Build an Advanced Drifting Car Rig in 3ds Max – Day 1

on Sep 28th 2009 with 50 comments
Tutorial Details
This entry is part 1 of 2 in the series Build an Advanced Drifting Car Rig

In this advanced level tutorial, you will learn all of the steps necessary to build a fully functioning car rig in 3D Studio Max. This rig features working suspension, steering and body roll, as well as some functionality for drifting and powerslides. You will learn how to set up internal functionality through links, constraints, expressions, and parameter wiring. The final result will be a robust rig with easy, and accessible controls.

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Project Files Download: FinalCarRig.rar

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By

Rollover to read this author's bio or click through to see a full list of posts by this author.

I'm Laurens Corijn, a recent Digital Arts & Entertainment graduate from Belgium. I've been doing CG for 4 years now, mainly focusing on mechanical subjects such as vehicles. I equally enjoy working on high-end rendering, and optimized, real-time, video game art. Besides doing CG, I like to spend my time listening to music, and riding and maintaining my motorcycle. My website can be found at: laurenscorijn.com.  

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  • http://www.heinzefilm.de Sebastian

    Why is this tutorial not for Cinema 4D? I would love that :(

  • Fllad

    Great tutorial. Have been looking for a car rigging tutorial forever. Cant wait for the second part

  • Georgi “Vrednia” Zahariev

    I think the tutorial is really cool, and i think you Sebastian can integrate the methods in Cinema 4d

  • Stefan Frank

    This is what i`m talking about! Ok i have learned this a while ago but definitly more advanced than the last tutorials. Very nice! CG Tuts is back ! Thanks

  • http://www.prospect-studio.com João

    I am learning a lot with you guys…keep good work.

    From Portugal

  • http://www.mushtools.com mushtools

    really a nice tutorial, thanks

  • Green

    Very cool ! thank very much !

  • CIonutD

    More 3ds Max tutorials please

    • tam lam

      it’s really cool tutorial but I can’t download it, it is not browse on the web

      could you show me how to get it

      thanks so much

  • monkeyalexthekidd

    thanks for the great tut

  • andi

    holy shit this is amazing

  • Cristian Pop

    Amazing!!!

  • dnch

    i want this in lightwave! frack cinema:)
    great one, thanks

  • http://carrig tam lam

    could you show me how to get it

    the tutorial not preview on the web

  • Boozy

    Cool Beans

  • wayne

    WOW One of the best iv seen and iv been looking for years thanks.By the way if you have time plese post a tutoreal of a car rigg for reactor in max.

  • http://ganirockz.co.cc ganesh

    Thank you very much. please come back soon with tuts like this

  • miaz3

    Wahou, thanks a lot for this videos tutorial. Great work !

  • Domen

    Great tutorial, but i run into problems with expression. Can you write down the expression that you used for motion of the spring and send it here or to my e-mail?

  • jtg

    Very good tutorial…But wheels are not rotating after 100 frame. What’s the reason..?

  • testout

    thanks man it is a great tut and i hope to u a good luck

  • valentious williams

    great tut
    i learned a lot here
    am from the Caribbean
    \we don;t have people teaching this kinda stuff here.
    i really need a reactor tutorial .like using the motor effectively

  • DakHo

    Great tutorial !

    I’m having some problems with the body suspensions, but i hope i’ll solve them as soon as possible.

    Thanks a lot!

  • duc

    does anyone know how to click and drag out a line like in the tut where the next vertex is restricted to being placed on along a single axis? like at time, -24:00

  • http://www.hsniperh.webs.com Hossam H.Sakr

    hiiiiiiiiiiii

    thanks Laurens for this awesome tutorial and i have question ??

    in part 1 every thing is okay till using IK when i am going to make last step linking IKHandle_Momentum & Dummy_Momentum_Taget with Body_Susp my car getting Scale and every thing getting crazy

    * my car is seperated parts not one Object *

  • aman

    sir please give us more tutorial

    • Ebay

      For that to not happen, make sure you have a clean save to before you make the IK link. Then redo everything. Before making the IK, go to your car Hierarchy pannel, and check all the “Scale” locks. Also make sure to remove the “Inherit scale”. You might also want to do the same with the Dummy_Body_Momentum, as it get scaled down when you make the Position constraint.

  • http://a hardy

    Hello,
    After tutorial end when I rotate SlidePivot about Z axis more than 90 degree,
    car body makes quick rotation on 180 degree. It is very strange.
    I think that this tutorial has defect.

    But nevertheless, thank you

  • karysino

    hi ther…… gr8 tut…. ha im looking for a car crash tut like collision effects 360 roll… etc. would b gr8 if u make one…. wil b waitin for tat thank ya for this tut….

  • http://Youtube.com/goranification Goran

    This website is great, You should be in youtube uploading some tutorials, so you get more famous, and get more visitor to your website.

  • http://www.digitalartempire.com Ben

    Absolutely hit the nail on the head – impressed – surprised there arent more comments and retweets – I hope you keep doing these tut especially the video’s they are excellent – thanks

  • Mike

    This is the coolest tutorial i have ever seen!
    i’m making a car model and i’ll apply this rig on the wheels of my car!

    Thanks For The Tutorial!!, Keep it up!

  • mazen khalil

    Thank you for yr tutorial
    about the expression float problem . i made S*Slider then update the speeddrive location and its working well,
    keep in mind to make yr speed weel from zero to 20 maximum and u can use all the frame u want

  • Yogesh

    Thanksssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss……………………….. a lot ,you are doing great work, please keep it up…..
    Thank ones again…………….

  • Codie

    Awesome tutorial, and I want to ask what is the grey car in intro video? It looks freaking good

  • sandeep

    I was looking for this thanx alot

  • http://indesign.azersayt.com INdesignER

    THANKS FOR TUTORIAL…..ITS GREAT TUTORIAL , BECAUSE I NEED IT ….THNKSSSSSSSSSSSSS

  • Ron_619

    hello,

    I needed some help in d wheel setup of my car as it is having a disk break & a caliper ,the problem is that if i will link the caliper wt the dummy it will also rotate along with the wheel which is not correct…..some plz help me……:/

    regards

  • PuppinoCbr

    Great!!! According to you, is it possible to do that in Luxology Modo 5 and/or Lightwave?

  • Andrew

    Great Tutorial. nice Work! Just what i needed.

  • wajid ali

    its a nice one procedure. but i want to learn more

  • Michael Kjergaard

    How do i download this tut? i have payed for the premium account, but cant see a download buttom?

    • http://www.christateonline.com Chris Tate
      Staff

      Hey Michael,

      You can download the tutorial by right clicking on the “Full Video” link (above the embedded video) and choosing “Save Link As” that should let you save it to your hard drive :)

      Cheers!

  • Denis

    Laurens, thanks for GREAT tutoruail!

    I have one problem – when I lower DriveSpeed in AttributeHolder wheels rotate backward ((((

  • Stephen

    This is a great Tutorial, I do actually have one tip. You can press alt – x wich will make your car transparent… so you can actually see what you linky yo what when linking your wheels or the car body! Great tut!!

  • cj3d

    hello
    that was a good tutorial but something makes it better :

    in the float expression panel when you want to assign a controller to something , max highlightes
    all the selected objects by yellow color so it makes finding controllers very easy.

  • Patrick

    Great tut.

    One thing I notice is that sometimes the float expressions only go through frame 100 and then stop. Why is that?

    Thanks.

    • Pedro A.

      Great tut.
      One thing I notice is that sometimes the float expressions only go through frame 100 and then stop. Why is that?
      Thanks.

      me too… how to solve it?

      • Patrick

        Hi Pedro, I think I found the solution:

        Instead of using NT (which stands for “Normalized Time”) in the expression, substitute S (which stands for “Seconds”) as the multiplier. This will make the tires spin really fast, so you can cut the amount you are multiplying the S (seconds) by dividing the “Slider” scaler in half.

        So instead of using -NT*Slider (or -NT*(Slider+Slider2) for the rear wheels), use -S*(.5*Slider) as the expression (or -S*((.5*Slider)+.5*Slider2)) for the rear wheels.

        Hope this helps.
        Patrick

  • addassd

    excellent tutorial. very useful for my project. thank you.

    ps my car did get messed up in the top rig (star). im still using the hyper active mode, but its fine. no problem.