Step by step guide for a noob?

[hblender]

Also the hash.txt file that has been created is showing as chinese characters (I've noticed it mentioned before) is it supposed to be like that or do i need to use something else to convert it to binary?

Yes, that is normal. It is just that the notepad (or any text editor of your choise) reads the file containing ones and zeroes and it converts it into plain text thinking that it is the correct way of displaying that file. The same would happen if you import that binary into a audio editor like Audacity, but then if you play it you will hear noise.

The wordlist or mask that you are using is too small.
This means that hashcat cannot use the full parallel power of your device(s).
Unless you supply more work, your cracking speed will drop.
For tips on supplying more work, see: https://hashcat.net/faq/morework

Approaching final keyspace - workload adjusted.

Cracking performance lower than expected?

* Append -w 3 to the commandline.
  This can cause your screen to lag.

* Update your backend API runtime / driver the right way:
  https://hashcat.net/faq/wrongdriver

* Create more work items to make use of your parallelization power:
  https://hashcat.net/faq/morework

Those warnings are mostly realted to your hashrate this means that the cracking is being performed at lower hashrates than expected (caused by your hardware configuration or drivers), in other words, it will take some time to hashcat to hash a password and try it againist the veracrypt hash.



Finally, I suppose you have told hashcat to try to crack the hash using three custom charsets:
-1 ?l?d?u, -2 ?l?d, -3 ?l?d*!$@_,
 
And every time you see this message:

Approaching final keyspace - workload adjusted.

It means that hashcat has exhausted (or it is getting close to the last combinations it will try) all the possible combinations of that charset you have specified.