutorial covers the bare bones of creating caustics in a simple waterbox.  The nuts and bolts of it are pretty straightforward, and Mario was kind enough to illustrate the tutorial clearly.

You can download the Caustics Tutorial here!