Tutoriales

Welcome to our tutorial on Creating a Procedural Winter Landscape. Today, we'll guide you through 3 steps to create a simple scene using procedural modelling techniques in 3ds Max and Forest Pack.

Step 1 - The Landscape

First, we begin with a basic plane. Ensure it has enough subdivisions to be deformed into our landscape. Next, create a spline to outline the path of your stream.

Now, copy this spline as a reference. Add an extrude modifier and adjust the amount until it intersects with the landscape. Then, apply a Shell modifier to give it some thickness. Right-click on the object, navigate to object properties, and disable renderable. Set it to display as a box for easier management in the viewports.

Select the landscape. Add a Volume Select modifier. Set the Selection level to Vertex, the mode to Replace, and Select By to Mesh Object. Use the extruded spline as the mesh object.

To define the stream's depth, add a push modifier and use a negative value. To adjust the stream's width, return to the Volume Select and tweak the Soft Selection settings. Falloff sets the width, while the Pinch and Bubble settings help shape the profile of the stream’s banks.

Make your landscape more organic by adding modifiers like a Noise modifier, or an OpenSubdiv for a smoother appearance.

Finally, the landscape's texture, we've used a simple snow material. This is well covered in other people’s tutorials so we won't go into detail here. 

Step 2 - Add the Water

Now, let's add water to our stream. Copy the original spline again as a reference. Add a Renderable Spline modifier and set the Length and Width. Position the spline appropriately. Finally, apply your chosen water or ice material.

Step 3 - Trees and Plants

We'll now use the original spline a 3rd time, this time to add trees and plants with Forest Pack. Since it's a winter scene, choose snowy trees. If you don't have any, here's a tutorial for a handy tip on how to make any tree into a winter version.

Create a new Forest Pack object by clicking on the surface. Add your chosen trees to the items list and adjust the distribution density. To exclude trees from the river, add the river spline and set the mode to Exclude.

You can use the Thickness parameter to control the vegetation's proximity to the stream. That’s all there is to it really. You can add multiple vegetation layers for a richer scene. In our winter setup, we've kept it simple with just bushes and shrubs, but feel free to add more for different seasons.

The beauty of this system is its flexibility. To change the river's course, simply modify the original spline. The landscape, water, and trees will all update automatically!

As we conclude this tutorial, we want to wish all our users and viewers a happy holiday season. Stay tuned for more exciting content in the new year. Don't forget to subscribe to our channel for more updates. See you next year!