Creating Realistic Diamond in 3ds Max

Let's first set our scene unit setup. In the menu bar across the top, click 'Customize' > 'Units Setup...' Then change 'Display Unit Scale' to 'Metric' > 'Centimetres'. Click on the top view with the left mouse button. The selected view appears with a yellow border around it. I have labeled the 3 buttons for 'Move', 'Rotate', and 'Scale', which we will use a lot during the tutorial. You can select any view by clicking on that view panel. Middle clicking will also select that view without accidentally moving something in the scene. If you press ALT+W it will maximise the currently selected view. Pressing ALT+W again will return to the quad workspace display. (To enlarge the more detailed screencaps in this tutorial, click the Zoom In / Out magnifying glass in the top left corner of the image.) Click on the 'Create' tab, highlighted here in red. Select 'Cylinder' and drag from the center of the upper diamond reference drawing outwards until you reach the outer edges. It will then expect you to define the depth. Drag slightly up to define a depth, it does not matter what right now. Then click to finish the creation of the cylinder. Now click on the tab next to 'Create', which when hovered over will show 'Modify'. Change the 'Height Segments' to 1, and the 'Sides' to 16, as the diamond will have 16 sides. Right click in the viewport, whilst the object is still selected and click 'Convert to Editable Poly'. This converts the primitive shape into a form that is editable.While in 'Editable Poly' mode, there are 6 subselection modes. You can access them by either expanding the 'Editable Poly' dropdown menu on the right-hand side, or by pressing the correct shortcut keys. Vertex (1) Edge (2) Edge Border (3) Polygon (4) Element (5) Select 'Vertex', or hit (1) on the keyboard. Using the select tool (Q) drag a rectangular selection encompassing all of the top points.
Now right click again over the object, and select 'Collapse' from the menu. This collapses all of those vertexes into just one vertex, which will be the bottom of our diamond.We are now going to make the preliminary cuts into our model. Make sure the model is selected. In the top viewport right-click the word 'Top' and select 'Smooth + Highlights'. Alternatively you could press (F3), which changes from Wireframe mode to Smooth + Highlights mode.Press (F4) to display the edges. Press ALT+X to display the model in 'X-ray' mode, so the reference image is visible behind the model. Enter Vertex Subselection mode by pressing (1) or clicking 'Vertex' under 'Editable Poly' on the 'Modify' tab. Scroll down using the scroll bar on the far right of the tab, and find the 'Cut' tool. Click the 'Cut' tool button. We're going to cut across the object along the star-shaped lines in the reference image. Although the lines in the image are curved, we're going to cut a straight line from one vertex to another and curve them later on. So following those lines, we'll start our cut at the top right vertex. With the 'Cut' tool active, hover over the vertex at the start of the red line and click once. Now follow the line across to the opposite side and click once on that vertex. This will perform a cut across the object.
Here I have labeled the beginning cut order. After cut 3, continue following the lines of the reference image by clicking on each vertex in turn until you end up back at vertex 1.Exit the cut tool by right-clicking. Turn off 'X-ray' mode by pressing ALT+x. This is how your model should look at this point.Enter Vertex Subselection mode (1) and select the two vertices show in red (upper right). Click the first vertex, then hold down CTRL as you click the second.We will connect these vertices together using the Connect' tool. Right-click and press 'Connect'.Continue this until all vertex pairs are connected and your diamond till all around finishes.
Go back to 'X-ray' mode (Alt+X), then vertex subselection mode (1). Select all the vertices in this area (all the inner vertices).Enter 'Scale' mode by clicking on the icon (highlighted in red) or hitting (R). Make sure the Scale icon is inset to indicate it's selected, or else press (R) again until it insets.Like before, the coloured lines correspond to the different axes. We only want to scale up in the Y and X axes, so hover your mouse over the highlighted strip until it turns solid and the lines of the X and Y axes both turn yellow (see below). Drag the strip towards the upper right corner until the star-shaped cuts match those of the reference image. The next step is to form the shape of the diamond. Go to the Perspective view. You may hide the selection brackets and the grid by pressing (J) and (G) respectively. This will give you a cleaner workspace so you can clear your mind and focus better. Remember, to display the edges select the diamond at top level / 'Editable Poly' (6) and hit (F4). To turn off 'Xray' mode press ALT+X. Then enter 'Polygon' Subselection mode (4), and select these polygons on the top of the model. Remember CTRL+click to select more than one.
With those polygons selected go to the Top view, enter the Move tool, and hover over the Y axis arrow. This will constrain movement to only the Y axis (up). Drag upwards, in line with the reference image.Go to Vertex subselection mode and select the vertices shown in the image below.
In the Top view, move these down in the Y axis (grab the green handle). Try to match the image below.Next, rotate the Perspective view to this angle and go to 'Edge' subselection mode (2). Proceed to draw a rectangle selection around the highlighted edges. Make sure 'Ignore Backfacing' is turned off.
With the edges now selected, right-click and click 'Connect'. Then select the 2 vertices shown below and 'Connect'.Rotate the camera slightly by ALT+middle mouse, and drag down in the viewport to see the vertices displayed in the image below. While keeping the two vertices you just connected selected, select the next two vertices shown and connect.
This should draw two more connections in the shape of a V instead of just one, so it's a slightly faster and more efficient method than if we were to de-select, then select again for each set of 2 points we want to connect.Proceed to connect the vertices until you reach the starting point.
Select the edges shown.
Right-click, then hold down CTRL while you click 'Remove'. This will do a 'clean remove', deleting the edges and vertices at once rather than just the edges.Now select the shown edges and again perform a 'clean remove'.Go to 'Element' subselection mode (5) and click on your object.'Clear All'. This takes away any smoothing groups on your model, and max displays each polygon as if it were a flat surface.
In the left view, select this column of vertices.
Right-click and you'll see a small box next to the 'Chamfer' tool button. The box brings up pop up options for the adjacent tool. Click this box now, and copy the settings in the next image.
Now select the highlighted vertices below.
Right-click and click on the options box next to 'Weld'. This tool will weld a number of vertices together based upon a threshold. Increase the weld threshold until the clumps of 2 vertices weld together as 1's. In this case it was 2.69cm that did the job.
Select the highlighted vertices and again, perform the same weld. This time a higher threshold is required.Around 4.95 compared to previous.
We are now going to make the diamond edge cuts. Select all of the highlighted edges.
Right-click and select 'Collapse'. This is the result:
Now select the marked vertices.
Right-click and select the 'Chamfer' options box. Increase the threshold to match the chamfer on the image below. Then go to Edge subselection mode and select the edges shown in the next two images.With these edges selected, right-click and 'Collapse'. Select the highlighted vertices, right-click and click connect. Then choose the vertices highlighted in green, and connect those. Do this to each of these vertex pairs around the diamond.
Our diamond is now complete. I hope you learned a lot from the process. You can apply the same methods with other diamond blueprints to model a variety of cuts and other gems.

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