Part VI, "Using MaxScript," is the shining star; by itself, it's worth the cost of this massive tome. Spanning well over 200 pages, this section covers the basics of MaxScript, how to manipulate scenes with MaxScript, animating with MaxScript by using controllers and keyframes, and creating plug-in scripts. If you want to squeeze the most from MaxScript, you'll be in heaven with this section.
The book falls short in two areas, unfortunately. The first is that there are no color illustrations to enhance the text on lighting, materials, and rendering. The second is that there is little information on animation and virtually none on character animation. Of the 745 pages, approximately 65 discuss creating and tweaking animation in Max. If you plan on using Max for complex animation of any kind, this book won't work for you. --Mike Caputo
This book is very detail explain of the using SIMULINK.
I recommend to the starter using SIMULINK.
It's very helpful..
Because I needed to learn the program thoroughly for my dissertation work, this is the fifth 3dsMax book I've bought, and it's the first that's not been overtly disappointing. If someone wants to have every little feature laid out in boring detail, there are the official materials and release notes for that. This book is the literal opposite (others suggesting otherwise have clearly not read the book in much detail).
What is most impressive here is that the book is NOT a systematic, unstructured tour of the program, dutifully covering each minor feature. Rather, it is results-oriented: if you want to accomplish X, here is how you go about it. Although it is graphically-rich and amazingly clear, it is most certainly not a comic book version of a Max book, and is clearly targeted to the sophisticated user. Even though a beginner would find the book quite useful, it should probably be bought in conjunction with a primer or a book "introducing" 3dsMax.
The writing is sprightly and, although there are spots where the editing might have been tightened, it is well above average even in that regard. In fact, if anything, the book has a crisp literary feel to it that will appeal to most readers, but may not be the style of choice for really hard-core users. Still, this is preferable to the studied dessication of nearly all the other books I've seen on the topic.
Finally, the graphical illustrations are uniformly excellent, leaving little to the imagination. I'm hoping that this team sees fit to write such a guide for the next, inevitable incarnation of the program. I for one will be advance ordering it.
