Complex scenes can end up being a collection of hundreds of files, and misplacing any of them will affect the final output, so learning to work with files is critical. This chapter focuses on working with files, whether they are object files, texture images, or background images. Files enable you to move scene pieces into and out of Max. You can also export and import files to and from other packages. Max scenes can also be composed from several different objects that have been created by a team. Using external references (XRefs), you can pull all the different pieces together into a single scene. Working with Max Scene Files Of all the different file types and formats, there is one file type that you will probably work with more than any other—the max format. Max has its own proprietary format for its scene files. These files have the .max extension and allow you to save your work as a file and return to it at a later time. Max also supports files saved with the .chr extension used for character files. When Max starts, a new scene opens. You can start a new scene at any time with the File➪New (Ctrl+N) command. Although each instance of Max can have only one scene open at a time, under Windows XP, you can open multiple copies of Max, each with its own scene instance. Starting a new scene deletes the current scene, but Max asks you whether you want to keep the objects and hierarchy, keep the objects, or make everything new, as shown in Figure 3-1. Starting a new scene with the File➪New menu command maintains all the current interface settings, including the viewport configurations, any interface changes, viewport backgrounds, and any changes to the Command Panel. To reset the interface, choose File➪Reset. When reset, all interface settings return to their default states, but interface changes aren’t affected.
3 3 CHAPTER
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In This Chapter
Saving, opening, merging, and archiving files
Importing and exporting objects and scenes
Importing objects from external packages like Illustrator
Externally referencing objects and scenes
Working with file utilities such as the Asset Browser
Accessing scene files’ information
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Figure 3-1: When creating a new scene, you can keep the current objects or select New All.
Saving files After you start up Max, the first thing you should learn is how to save your work. After a scene has changed, you can save it as a file. Before a file is saved, the word “Untitled” appears in the title bar; after you save the file, its name appears in the title bar. Choose File➪Save (Ctrl+S) to save the scene. If the scene hasn’t been saved yet, then a Save File As dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 3-2. You can also make this dialog box appear using the File➪ Save As command. After a file’s been saved, using the File➪Save command saves the file without opening the File dialog box. Pretty simple—just don’t forget to do it often.
All file dialog boxes can now be resized to show more files. To resize a file dialog box, simply drag on its edges or corners. This feature is new to 3ds max 7.
Figure 3-2: Use the Save File As dialog box to save a scene as a file.
The Save File As dialog box keeps a history list of the last five directories that you’ve opened. You can select these directories from the History drop-down list at the top of the dialog box. The buttons in this dialog box are the standard Windows file dialog box buttons used to go to the last folder visited, go up one directory, create a new folder, and to view a pop-up menu of file view options. The options include Large Icons, Small Icons, List, Details, and Thumbnails.
Go to Last Folder Visited
Increment File Number and Save
View Menu Up One Level Create New Folder
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The thumbnail option displays an image of the active viewport, which is useful when you open files, but when you save files for the first time, the thumbnail is blank.
If you try to save a scene over the top of an existing scene, then Max presents a dialog box confirming this action.
Clicking the button with a plus sign to the right of the Save button automatically appends a number onto the end of the current filename and saves the file. For example, if you select the myScene.max file and click the plus button, a file named myScene01.max is saved.
Use the auto increment file number and Save button to save progressive versions of a scene. This is an easy version control system. If you need to backtrack to an earlier version, you can.
The File menu also includes an option to Save Selected. This option saves the current selected objects to a separate scene file. If you create a single object that you might use again, select the object and use the Save Selected option to save it to a directory of models. A Save Copy As menu command is also available that lets you save the current scene to a different name without changing its current name. Another useful feature for saving files is to enable the Auto Backup feature in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box. This dialog box can be accessed with the Customize➪ Preferences menu command, which is covered later in this chapter. Opening files After you’ve saved a file, you may want to know how to open it again. Choosing File➪Open (Ctrl+O) opens a file dialog box that is the same as the one used to save files, shown in Figure 3-2. Max can open files saved with the .max and .chr extensions. Max can also open VIZ Render files that have the .drf extension. Selecting a file and clicking on the plus button opens a copy of the selected file with a new version number appended to its name. If Max cannot locate resources used within a scene (such as maps) when you open a Max file, then the Missing External Files dialog box, shown in Figure 3-3, appears, enabling you to Continue without the file or to Browse for the missing files. If you click the Browse button, the Configure External File Paths dialog box opens, where you can add a path to the missing files.
Figure 3-3: The Missing External Files dialog box identifies files for the current scene that are missing.
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If you open a file that includes features that have changed since the previous version, then Max presents an obsolete data format warning statement. Resaving the file can fix this problem. However, if you save a file created with a previous version of Max as a Max 7 scene file, then you won’t be able to open the file again in the previous versions of Max.
You can disable the Obsolete File Message in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box.
The most recently opened scenes are listed in the File➪Open Recent submenu. Selecting these scenes from the list opens the scene file.
You can also open files from the command line by placing the filename after the executable name, i.e., 3dsmax.exe myFile.max. You can also use the –L switch after the executable name to open the last file that was opened.
Merging and replacing objects If you happen to create the perfect prop in one scene and want to integrate the prop into another scene, you can use the Merge menu command. Choose File➪Merge to load objects from another scene into the current scene. Using this menu command opens a file dialog box that is exactly like the Save As dialog box, but after you select a scene and click the Open button, the Merge dialog box, shown in Figure 3-4, appears. This dialog box displays all the objects found in the selected scene file. It also has options for sorting the objects and filtering certain types of objects. Selecting an object and clicking the OK button loads the object into the current scene.
The Merge dialog box is very similar to the Select Objects dialog box.
Figure 3-4: The Merge dialog box lists all the objects from a merging scene.
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If you ever get involved in a modeling duel, then you’ll probably be using the File➪Replace menu command at some time. A modeling duel is when two modelers work on the same rough model of named objects and the animator (or boss) gets to choose which object to use. With the File➪Replace menu command, you can replace a named object with an object of the same name in a different scene. The objects are selected using the same dialog box shown in Figure 3-4, but only the objects with identical names in both scene files display. If no objects with the same name appear in both scene files, a warning box is displayed.
The File menu also includes a Merge Animation menu command, which is covered in Chapter 29, “Animation and Keyframe Basics.”
Archiving files By archiving a Max scene along with its reference bitmaps, you can ensure that the file includes all the necessary files. This is especially useful if you need to send the project to your cousin to show off or to your boss and you don’t want to miss any ancillary files. Choose File➪Archive to save all scene files as a compressed archive. The default archive format is .zip (but you can change it in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box to use whatever archive format you want). The Archive System lets you specify which archive program Max uses to archive your files. Maxzip is the default, but you can change it to whichever program you want to use. Saving an archive as a .zip file compiles all external files, such as bitmaps, into a single compressed file. The File Type drop-down list of the File Archive dialog box also includes an option to create a List of Files. When you select this file type, a text file is created that lists all relevant files and their paths. Getting out As you can probably guess, you use the File➪Exit command to exit the program, but only after it gives you a chance to save your work. Clicking on the window icon with an X on it in the upper right has the same effect (but I’m sure you knew that). Setting File Preferences The Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box holds the controls for backing up, archiving, and logging Max files. You can open this dialog box using the Customize➪ Preferences menu command. Figure 3-5 shows this panel. Handling files The Files panel includes several options that define how to handle files. The first option is to Backup on Save. When you save a file using the File➪Save (Ctrl+S) menu command, the existing file is overwritten. The Backup on Save option causes the current scene file to be saved as a backup (with the name MaxBack.bak in the 3dsmax\autobak directory) before saving the new file. If the changes you made were a mistake, you can recover the file before the last changes by renaming the MaxBack.bak file to MaxBack.max and reopening it in Max.
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Figure 3-5: The Files panel includes an Auto Backup feature.
Another option to prevent overwriting your changes is the Increment on Save option. This option adds an incremented number to the end of the existing filename every time it is saved. This retains multiple copies of the file and is an easy version-control method for your scene files. This way, you can always go back to an earlier file when the client changes his mind. With this option enabled, the MaxBack.bak file isn’t used. The Compress on Save option compresses the file automatically when it is saved. Compressed files require less file space but take longer to load. If you’re running low on hard drive space, then you’ll want to enable this option.
Another reason to enable the Compress on Save option is that large files (100MB or greater) load into the Network Queue Manager much more quickly when compressed for network rendering.
The Save Viewport Thumbnail Image option saves a 64-×-64-pixel thumbnail of the active viewport along with the file. This thumbnail is displayed in the Open dialog box and can also be seen from Windows Explorer, as shown in Figure 3-6. Saving a thumbnail with a scene adds about 9K to the file size.
The Save Viewport Thumbnail Image option is another good option to keep enabled. Thumbnails help you to find scene files later, and nothing is more frustrating than seeing a scene’s filename without a thumbnail.
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Figure 3-6: Max files with thumbnails show up in Windows Explorer.
In addition to a thumbnail, Max also offers an option to save the Schematic View with the file. Although Max can generate a new Schematic View from an existing file, saving the Schematic View with the file is quicker if you work with this view often. Saving File Properties with the file is also helpful, but be warned that saving this extra info with the file increases its file size slightly. Still, doing so is worth the effort because you can easily locate and understand the scene file later on. When a Max file created in a previous version of Max is opened, a warning dialog box appears that says, “Obsolete data format found—Please resave file.” To eliminate this warning, disable the Display Obsolete File Message option. The warning dialog box also includes an option to Don’t Display Again that enables this option when selected. When textures are updated, the Reload Textures on Change option forces the textures to be reloaded when they are altered. This slows your system while Max waits for the textures to reload, but offers the latest look immediately. The Recent Files in File Menu option determines the number of recently opened files that appear in the File➪Open Recent menu. The maximum value is 9.
I like to set the Recent Files in File Menu option at its highest value because I find that this is the easiest way to open up the latest scenes.
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Backing up files The Auto Backup feature in Max can save you from the nightmare of losing all your work due to a system crash. With Auto Backup enabled, you can select the number of Autobak Files to keep around and how often the files are backed up. The backup files are saved to the directory specified by the Configure Paths dialog box. The default is to save these backups to the 3dsmax\autoback directory. You can also select a name for the backup files.
Even if you have this feature enabled, you should still save your file often.
This is how it works: If you’ve set the number of backup files to 2, the interval to 5 minutes, and the backup name to MyBackup, then after five minutes the current file is saved as MyBackup1.max. After another five minutes, another file named MyBackup2.max is saved, and then after another five minutes, the MyBackup1.max file is overwritten with the latest changes. If you lose your work as a result of a power failure or by having your toddler accidentally pull out the plug, you can recover your work by locating the autobak file with the latest date and reloading it into Max. This file won’t include all the latest changes—only updates up to the last backup save.
I highly recommend that you keep the Auto Backup option enabled. This feature has saved my bacon more than once.
Tutorial: Setting Auto Backup Now that I have stressed that setting up Auto Backup is an important step to do, let’s run through exactly how to set it up. To set up the Auto Backup feature, follow these steps: 1. Open the Preference Settings dialog box by choosing Customize➪Preferences, and click the Files panel. 2. Turn on Auto Backup by selecting the Enable option in the Auto Backup section. 3. Set the number of Autobak files to 3.
To maintain version control of your Max scenes, use the Increment on Save feature instead of increasing the Number of Autobak Files.
4. Set the Backup Interval to the amount of time to wait between backups. The Backup Interval should be set to the maximum amount of work that you are willing to redo. (I keep my settings at 5 minutes.) You can also give the Auto Backup file a name. 5. Auto Backup saves the files in the directory specified by the Auto Backup path. To view where this path is located, choose Customize➪Configure Paths.
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Maintaining log files You can also use the Files panel to control log files. Log files keep track of any errors and warnings, general command info, and any debugging information. You can set log files to never be deleted, expire after so many days, or keep a specified file size with the latest information. If your system is having trouble, checking the error log gives you some idea as to what the problem is. Logs are essential if you plan on developing any custom scripts or plugins. You can select that the log contain all Errors, Warnings, Info, and Debug statements. Each entry in the log file includes a date-time stamp and a three-letter designation of the type of message with DBG for debug, INF for info, WRN for warning, and ERR for error messages followed by the message. The name of the log file is Max.log. It is saved in the 3dsmax\network subdirectory. Importing and Exporting If you haven’t noticed, Max isn’t the only game in town. A number of different 3D packages exist, and exchanging files between them is where the importing and exporting menu commands come in. You can find both of these commands in the File menu. Importing supported formats Choose File➪Import to open the Import dialog box. This dialog box looks like a typical Windows file dialog box. The real power comes with the various Import Settings dialog boxes that are available for each format. The settings in the Import Settings dialog box are different for the various format types. Another common import dialog box offers options to merge the imported objects with the current scene or to completely replace the current scene. For many formats, you can also convert units on the imported file. For example, importing a 3D Studio file opens a simple dialog box, shown in Figure 3-7. With the Convert Units option selected, Max assumes that the 3DS file is based in inches and converts it to the currently defined units.
Figure 3-7: The 3DS Import dialog box enables you to merge objects into or completely replace the current scene.
If any of the object names in the imported scene match those in the current scene, an Import Name Conflict dialog box opens, allowing you to rename the imported objects, or you can Skip or Cancel the import.
The ability to import LandXML/DEM/DDF and Wavefront Material and Object files is new to 3ds max 7.
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Max can import several different formats, including the following: ✦ 3D Studio Mesh, Projects, and Shapes (3DS, PRJ, SHP) ✦ Adobe Illustrator (AI) ✦ LandXML/DEM/DDF ✦ AutoCAD (DWG, DXF) ✦ Kaydara (FBX) ✦ Initial Graphics Exchange Standard (IGE, IGS, IGES) ✦ Lightscape (LS, VW, LP) ✦ StereoLithography (STL) ✦ Wavefront Material and Object (MTL, OBJ) ✦ VRML (WRL, WRZ) ✦ VIZ Material XML Import (XML) Import preference The Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box has a single option dealing with importing—Zoom Extents on Import. When this option is enabled, it automatically zooms all viewports to the extent of the imported objects. Imported objects can often be scaled so small that they aren’t even visible. This option helps you to locate an object when imported. Exporting supported formats In addition to importing, you’ll sometimes want to export Max objects for use in other programs. You access the Export command by choosing File➪Export. You also have the option to Export Selected (available only if an object is selected).
The ability to export to the JSR-184 (M3G) for wireless devices and to the Wavefront (MTL, OBJ) format is new to 3ds max 7.
Max can export to several different formats, including the following: ✦ 3D Studio (3DS) ✦ Adobe Illustrator (AI) ✦ ASCII Scene Export (ASE) ✦ Lightscape Material, Blocks, Parameters, Layers, Preparations, and Views (ATR, BLK, DF, LAY, LP, VW) ✦ AutoCAD (DWG, DXF) ✦ Kaydara (FBX) ✦ Initial Graphics Exchange Standard (IGS) ✦ JSR-184 (M3G) ✦ Wavefront Material and Object (MTL, OBJ)
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✦ StereoLithography (STL) ✦ Shockwave 3D Scene Export (W3D) ✦ VRML97 (WRL) Exporting to the JSR-184 (M3G) format The JSR-184 export option lets you save a scene to a format that can be viewed on mobile devices that support the Java 2 Micro Edition standard interface, such as mobile phones and PDA devices. Because wireless devices have such a limited bandwidth, the JSR-184 Exporter dialog box, shown in Figure 3-8, includes several options for optimizing the exported scene. This dialog box lists the Max scene hierarchy, the JSR-184 scene hierarchy, and the parameters for the selected scene object. Using the toolbar buttons at the top of the dialog box, you can change the hierarchy that is to be exported.
Figure 3-8: The JSR-184 Exporter dialog box provides ways to optimize the exported scene.
New JSR-184 Scene Add 3dsmax Scene Add World Object Add Group Convert Mesh to Sprite Texture Tool Remove Object
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Before a scene can be exported, the Max scene must include a camera and you must specify an Active Camera in the JSR-184 Exported dialog box. When a material map is selected from the JSR-184 hierarchy list, the Texture Tool icon on the toolbar becomes active. Clicking this button opens the Texture Tool dialog box, shown in Figure 3-9, where you can precisely control the size and format of the exported maps.
Figure 3-9: The Texture Tool lets you specify the exact size of texture maps to be exported for mobile devices.
To view the exported M3G files, the default installation of Max includes an M3G Player, which can be found along with the other Max programs in Start➪Programs➪discreet➪3ds max 7➪ M3G Player. To use this player, the Java Runtime Environment needs to be installed. You can install it from the Max setup disc. Exporting to the Shockwave 3D (W3D) format Shockwave 3D is an interactive format used by Macromedia’s Director software. The exporter includes an Analysis tool and a Preview window. To export a Max scene to the Shockwave 3D format, select File➪Export or File➪Export Selected and select the Shockwave 3D format as the File Type in the file dialog box. After you give the file a name and click OK, the Shockwave 3D Scene Export Options dialog box opens, as shown in Figure 3-10. This dialog box includes several options that you can include in the export file. You can also select a camera to use or choose to use the Active Viewport. The Compression Settings for Geometry, Texture, and Animation can be set to different quality settings between 0 and 100, and you can choose to limit the texture size. The Shockwave 3D Export Options dialog box includes buttons that enable you to check the objects for any geometry abnormalities that will cause problems within a Shockwave viewer. After you click the Author Check button, all geometries are checked, and another dialog box listing potential problems opens. Possible problems include the following: ✦ Geometries with holes ✦ Isolated vertices ✦ Unsupported textures ✦ Use of any Shaders other than Blinn ✦ Unsupported modifier and controller animations
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Figure 3-10: The Shockwave 3D Scene Export Options dialog box lets you choose which resources to export.
The Analyze button opens the Shockwave 3D File Analysis dialog box, shown in Figure 3-11. This dialog box shows a pie chart of the size of the various objects used in the scene.
Figure 3-11: The Shockwave 3D File Analysis dialog box shows the size of your scene’s objects.
The Preview button opens a Preview window, where you can view the exported Shockwave 3D file. You can navigate about the Preview window by clicking and dragging with the left mouse button. Holding down the Shift key while dragging spins the viewpoint about its axis.
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Holding down the Ctrl key while dragging zooms in and out of the view, and dragging with the spacebar held down pans the view. Pressing the Shift key and the spacebar together constrains the panning motion to either horizontal or vertical. Exporting utilities In addition to the menu commands found in the File menu, Max includes a couple of utilities that export specific information: the Lighting Data Export Utility and the Material XML Exporter Utility. You can access these utilities from the Utilities panel in the Command Panel by clicking the More button and selecting them from the pop-up list that appears. Lighting Data Export Utility The Lighting Data Export Utility exports exposure control data for a scene’s Illuminance and Luminance values. These files can be saved as PIC or TIF files, which you can select in the 2D Lighting Data Exporter rollout. You also can set an image’s Width and Height dimensions.
Exposure Control must be enabled for this utility to be enabled. You can learn about exposure control in Chapter 43, “Rendering Basics.”
Material XML Exporter Utility The Material XML Exporter Utility exports a selected material to an XML file format, where it can be easily shared with other users. After you select this utility, the Parameters rollout offers four options for selecting the material to export: the Material/Map Browser, the Object List, Pick Object in Scene, and All Objects in Scene. The utility also offers several export options including Native XML, export to an Autodesk Tool Catalog, and using an XSLT template. You also can select to export the material with a thumbnail and along with its mapping modifiers. Tutorial: Importing vector drawings from Illustrator In most companies, a professional creative team uses an advanced vector drawing tool such as Illustrator to design the company logo. If you need to work with such a logo, learning how to import the externally created file gives you a jumpstart on your project.
When importing vector-based files into Max, only the lines are imported. Max cannot import fills, blends, or other specialized vector effects. All imported lines are automatically converted to Bézier splines in Max.
Although Max can draw and work with splines, this feature takes a backseat to the vector functions available in Adobe Illustrator. If you have an Illustrator (AI) file, you can import it directly into Max. To import Adobe Illustrator files into Max, follow these steps: 1. Within Illustrator, save your file as “Bugs Head Software Logo” using the .AI file format by choosing File➪Save As. Figure 3-12 shows a logo created using Illustrator.
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Figure 3-12: A company logo created in Illustrator and ready to save and import into Max
2. Open Max, and choose File➪Import. A file dialog box opens. 3. Select Adobe Illustrator (AI) as the File Type. Locate the file to import, and click OK. The AI Import dialog box asks whether you want to merge the objects with the current scene or replace the current scene. 4. For our purposes, select the replace the current scene option and click OK. 5. The Shape Import dialog box asks whether you want to import the shapes as single or multiple objects. Select multiple, and click OK. Figure 3-13 shows the logo after it has been imported into Max. Notice that all the fills are missing.
Spline objects that are imported from Illustrator appear in Max as Editable Spline objects. You can learn more about Editable Splines in Chapter 13, “Drawing and Editing 2D Splines and Shapes.”
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Figure 3-13: A company logo created in Illustrator and imported into Max
Referencing External Objects No man is an island, and if Discreet has its way, no Max user will be an island either. XRefs (which stands for eXternal References) make it easy for creative teams to collaborate on a project without having to wait for another group member to finish his or her respective production task. External references are objects and scenes contained in separate Max files and made available for reference during a Max session. This arrangement enables several artists on a team to work on separate sections of a project without interfering with one another or altering each other’s work. Max includes two different types of XRefs: XRef scenes and XRef objects. Using XRef scenes An externally referenced scene is one that appears in the current Max session, but that is not accessible for editing or changing. The scene can be positioned and transformed when linked to a parent object and can be set to update automatically as changes are made to the source file. As an example of how XRef scenes facilitate a project, let’s say that a design team is in the midst of creating an environment for a project while the animator is animating a character model. The animator can access the in-production environment as an XRef scene in order to help him move the character correctly about the environment. The design team members are
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happy because the animator didn’t modify any of their lights, terrain models, maps, and props. The animator is happy because he won’t have to wait for the design team members to finish all their tweaking before he can get started. The end result is one large, happy production team (if they can meet their deadlines). Choose File➪XRef Scenes to open the XRef Scenes dialog box (shown in Figure 3-14), which you use to load XRef scenes into a file.
Figure 3-14: The XRef Scenes dialog box lets you specify which scenes to load as external references.
XRef scene options In the XRef Scenes dialog box are several options for controlling the appearance of the scene objects, how often the scene is updated, and to which object the scene is bound. This dialog box is modeless, and you can open and change the options in this dialog box at any time. The pane on the left lists all XRef scenes in the current scene. To the right are the settings, which can be different for each XRef scene in the list. To view or apply a setting, you first need to select the scene from the list. You can remove any scene by selecting it from the list and clicking the Remove button.
If an XRef scene in the list is displayed in red, then the scene could not be loaded. If the path or name is incorrect, you can change it in the Path field at the bottom of the list.
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The Convert Selected button converts any selected objects in the current scene to XRef objects by saving them as a separate file. This button opens a dialog box to let you name and save the new file. If no objects are selected in the current scene, then this option is disabled. Use the Enabled option to enable or disable all XRef scenes. Disabled scenes are displayed in gray. The Merge button lets you insert the current XRef scene into the current scene. This button removes the scene from the list and acts the same way as the File➪Merge command. Updating an external scene Automatic is a key option that can set any XRef scene to be automatically updated. Enable this option by selecting a scene from the list and checking the Automatic option box; thereafter, the scene is updated anytime the source file is updated. This option can slow the system if the external scene is updated frequently, but the benefit is that you can work with the latest update. The Update Now button is for manually updating the XRef scene. Click this button to update the external scene to the latest saved version. External scene appearance Other options let you decide how the scene is displayed in the viewports. You can choose to make the external scene invisible or to display it as a box. Making an external scene invisible removes it from the viewports, but the scene is still included in the rendered output. To remove a scene from the rendered output, deselect the Enabled option. The Ignore section lists objects such as lights, cameras, shapes, helpers, and animation; selecting them causes them to be ignored and to have no effect in the scene. If an external scene’s animation is ignored, then the scene appears as it does in frame 0. Positioning an external scene Positioning an external scene is accomplished by binding the scene to an object in the current scene (a dummy object, for example). The XRef Scenes dialog box is modeless, so you can select the object to bind to without closing the dialog box. After a binding object is selected, the external scene transforms to the binding object’s pivot point. The name of the parent object is also displayed in the XRef Scenes dialog box. Transforming the object to which the scene is bound can control how the external scene is repositioned. To unbind an object, click the Unbind button in the XRef Scenes dialog box. Unbound scenes are positioned at the World origin for the current scene. Working with XRef scenes You can’t edit XRef scenes in the current scene. Their objects are not visible in the Select by Name dialog box or in the Track and Schematic Views. You also cannot access the Modifier Stack of external scenes’ objects. However, you can make use of external scene objects in other ways. For example, you can change a viewport to show the view from any camera or light in the external scene. External scene objects are included in the Summary Info dialog box.
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Another way to use XRef scenes is to create a scene with lights and/or cameras positioned at regular intervals around the scene. You can then use the XRef Scenes dialog box to turn these lights on and off or to select from a number of different views without creating new cameras.
You can also nest XRef scenes within each other, so you can have one XRef scene for the distant mountains that includes another XRef for a castle.
If a Max file is loaded with XRef files that cannot be located, a warning dialog box appears, enabling you to browse to the file’s new location. If you click OK or Cancel, the scene still loads, but the external scenes are missing.
Tutorial: Adding an XRef scene As an example of a project that would benefit from XRefs, I’ve created a maze environment. I open a new Max file and animate a diamond moving through this maze that is opened as an XRef scene. To set up an XRef scene, follow these steps: 1. Create a new Max file by choosing File➪New. 2. Choose File➪XRef Scenes to open the XRef Scenes dialog box. 3. Click the Add button, locate the Maze.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM, and click Open to add it to the XRef Scene dialog box list.
You can add several XRef scenes by clicking the Add button again. You can also add a scene to the XRef Scene dialog box by dragging a .max file from Windows Explorer or from the Asset Manager window.
4. Select Create➪Helpers➪Dummy, and drag in the Perspective viewport to create a new Dummy object. 5. In the XRef Scenes dialog box, click the Bind button and select the dummy object. This enables you to reposition the XRef scene as needed. 6. Select the Automatic update option, and then click the Close button to exit the XRef Scene dialog box. 7. Now animate objects moving through the maze. Figure 3-15 shows the Maze.max scene included in the current Max file as an XRef.
With the diamond animated, you can replace it at a later time with a detailed model of a mouse using the File➪Replace command.
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Figure 3-15: The maze.max file loaded into the current file as an XRef scene
Using XRef objects XRef objects are slightly different from XRef scenes. XRef objects appear in a scene and can be transformed and animated, but the original object’s structure and Modifier Stack cannot be changed. An innovative way to use this feature would be to create a library of objects that you could load on the fly as needed. For example, if you had a furniture library, you could load several different styles until you got just the look you wanted. You can also use XRef objects to load low-resolution proxies of complex models in order to lighten the system load during a Max session. This method increases the viewport refresh rate. Many of the options in the XRef Objects dialog box, shown in Figure 3-16, are the same as in the XRef Scenes dialog box. The left side of the XRef Objects dialog box is divided into two sections. The top section displays the externally referenced files, and the lower section displays the objects selected from that file. A file needs to be selected for you to see its objects.
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Figure 3-16: The XRef Objects dialog box lets you choose which files to look in for external objects.
You have several options for controlling how the XRef objects are displayed: ✦ Use Proxy: Lets you choose between displaying the proxy and displaying the actual object. ✦ Render Proxy: Forces the proxy object to be rendered instead of the actual referenced object. If this option is not selected, then the referenced object is rendered regardless of the object displayed in the viewports. ✦ Update Materials: Enables the object’s materials to update as the source gets updated. ✦ Ignore Animation: Turns off any Modifier Stack animations associated with the object. The Convert Selected button works the same as in the XRef Scenes dialog box. It enables you to save the selected objects in the current scene to a separate file just like the File➪Save Selected command. In the XRef Objects dialog box, you can choose to automatically update the external referenced objects or use the Update Now button. You can also Enable and Disable all objects in a file. The Select In Scene and Select From Scene buttons are useful for seeing which objects in the scene are related to which items in the XRef Objects dialog box list.
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Using proxies The Use as Proxy option opens a low-resolution proxy object in place of a more complex object. This feature saves memory by not requiring the more complex object to be kept in memory. You can also select to render the proxy, update its materials, or ignore its animation. If an object in the lower section of the XRefs Objects dialog box is selected, the Add button changes to a Set button. The Set button lets you choose a file and object to use as a proxy. The proxy is displayed in place of the actual referenced object.
The real benefit of using proxies is to replace complex referenced objects with simpler objects that update quickly. When creating a complex object, remember to also create a lowresolution version to use as a proxy.
Tutorial: Using an XRef proxy To set up an XRef proxy, follow these steps: 1. Open the Post box with XRef tree.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. This file includes the post box model produced by Zygote Media. 2. Open the XRef Objects dialog box by choosing File➪XRef Objects. 3. Click the Add button, and locate the Park bench under a tree.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. This file includes the old tree and park bench models made by Zygote Media. The XRef Merge dialog box, shown in Figure 3-17, automatically opens and displays a list of all the objects in the file just added.
Figure 3-17: The XRef Merge dialog box lets you choose specific objects from a scene.
4. Select the Tree object to add to the current scene, and click OK. (Hold down the Ctrl key to select several objects.) Use the Filter and Sort options to locate specific objects.
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If an object you’ve selected has the same name as an object that is currently in the scene, the Duplicate Name dialog box appears and lets you rename the object, merge it anyway, skip the new object, or delete the old version.
5. Select the Tree object in the lower pane, and click the Set button with the Set Proxy option selected. The Open File dialog box appears. 6. Select the Tree Lo-Res.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. The Merge dialog box opens. 7. Select the Cylinder01 object, and click OK.
If the proxy object has a different offset than the original object, a warning dialog box appears instructing you to use the Reset XForm utility to reset the transform of the objects.
8.With the Tree object selected in the lower pane, select the Use Proxy option to see the proxy object, and deselect it to see the actual object. XRef objects that you add to a scene instantly appear in the current scene as you add them. Figure 3-18 shows the post box with the actual tree object. The XRef Objects dialog box lets you switch to the proxy object at any time.
Figure 3-18: The tree object is an XRef from another scene. Its proxy is a simple cylinder.
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XRef objects in the Modifier Stack XRef objects appear and act like any other object in the scene. You would see a slight difference if you open the Modifier Stack. The Stack displays “XRef Object” as its only entry. When you select the XRef Object item in the Modifier Stack, a rollout appears. The rollout includes many of the same controls displayed in the XRef Objects dialog box discussed earlier. These controls include the XRef File Name, Object Name, Proxy File Name, and Proxy Object Name. Configuring XRef paths The Configure Paths dialog box includes an XRefs tab for setting the paths for XRef scenes and objects, shown in Figure 3-19. Choose Customize➪Configure Paths to open the XRefs panel.
Figure 3-19: The XRefs panel in the Configure Paths dialog box lets you specify paths to be searched when an XRef cannot be located.
Max keeps track of the path of any XRefs used in a scene, but if it cannot find them, it looks at the paths designated in the XRefs panel of the Configure Paths dialog box. For projects that use lots of XRefs, populating this list with potential paths is a good idea. Paths are scanned in the order they are listed, so place the most likely paths at the top of the list. To add a new path to the panel, click the Add button. You can also modify or delete paths in this panel with the Modify and Delete buttons. Using the File Utilities With all these various files floating around, Max has included several utilities that make it easier to work with them. The Utilities panel of the Command Panel includes several useful utilities for working with files. You can access these utilities by opening the Utilities panel and clicking the More button to see a list of available utilities.
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Using the Asset Browser utility The Asset Browser utility is the first default button in the Utility panel. Clicking this button opens the Asset Browser window. The Asset Browser resembles Windows Explorer, except that it displays thumbnail images of all the supported formats contained within the current directory. Using this window, shown in Figure 3-20, you can browse through directory files and see thumbnails of images and scenes.
Figure 3-20: The Asset Browser window displays thumbnails of the files in the current directory.
The supported file types include AVI, BMP, CIN, CEL, GIF, IFL, IPP, JPEG, PNG, PSD, MOV, RGB, RLA, RPF, VST, TIF, and YUV. These types are the same ones that the File➪View File command can open. All files with these extensions are viewable within the Asset Browser. You can select to view only a certain type of file using the Filter menu.
Open and display the Asset Manager within a viewport by right-clicking the viewport title and choosing Views➪Extended➪Asset Manager from the pop-up menu.
You can also drag and drop files from the Asset Browser window to Max. Drag a scene file and drop it on Max’s title bar to open the scene file within Max. You can drop image files onto the map buttons in the Material Editor window or drop an image file onto a viewport to make a dialog box appear, which lets you apply the image as an Environment Map or as a Viewport Background, respectively. The Asset Browser window is modeless, so you can work with the Max interface while the Asset Browser window is open. Double-clicking an image opens it full size in the Rendered Frame Window. The Asset Browser can also act as a Web browser to look at content online. When the Asset Browser first opens, a dialog box reminds you that online content may be copyrighted and cannot be used without consent from the owner.
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The Display menu includes three panes that you can select. The Thumbnail pane shows the files as thumbnails. You can change the size of these thumbnails using the Thumbnails menu. The Explorer pane displays the files as icons the same as you would see in Windows Explorer. The Web pane displays the Web page for the site listed in the Address field. To view Web sites, you need to be connected to the Internet. The Asset Browser can remember your favorite Web sites using the Favorites menu. The Asset Browser window also includes the standard Web browser navigation buttons, such as Back, Forward, Home, Refresh, and Stop. You can also find these commands in the Browse menu. Max keeps thumbnails of all the images you access in its cache. The cache is a directory that holds thumbnails of all the recently accessed images. Each thumbnail image points to the actual directory where the image is located. Choose File➪Preferences to open the Preferences dialog box, in which you can specify where you want the cache directory to be located. Its default location is the abcache directory located where Max is installed. To view the cached files, choose Filter➪All in Cache. Choose File➪Print to print the selected image. Finding files with the Max File Finder utility Another useful utility for locating files is the Max File Finder utility, which you get to by using the More button in the Utilities panel. When you select this utility, a rollout with a Start button appears in the Utility panel. Clicking this button opens the MAXFinder dialog box. Using MAXFinder, you can search for scene files by any of the information listed in the File Properties dialog box. You can use the Browse button to specify the root directory to search. You can select to have the search also examine any subfolders. Figure 3-21 shows the MAXFinder dialog box locating all the scene files that include the word blue.
Figure 3-21: You can use the MAXFinder utility to search for scene files by property.
Collecting files with the Resource Collector utility When a scene is created, image and object files can be pulled from several different locations. The Resource Collector utility helps you consolidate all these files into one location. The settings for this utility appear in the Parameters rollout in the Utility panel of the Command Panel, as shown in Figure 3-22. The Output Path is the location where the files are collected. You can change this location using the Browse button.
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Figure 3-22: The Resource Collector utility can compile all referenced files into a single location.
The utility includes options to Collect Bitmaps, to include the Max scene file, and to Compress the files into a compressed WinZip file. The Copy option makes copies of the files, and the Move option moves the actual file into the directory specified in the Output Path field. The Update Materials option updates all material paths in the Material Editor. When you’re comfortable with the settings, click the Begin button to start the collecting. Using the File Link Manager utility The File Link Manager utility lets you use external AutoCad files in the same way that you use Max’s XRef features. By creating links between the current Max scene and an external AutoCad file, you can reload the linked file when the external AutoCad file has been updated and see the updates within Max.
The File Link Manager utility is new to 3ds max 7.
This utility is divided into four panels—Attach, Files, Presets, and Rendering. The Attach panel includes a File button to select and open a DWG or DXF file. The Attach panel also includes options to rescale the file units and a button to attach the file. The Files panel displays each linked Autocad file along with icons to show if the linked file has changed. There is also a Reload button that you can click to reload the linked file within Max. The Preset panel lets you define file linking presets, and the Rendering panel lets you define how shapes are displayed in the viewport and in the renderer. Using i-drop To make accessing needed files from the Web even easier, Autodesk has created a technology known as i-drop that lets you drag files from i-drop-supported Web pages and drop them directly into Max. With i-drop, you can drag and drop Max-created light fixture models, textures, or any other Max-supported file from a light manufacturer’s Web site into your scene without importing and positioning a file. This format makes it possible to add geometry, photometric data, and materials.
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Accessing File Information As you work with files, several dialog boxes in Max supply you with extra information about your scene. Using this information to your advantage can help you keep track of files and record valuable statistics about a scene. Displaying scene information If you like to keep statistics on your files (to see whether you’ve broken the company record for the model with the greatest number of faces), you’ll find the Summary Info dialog box useful. Use the File➪Summary Info menu command to open a dialog box that displays all the relevant details about the current scene, such as the number of objects, lights, and cameras; the total number of vertices and faces; and various model settings, as well as a Description field where you can describe the scene. Figure 3-23 shows the Summary Info dialog box.
Figure 3-23: The Summary Info dialog box shows all the basic information about the current scene.
The Plug-In Info button on the Summary Info dialog box displays a list of all the plug-ins currently installed on your system. Even without any external plug-ins installed, the list is fairly long because many of the core features in Max are implemented as plug-ins. The Summary Info dialog box also includes a Save to File button for saving the scene summary information as a text file. Viewing file properties As the number of files on your system increases, you’ll be wishing you had a card catalog to keep track of them all. Max has an interface that you can use to attach keywords and other descriptive information about the scene to the file. The File➪File Properties menu command opens the File Properties dialog box. This dialog box, shown in Figure 3-24, includes three panels: Summary, Contents, and Custom. The Summary panel holds information such as the Title, Subject, and Author of the Max file and can be useful for managing a collaborative project. The Contents panel holds information about the scene such as the total number of objects and much more. Much of this information is also found in the Summary Info dialog
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box. The Custom panel, also shown in Figure 3-24, includes a way to enter a custom list of properties such as client information, language, and so on.
You can also view the File Properties dialog box information while working in Windows Explorer by right-clicking the file and selecting Properties. Three unique tabs are visible: Summary, Contents, and Custom. The Summary tab holds the file identification information, including the Title, Subject, Author, Category, Keywords, and Comments.
Figure 3-24: The File Properties dialog box contains workflow information such as the scene author, comments, and revision dates.
Viewing files Sometimes, looking at the thumbnail of an image isn’t enough to help you decide whether you have the right image. For these cases, you can quickly load the image in question into a viewer to look at it closely. The File➪View Image File menu command opens the View File dialog box shown in Figure 3-25. This dialog box lets you load and view graphic and animation files using the Rendered Frame Window or the default Media Player for your system.
The Rendered Frame Window is discussed in more detail in Chapter 43, “Rendering Basics.”
The View File dialog box includes several controls for viewing files. The Devices and Setup buttons let you set up and view a file using external devices such as Video Recorders. The Info button lets you view detailed information about the selected file. The View button opens the file for viewing while leaving the View File dialog box open. The Open button opens the selected file and closes the dialog box. At the bottom of the View File dialog box, the statistics and path of the current file are displayed. The View File dialog box can open many types of files, including Microsoft videos (AVI), MPEG files, Bitmap images (BMP), Kodak Cineon (CIN), Combustion (CWS), Autodesk Flic images (FLC, FLI, CEL), Graphics Image Format (GIF), Radiance HDRI Image Files (HDR), Image File List (IFL), JPEG images (JPG), Portable Network Graphics (PNG), Adobe Photoshop images (PSD), QuickTime movies (MOV), SGI images (RGB), RLA images, RPF images, Targa images (TGA, VST), Tagged image file format images (TIF), Abekas Digital Disk (YUV), and DirectDraw Surface (DDS) images.
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Figure 3-25: The View File dialog box can open an assortment of image and animation formats.
Max’s ability to import MPEG files is new to 3ds max 7, but Max cannot export to the MPEG format.
You use the Gamma area on the View File dialog box to specify whether an image uses its own gamma settings or the system’s default setting, or whether an override value should be used. Summary Working with files lets you save your work, share it with others, and collaborate across teams. This chapter covered the following topics: ✦ Creating, saving, opening, merging, and archiving files ✦ Understanding the various import and export types ✦ Importing models from other programs, such as Illustrator and Poser ✦ Using externally referenced scenes and objects to work on the same project at the same time as your fellow team members without interfering with their work (or they with yours) ✦ Configuring XRef paths to help Max track your XRef Scenes and Objects ✦ Working with the file utilities, such as the Asset Browser ✦ Using the Summary Info and File Properties dialog boxes to keep track of scene files By now, you should be feeling more comfortable with the user interface, but if you’re not, the next chapter covers how to customize the user interface. ✦✦✦
3 3 CHAPTER
✦✦✦✦
In This Chapter
Saving, opening, merging, and archiving files
Importing and exporting objects and scenes
Importing objects from external packages like Illustrator
Externally referencing objects and scenes
Working with file utilities such as the Asset Browser
Accessing scene files’ information
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Figure 3-1: When creating a new scene, you can keep the current objects or select New All.
Saving files After you start up Max, the first thing you should learn is how to save your work. After a scene has changed, you can save it as a file. Before a file is saved, the word “Untitled” appears in the title bar; after you save the file, its name appears in the title bar. Choose File➪Save (Ctrl+S) to save the scene. If the scene hasn’t been saved yet, then a Save File As dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 3-2. You can also make this dialog box appear using the File➪ Save As command. After a file’s been saved, using the File➪Save command saves the file without opening the File dialog box. Pretty simple—just don’t forget to do it often.
All file dialog boxes can now be resized to show more files. To resize a file dialog box, simply drag on its edges or corners. This feature is new to 3ds max 7.
Figure 3-2: Use the Save File As dialog box to save a scene as a file.
The Save File As dialog box keeps a history list of the last five directories that you’ve opened. You can select these directories from the History drop-down list at the top of the dialog box. The buttons in this dialog box are the standard Windows file dialog box buttons used to go to the last folder visited, go up one directory, create a new folder, and to view a pop-up menu of file view options. The options include Large Icons, Small Icons, List, Details, and Thumbnails.
Go to Last Folder Visited
Increment File Number and Save
View Menu Up One Level Create New Folder
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The thumbnail option displays an image of the active viewport, which is useful when you open files, but when you save files for the first time, the thumbnail is blank.
If you try to save a scene over the top of an existing scene, then Max presents a dialog box confirming this action.
Clicking the button with a plus sign to the right of the Save button automatically appends a number onto the end of the current filename and saves the file. For example, if you select the myScene.max file and click the plus button, a file named myScene01.max is saved.
Use the auto increment file number and Save button to save progressive versions of a scene. This is an easy version control system. If you need to backtrack to an earlier version, you can.
The File menu also includes an option to Save Selected. This option saves the current selected objects to a separate scene file. If you create a single object that you might use again, select the object and use the Save Selected option to save it to a directory of models. A Save Copy As menu command is also available that lets you save the current scene to a different name without changing its current name. Another useful feature for saving files is to enable the Auto Backup feature in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box. This dialog box can be accessed with the Customize➪ Preferences menu command, which is covered later in this chapter. Opening files After you’ve saved a file, you may want to know how to open it again. Choosing File➪Open (Ctrl+O) opens a file dialog box that is the same as the one used to save files, shown in Figure 3-2. Max can open files saved with the .max and .chr extensions. Max can also open VIZ Render files that have the .drf extension. Selecting a file and clicking on the plus button opens a copy of the selected file with a new version number appended to its name. If Max cannot locate resources used within a scene (such as maps) when you open a Max file, then the Missing External Files dialog box, shown in Figure 3-3, appears, enabling you to Continue without the file or to Browse for the missing files. If you click the Browse button, the Configure External File Paths dialog box opens, where you can add a path to the missing files.
Figure 3-3: The Missing External Files dialog box identifies files for the current scene that are missing.
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If you open a file that includes features that have changed since the previous version, then Max presents an obsolete data format warning statement. Resaving the file can fix this problem. However, if you save a file created with a previous version of Max as a Max 7 scene file, then you won’t be able to open the file again in the previous versions of Max.
You can disable the Obsolete File Message in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box.
The most recently opened scenes are listed in the File➪Open Recent submenu. Selecting these scenes from the list opens the scene file.
You can also open files from the command line by placing the filename after the executable name, i.e., 3dsmax.exe myFile.max. You can also use the –L switch after the executable name to open the last file that was opened.
Merging and replacing objects If you happen to create the perfect prop in one scene and want to integrate the prop into another scene, you can use the Merge menu command. Choose File➪Merge to load objects from another scene into the current scene. Using this menu command opens a file dialog box that is exactly like the Save As dialog box, but after you select a scene and click the Open button, the Merge dialog box, shown in Figure 3-4, appears. This dialog box displays all the objects found in the selected scene file. It also has options for sorting the objects and filtering certain types of objects. Selecting an object and clicking the OK button loads the object into the current scene.
The Merge dialog box is very similar to the Select Objects dialog box.
Figure 3-4: The Merge dialog box lists all the objects from a merging scene.
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If you ever get involved in a modeling duel, then you’ll probably be using the File➪Replace menu command at some time. A modeling duel is when two modelers work on the same rough model of named objects and the animator (or boss) gets to choose which object to use. With the File➪Replace menu command, you can replace a named object with an object of the same name in a different scene. The objects are selected using the same dialog box shown in Figure 3-4, but only the objects with identical names in both scene files display. If no objects with the same name appear in both scene files, a warning box is displayed.
The File menu also includes a Merge Animation menu command, which is covered in Chapter 29, “Animation and Keyframe Basics.”
Archiving files By archiving a Max scene along with its reference bitmaps, you can ensure that the file includes all the necessary files. This is especially useful if you need to send the project to your cousin to show off or to your boss and you don’t want to miss any ancillary files. Choose File➪Archive to save all scene files as a compressed archive. The default archive format is .zip (but you can change it in the Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box to use whatever archive format you want). The Archive System lets you specify which archive program Max uses to archive your files. Maxzip is the default, but you can change it to whichever program you want to use. Saving an archive as a .zip file compiles all external files, such as bitmaps, into a single compressed file. The File Type drop-down list of the File Archive dialog box also includes an option to create a List of Files. When you select this file type, a text file is created that lists all relevant files and their paths. Getting out As you can probably guess, you use the File➪Exit command to exit the program, but only after it gives you a chance to save your work. Clicking on the window icon with an X on it in the upper right has the same effect (but I’m sure you knew that). Setting File Preferences The Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box holds the controls for backing up, archiving, and logging Max files. You can open this dialog box using the Customize➪ Preferences menu command. Figure 3-5 shows this panel. Handling files The Files panel includes several options that define how to handle files. The first option is to Backup on Save. When you save a file using the File➪Save (Ctrl+S) menu command, the existing file is overwritten. The Backup on Save option causes the current scene file to be saved as a backup (with the name MaxBack.bak in the 3dsmax\autobak directory) before saving the new file. If the changes you made were a mistake, you can recover the file before the last changes by renaming the MaxBack.bak file to MaxBack.max and reopening it in Max.
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Figure 3-5: The Files panel includes an Auto Backup feature.
Another option to prevent overwriting your changes is the Increment on Save option. This option adds an incremented number to the end of the existing filename every time it is saved. This retains multiple copies of the file and is an easy version-control method for your scene files. This way, you can always go back to an earlier file when the client changes his mind. With this option enabled, the MaxBack.bak file isn’t used. The Compress on Save option compresses the file automatically when it is saved. Compressed files require less file space but take longer to load. If you’re running low on hard drive space, then you’ll want to enable this option.
Another reason to enable the Compress on Save option is that large files (100MB or greater) load into the Network Queue Manager much more quickly when compressed for network rendering.
The Save Viewport Thumbnail Image option saves a 64-×-64-pixel thumbnail of the active viewport along with the file. This thumbnail is displayed in the Open dialog box and can also be seen from Windows Explorer, as shown in Figure 3-6. Saving a thumbnail with a scene adds about 9K to the file size.
The Save Viewport Thumbnail Image option is another good option to keep enabled. Thumbnails help you to find scene files later, and nothing is more frustrating than seeing a scene’s filename without a thumbnail.
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Figure 3-6: Max files with thumbnails show up in Windows Explorer.
In addition to a thumbnail, Max also offers an option to save the Schematic View with the file. Although Max can generate a new Schematic View from an existing file, saving the Schematic View with the file is quicker if you work with this view often. Saving File Properties with the file is also helpful, but be warned that saving this extra info with the file increases its file size slightly. Still, doing so is worth the effort because you can easily locate and understand the scene file later on. When a Max file created in a previous version of Max is opened, a warning dialog box appears that says, “Obsolete data format found—Please resave file.” To eliminate this warning, disable the Display Obsolete File Message option. The warning dialog box also includes an option to Don’t Display Again that enables this option when selected. When textures are updated, the Reload Textures on Change option forces the textures to be reloaded when they are altered. This slows your system while Max waits for the textures to reload, but offers the latest look immediately. The Recent Files in File Menu option determines the number of recently opened files that appear in the File➪Open Recent menu. The maximum value is 9.
I like to set the Recent Files in File Menu option at its highest value because I find that this is the easiest way to open up the latest scenes.
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Backing up files The Auto Backup feature in Max can save you from the nightmare of losing all your work due to a system crash. With Auto Backup enabled, you can select the number of Autobak Files to keep around and how often the files are backed up. The backup files are saved to the directory specified by the Configure Paths dialog box. The default is to save these backups to the 3dsmax\autoback directory. You can also select a name for the backup files.
Even if you have this feature enabled, you should still save your file often.
This is how it works: If you’ve set the number of backup files to 2, the interval to 5 minutes, and the backup name to MyBackup, then after five minutes the current file is saved as MyBackup1.max. After another five minutes, another file named MyBackup2.max is saved, and then after another five minutes, the MyBackup1.max file is overwritten with the latest changes. If you lose your work as a result of a power failure or by having your toddler accidentally pull out the plug, you can recover your work by locating the autobak file with the latest date and reloading it into Max. This file won’t include all the latest changes—only updates up to the last backup save.
I highly recommend that you keep the Auto Backup option enabled. This feature has saved my bacon more than once.
Tutorial: Setting Auto Backup Now that I have stressed that setting up Auto Backup is an important step to do, let’s run through exactly how to set it up. To set up the Auto Backup feature, follow these steps: 1. Open the Preference Settings dialog box by choosing Customize➪Preferences, and click the Files panel. 2. Turn on Auto Backup by selecting the Enable option in the Auto Backup section. 3. Set the number of Autobak files to 3.
To maintain version control of your Max scenes, use the Increment on Save feature instead of increasing the Number of Autobak Files.
4. Set the Backup Interval to the amount of time to wait between backups. The Backup Interval should be set to the maximum amount of work that you are willing to redo. (I keep my settings at 5 minutes.) You can also give the Auto Backup file a name. 5. Auto Backup saves the files in the directory specified by the Auto Backup path. To view where this path is located, choose Customize➪Configure Paths.
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Maintaining log files You can also use the Files panel to control log files. Log files keep track of any errors and warnings, general command info, and any debugging information. You can set log files to never be deleted, expire after so many days, or keep a specified file size with the latest information. If your system is having trouble, checking the error log gives you some idea as to what the problem is. Logs are essential if you plan on developing any custom scripts or plugins. You can select that the log contain all Errors, Warnings, Info, and Debug statements. Each entry in the log file includes a date-time stamp and a three-letter designation of the type of message with DBG for debug, INF for info, WRN for warning, and ERR for error messages followed by the message. The name of the log file is Max.log. It is saved in the 3dsmax\network subdirectory. Importing and Exporting If you haven’t noticed, Max isn’t the only game in town. A number of different 3D packages exist, and exchanging files between them is where the importing and exporting menu commands come in. You can find both of these commands in the File menu. Importing supported formats Choose File➪Import to open the Import dialog box. This dialog box looks like a typical Windows file dialog box. The real power comes with the various Import Settings dialog boxes that are available for each format. The settings in the Import Settings dialog box are different for the various format types. Another common import dialog box offers options to merge the imported objects with the current scene or to completely replace the current scene. For many formats, you can also convert units on the imported file. For example, importing a 3D Studio file opens a simple dialog box, shown in Figure 3-7. With the Convert Units option selected, Max assumes that the 3DS file is based in inches and converts it to the currently defined units.
Figure 3-7: The 3DS Import dialog box enables you to merge objects into or completely replace the current scene.
If any of the object names in the imported scene match those in the current scene, an Import Name Conflict dialog box opens, allowing you to rename the imported objects, or you can Skip or Cancel the import.
The ability to import LandXML/DEM/DDF and Wavefront Material and Object files is new to 3ds max 7.
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Max can import several different formats, including the following: ✦ 3D Studio Mesh, Projects, and Shapes (3DS, PRJ, SHP) ✦ Adobe Illustrator (AI) ✦ LandXML/DEM/DDF ✦ AutoCAD (DWG, DXF) ✦ Kaydara (FBX) ✦ Initial Graphics Exchange Standard (IGE, IGS, IGES) ✦ Lightscape (LS, VW, LP) ✦ StereoLithography (STL) ✦ Wavefront Material and Object (MTL, OBJ) ✦ VRML (WRL, WRZ) ✦ VIZ Material XML Import (XML) Import preference The Files panel of the Preference Settings dialog box has a single option dealing with importing—Zoom Extents on Import. When this option is enabled, it automatically zooms all viewports to the extent of the imported objects. Imported objects can often be scaled so small that they aren’t even visible. This option helps you to locate an object when imported. Exporting supported formats In addition to importing, you’ll sometimes want to export Max objects for use in other programs. You access the Export command by choosing File➪Export. You also have the option to Export Selected (available only if an object is selected).
The ability to export to the JSR-184 (M3G) for wireless devices and to the Wavefront (MTL, OBJ) format is new to 3ds max 7.
Max can export to several different formats, including the following: ✦ 3D Studio (3DS) ✦ Adobe Illustrator (AI) ✦ ASCII Scene Export (ASE) ✦ Lightscape Material, Blocks, Parameters, Layers, Preparations, and Views (ATR, BLK, DF, LAY, LP, VW) ✦ AutoCAD (DWG, DXF) ✦ Kaydara (FBX) ✦ Initial Graphics Exchange Standard (IGS) ✦ JSR-184 (M3G) ✦ Wavefront Material and Object (MTL, OBJ)
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✦ StereoLithography (STL) ✦ Shockwave 3D Scene Export (W3D) ✦ VRML97 (WRL) Exporting to the JSR-184 (M3G) format The JSR-184 export option lets you save a scene to a format that can be viewed on mobile devices that support the Java 2 Micro Edition standard interface, such as mobile phones and PDA devices. Because wireless devices have such a limited bandwidth, the JSR-184 Exporter dialog box, shown in Figure 3-8, includes several options for optimizing the exported scene. This dialog box lists the Max scene hierarchy, the JSR-184 scene hierarchy, and the parameters for the selected scene object. Using the toolbar buttons at the top of the dialog box, you can change the hierarchy that is to be exported.
Figure 3-8: The JSR-184 Exporter dialog box provides ways to optimize the exported scene.
New JSR-184 Scene Add 3dsmax Scene Add World Object Add Group Convert Mesh to Sprite Texture Tool Remove Object
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Before a scene can be exported, the Max scene must include a camera and you must specify an Active Camera in the JSR-184 Exported dialog box. When a material map is selected from the JSR-184 hierarchy list, the Texture Tool icon on the toolbar becomes active. Clicking this button opens the Texture Tool dialog box, shown in Figure 3-9, where you can precisely control the size and format of the exported maps.
Figure 3-9: The Texture Tool lets you specify the exact size of texture maps to be exported for mobile devices.
To view the exported M3G files, the default installation of Max includes an M3G Player, which can be found along with the other Max programs in Start➪Programs➪discreet➪3ds max 7➪ M3G Player. To use this player, the Java Runtime Environment needs to be installed. You can install it from the Max setup disc. Exporting to the Shockwave 3D (W3D) format Shockwave 3D is an interactive format used by Macromedia’s Director software. The exporter includes an Analysis tool and a Preview window. To export a Max scene to the Shockwave 3D format, select File➪Export or File➪Export Selected and select the Shockwave 3D format as the File Type in the file dialog box. After you give the file a name and click OK, the Shockwave 3D Scene Export Options dialog box opens, as shown in Figure 3-10. This dialog box includes several options that you can include in the export file. You can also select a camera to use or choose to use the Active Viewport. The Compression Settings for Geometry, Texture, and Animation can be set to different quality settings between 0 and 100, and you can choose to limit the texture size. The Shockwave 3D Export Options dialog box includes buttons that enable you to check the objects for any geometry abnormalities that will cause problems within a Shockwave viewer. After you click the Author Check button, all geometries are checked, and another dialog box listing potential problems opens. Possible problems include the following: ✦ Geometries with holes ✦ Isolated vertices ✦ Unsupported textures ✦ Use of any Shaders other than Blinn ✦ Unsupported modifier and controller animations
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Figure 3-10: The Shockwave 3D Scene Export Options dialog box lets you choose which resources to export.
The Analyze button opens the Shockwave 3D File Analysis dialog box, shown in Figure 3-11. This dialog box shows a pie chart of the size of the various objects used in the scene.
Figure 3-11: The Shockwave 3D File Analysis dialog box shows the size of your scene’s objects.
The Preview button opens a Preview window, where you can view the exported Shockwave 3D file. You can navigate about the Preview window by clicking and dragging with the left mouse button. Holding down the Shift key while dragging spins the viewpoint about its axis.
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Holding down the Ctrl key while dragging zooms in and out of the view, and dragging with the spacebar held down pans the view. Pressing the Shift key and the spacebar together constrains the panning motion to either horizontal or vertical. Exporting utilities In addition to the menu commands found in the File menu, Max includes a couple of utilities that export specific information: the Lighting Data Export Utility and the Material XML Exporter Utility. You can access these utilities from the Utilities panel in the Command Panel by clicking the More button and selecting them from the pop-up list that appears. Lighting Data Export Utility The Lighting Data Export Utility exports exposure control data for a scene’s Illuminance and Luminance values. These files can be saved as PIC or TIF files, which you can select in the 2D Lighting Data Exporter rollout. You also can set an image’s Width and Height dimensions.
Exposure Control must be enabled for this utility to be enabled. You can learn about exposure control in Chapter 43, “Rendering Basics.”
Material XML Exporter Utility The Material XML Exporter Utility exports a selected material to an XML file format, where it can be easily shared with other users. After you select this utility, the Parameters rollout offers four options for selecting the material to export: the Material/Map Browser, the Object List, Pick Object in Scene, and All Objects in Scene. The utility also offers several export options including Native XML, export to an Autodesk Tool Catalog, and using an XSLT template. You also can select to export the material with a thumbnail and along with its mapping modifiers. Tutorial: Importing vector drawings from Illustrator In most companies, a professional creative team uses an advanced vector drawing tool such as Illustrator to design the company logo. If you need to work with such a logo, learning how to import the externally created file gives you a jumpstart on your project.
When importing vector-based files into Max, only the lines are imported. Max cannot import fills, blends, or other specialized vector effects. All imported lines are automatically converted to Bézier splines in Max.
Although Max can draw and work with splines, this feature takes a backseat to the vector functions available in Adobe Illustrator. If you have an Illustrator (AI) file, you can import it directly into Max. To import Adobe Illustrator files into Max, follow these steps: 1. Within Illustrator, save your file as “Bugs Head Software Logo” using the .AI file format by choosing File➪Save As. Figure 3-12 shows a logo created using Illustrator.
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Figure 3-12: A company logo created in Illustrator and ready to save and import into Max
2. Open Max, and choose File➪Import. A file dialog box opens. 3. Select Adobe Illustrator (AI) as the File Type. Locate the file to import, and click OK. The AI Import dialog box asks whether you want to merge the objects with the current scene or replace the current scene. 4. For our purposes, select the replace the current scene option and click OK. 5. The Shape Import dialog box asks whether you want to import the shapes as single or multiple objects. Select multiple, and click OK. Figure 3-13 shows the logo after it has been imported into Max. Notice that all the fills are missing.
Spline objects that are imported from Illustrator appear in Max as Editable Spline objects. You can learn more about Editable Splines in Chapter 13, “Drawing and Editing 2D Splines and Shapes.”
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Figure 3-13: A company logo created in Illustrator and imported into Max
Referencing External Objects No man is an island, and if Discreet has its way, no Max user will be an island either. XRefs (which stands for eXternal References) make it easy for creative teams to collaborate on a project without having to wait for another group member to finish his or her respective production task. External references are objects and scenes contained in separate Max files and made available for reference during a Max session. This arrangement enables several artists on a team to work on separate sections of a project without interfering with one another or altering each other’s work. Max includes two different types of XRefs: XRef scenes and XRef objects. Using XRef scenes An externally referenced scene is one that appears in the current Max session, but that is not accessible for editing or changing. The scene can be positioned and transformed when linked to a parent object and can be set to update automatically as changes are made to the source file. As an example of how XRef scenes facilitate a project, let’s say that a design team is in the midst of creating an environment for a project while the animator is animating a character model. The animator can access the in-production environment as an XRef scene in order to help him move the character correctly about the environment. The design team members are
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happy because the animator didn’t modify any of their lights, terrain models, maps, and props. The animator is happy because he won’t have to wait for the design team members to finish all their tweaking before he can get started. The end result is one large, happy production team (if they can meet their deadlines). Choose File➪XRef Scenes to open the XRef Scenes dialog box (shown in Figure 3-14), which you use to load XRef scenes into a file.
Figure 3-14: The XRef Scenes dialog box lets you specify which scenes to load as external references.
XRef scene options In the XRef Scenes dialog box are several options for controlling the appearance of the scene objects, how often the scene is updated, and to which object the scene is bound. This dialog box is modeless, and you can open and change the options in this dialog box at any time. The pane on the left lists all XRef scenes in the current scene. To the right are the settings, which can be different for each XRef scene in the list. To view or apply a setting, you first need to select the scene from the list. You can remove any scene by selecting it from the list and clicking the Remove button.
If an XRef scene in the list is displayed in red, then the scene could not be loaded. If the path or name is incorrect, you can change it in the Path field at the bottom of the list.
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The Convert Selected button converts any selected objects in the current scene to XRef objects by saving them as a separate file. This button opens a dialog box to let you name and save the new file. If no objects are selected in the current scene, then this option is disabled. Use the Enabled option to enable or disable all XRef scenes. Disabled scenes are displayed in gray. The Merge button lets you insert the current XRef scene into the current scene. This button removes the scene from the list and acts the same way as the File➪Merge command. Updating an external scene Automatic is a key option that can set any XRef scene to be automatically updated. Enable this option by selecting a scene from the list and checking the Automatic option box; thereafter, the scene is updated anytime the source file is updated. This option can slow the system if the external scene is updated frequently, but the benefit is that you can work with the latest update. The Update Now button is for manually updating the XRef scene. Click this button to update the external scene to the latest saved version. External scene appearance Other options let you decide how the scene is displayed in the viewports. You can choose to make the external scene invisible or to display it as a box. Making an external scene invisible removes it from the viewports, but the scene is still included in the rendered output. To remove a scene from the rendered output, deselect the Enabled option. The Ignore section lists objects such as lights, cameras, shapes, helpers, and animation; selecting them causes them to be ignored and to have no effect in the scene. If an external scene’s animation is ignored, then the scene appears as it does in frame 0. Positioning an external scene Positioning an external scene is accomplished by binding the scene to an object in the current scene (a dummy object, for example). The XRef Scenes dialog box is modeless, so you can select the object to bind to without closing the dialog box. After a binding object is selected, the external scene transforms to the binding object’s pivot point. The name of the parent object is also displayed in the XRef Scenes dialog box. Transforming the object to which the scene is bound can control how the external scene is repositioned. To unbind an object, click the Unbind button in the XRef Scenes dialog box. Unbound scenes are positioned at the World origin for the current scene. Working with XRef scenes You can’t edit XRef scenes in the current scene. Their objects are not visible in the Select by Name dialog box or in the Track and Schematic Views. You also cannot access the Modifier Stack of external scenes’ objects. However, you can make use of external scene objects in other ways. For example, you can change a viewport to show the view from any camera or light in the external scene. External scene objects are included in the Summary Info dialog box.
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Another way to use XRef scenes is to create a scene with lights and/or cameras positioned at regular intervals around the scene. You can then use the XRef Scenes dialog box to turn these lights on and off or to select from a number of different views without creating new cameras.
You can also nest XRef scenes within each other, so you can have one XRef scene for the distant mountains that includes another XRef for a castle.
If a Max file is loaded with XRef files that cannot be located, a warning dialog box appears, enabling you to browse to the file’s new location. If you click OK or Cancel, the scene still loads, but the external scenes are missing.
Tutorial: Adding an XRef scene As an example of a project that would benefit from XRefs, I’ve created a maze environment. I open a new Max file and animate a diamond moving through this maze that is opened as an XRef scene. To set up an XRef scene, follow these steps: 1. Create a new Max file by choosing File➪New. 2. Choose File➪XRef Scenes to open the XRef Scenes dialog box. 3. Click the Add button, locate the Maze.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM, and click Open to add it to the XRef Scene dialog box list.
You can add several XRef scenes by clicking the Add button again. You can also add a scene to the XRef Scene dialog box by dragging a .max file from Windows Explorer or from the Asset Manager window.
4. Select Create➪Helpers➪Dummy, and drag in the Perspective viewport to create a new Dummy object. 5. In the XRef Scenes dialog box, click the Bind button and select the dummy object. This enables you to reposition the XRef scene as needed. 6. Select the Automatic update option, and then click the Close button to exit the XRef Scene dialog box. 7. Now animate objects moving through the maze. Figure 3-15 shows the Maze.max scene included in the current Max file as an XRef.
With the diamond animated, you can replace it at a later time with a detailed model of a mouse using the File➪Replace command.
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Figure 3-15: The maze.max file loaded into the current file as an XRef scene
Using XRef objects XRef objects are slightly different from XRef scenes. XRef objects appear in a scene and can be transformed and animated, but the original object’s structure and Modifier Stack cannot be changed. An innovative way to use this feature would be to create a library of objects that you could load on the fly as needed. For example, if you had a furniture library, you could load several different styles until you got just the look you wanted. You can also use XRef objects to load low-resolution proxies of complex models in order to lighten the system load during a Max session. This method increases the viewport refresh rate. Many of the options in the XRef Objects dialog box, shown in Figure 3-16, are the same as in the XRef Scenes dialog box. The left side of the XRef Objects dialog box is divided into two sections. The top section displays the externally referenced files, and the lower section displays the objects selected from that file. A file needs to be selected for you to see its objects.
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Figure 3-16: The XRef Objects dialog box lets you choose which files to look in for external objects.
You have several options for controlling how the XRef objects are displayed: ✦ Use Proxy: Lets you choose between displaying the proxy and displaying the actual object. ✦ Render Proxy: Forces the proxy object to be rendered instead of the actual referenced object. If this option is not selected, then the referenced object is rendered regardless of the object displayed in the viewports. ✦ Update Materials: Enables the object’s materials to update as the source gets updated. ✦ Ignore Animation: Turns off any Modifier Stack animations associated with the object. The Convert Selected button works the same as in the XRef Scenes dialog box. It enables you to save the selected objects in the current scene to a separate file just like the File➪Save Selected command. In the XRef Objects dialog box, you can choose to automatically update the external referenced objects or use the Update Now button. You can also Enable and Disable all objects in a file. The Select In Scene and Select From Scene buttons are useful for seeing which objects in the scene are related to which items in the XRef Objects dialog box list.
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Using proxies The Use as Proxy option opens a low-resolution proxy object in place of a more complex object. This feature saves memory by not requiring the more complex object to be kept in memory. You can also select to render the proxy, update its materials, or ignore its animation. If an object in the lower section of the XRefs Objects dialog box is selected, the Add button changes to a Set button. The Set button lets you choose a file and object to use as a proxy. The proxy is displayed in place of the actual referenced object.
The real benefit of using proxies is to replace complex referenced objects with simpler objects that update quickly. When creating a complex object, remember to also create a lowresolution version to use as a proxy.
Tutorial: Using an XRef proxy To set up an XRef proxy, follow these steps: 1. Open the Post box with XRef tree.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. This file includes the post box model produced by Zygote Media. 2. Open the XRef Objects dialog box by choosing File➪XRef Objects. 3. Click the Add button, and locate the Park bench under a tree.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. This file includes the old tree and park bench models made by Zygote Media. The XRef Merge dialog box, shown in Figure 3-17, automatically opens and displays a list of all the objects in the file just added.
Figure 3-17: The XRef Merge dialog box lets you choose specific objects from a scene.
4. Select the Tree object to add to the current scene, and click OK. (Hold down the Ctrl key to select several objects.) Use the Filter and Sort options to locate specific objects.
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If an object you’ve selected has the same name as an object that is currently in the scene, the Duplicate Name dialog box appears and lets you rename the object, merge it anyway, skip the new object, or delete the old version.
5. Select the Tree object in the lower pane, and click the Set button with the Set Proxy option selected. The Open File dialog box appears. 6. Select the Tree Lo-Res.max file from the Chap 03 directory on the CD-ROM. The Merge dialog box opens. 7. Select the Cylinder01 object, and click OK.
If the proxy object has a different offset than the original object, a warning dialog box appears instructing you to use the Reset XForm utility to reset the transform of the objects.
8.With the Tree object selected in the lower pane, select the Use Proxy option to see the proxy object, and deselect it to see the actual object. XRef objects that you add to a scene instantly appear in the current scene as you add them. Figure 3-18 shows the post box with the actual tree object. The XRef Objects dialog box lets you switch to the proxy object at any time.
Figure 3-18: The tree object is an XRef from another scene. Its proxy is a simple cylinder.
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XRef objects in the Modifier Stack XRef objects appear and act like any other object in the scene. You would see a slight difference if you open the Modifier Stack. The Stack displays “XRef Object” as its only entry. When you select the XRef Object item in the Modifier Stack, a rollout appears. The rollout includes many of the same controls displayed in the XRef Objects dialog box discussed earlier. These controls include the XRef File Name, Object Name, Proxy File Name, and Proxy Object Name. Configuring XRef paths The Configure Paths dialog box includes an XRefs tab for setting the paths for XRef scenes and objects, shown in Figure 3-19. Choose Customize➪Configure Paths to open the XRefs panel.
Figure 3-19: The XRefs panel in the Configure Paths dialog box lets you specify paths to be searched when an XRef cannot be located.
Max keeps track of the path of any XRefs used in a scene, but if it cannot find them, it looks at the paths designated in the XRefs panel of the Configure Paths dialog box. For projects that use lots of XRefs, populating this list with potential paths is a good idea. Paths are scanned in the order they are listed, so place the most likely paths at the top of the list. To add a new path to the panel, click the Add button. You can also modify or delete paths in this panel with the Modify and Delete buttons. Using the File Utilities With all these various files floating around, Max has included several utilities that make it easier to work with them. The Utilities panel of the Command Panel includes several useful utilities for working with files. You can access these utilities by opening the Utilities panel and clicking the More button to see a list of available utilities.
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Using the Asset Browser utility The Asset Browser utility is the first default button in the Utility panel. Clicking this button opens the Asset Browser window. The Asset Browser resembles Windows Explorer, except that it displays thumbnail images of all the supported formats contained within the current directory. Using this window, shown in Figure 3-20, you can browse through directory files and see thumbnails of images and scenes.
Figure 3-20: The Asset Browser window displays thumbnails of the files in the current directory.
The supported file types include AVI, BMP, CIN, CEL, GIF, IFL, IPP, JPEG, PNG, PSD, MOV, RGB, RLA, RPF, VST, TIF, and YUV. These types are the same ones that the File➪View File command can open. All files with these extensions are viewable within the Asset Browser. You can select to view only a certain type of file using the Filter menu.
Open and display the Asset Manager within a viewport by right-clicking the viewport title and choosing Views➪Extended➪Asset Manager from the pop-up menu.
You can also drag and drop files from the Asset Browser window to Max. Drag a scene file and drop it on Max’s title bar to open the scene file within Max. You can drop image files onto the map buttons in the Material Editor window or drop an image file onto a viewport to make a dialog box appear, which lets you apply the image as an Environment Map or as a Viewport Background, respectively. The Asset Browser window is modeless, so you can work with the Max interface while the Asset Browser window is open. Double-clicking an image opens it full size in the Rendered Frame Window. The Asset Browser can also act as a Web browser to look at content online. When the Asset Browser first opens, a dialog box reminds you that online content may be copyrighted and cannot be used without consent from the owner.
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The Display menu includes three panes that you can select. The Thumbnail pane shows the files as thumbnails. You can change the size of these thumbnails using the Thumbnails menu. The Explorer pane displays the files as icons the same as you would see in Windows Explorer. The Web pane displays the Web page for the site listed in the Address field. To view Web sites, you need to be connected to the Internet. The Asset Browser can remember your favorite Web sites using the Favorites menu. The Asset Browser window also includes the standard Web browser navigation buttons, such as Back, Forward, Home, Refresh, and Stop. You can also find these commands in the Browse menu. Max keeps thumbnails of all the images you access in its cache. The cache is a directory that holds thumbnails of all the recently accessed images. Each thumbnail image points to the actual directory where the image is located. Choose File➪Preferences to open the Preferences dialog box, in which you can specify where you want the cache directory to be located. Its default location is the abcache directory located where Max is installed. To view the cached files, choose Filter➪All in Cache. Choose File➪Print to print the selected image. Finding files with the Max File Finder utility Another useful utility for locating files is the Max File Finder utility, which you get to by using the More button in the Utilities panel. When you select this utility, a rollout with a Start button appears in the Utility panel. Clicking this button opens the MAXFinder dialog box. Using MAXFinder, you can search for scene files by any of the information listed in the File Properties dialog box. You can use the Browse button to specify the root directory to search. You can select to have the search also examine any subfolders. Figure 3-21 shows the MAXFinder dialog box locating all the scene files that include the word blue.
Figure 3-21: You can use the MAXFinder utility to search for scene files by property.
Collecting files with the Resource Collector utility When a scene is created, image and object files can be pulled from several different locations. The Resource Collector utility helps you consolidate all these files into one location. The settings for this utility appear in the Parameters rollout in the Utility panel of the Command Panel, as shown in Figure 3-22. The Output Path is the location where the files are collected. You can change this location using the Browse button.
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Figure 3-22: The Resource Collector utility can compile all referenced files into a single location.
The utility includes options to Collect Bitmaps, to include the Max scene file, and to Compress the files into a compressed WinZip file. The Copy option makes copies of the files, and the Move option moves the actual file into the directory specified in the Output Path field. The Update Materials option updates all material paths in the Material Editor. When you’re comfortable with the settings, click the Begin button to start the collecting. Using the File Link Manager utility The File Link Manager utility lets you use external AutoCad files in the same way that you use Max’s XRef features. By creating links between the current Max scene and an external AutoCad file, you can reload the linked file when the external AutoCad file has been updated and see the updates within Max.
The File Link Manager utility is new to 3ds max 7.
This utility is divided into four panels—Attach, Files, Presets, and Rendering. The Attach panel includes a File button to select and open a DWG or DXF file. The Attach panel also includes options to rescale the file units and a button to attach the file. The Files panel displays each linked Autocad file along with icons to show if the linked file has changed. There is also a Reload button that you can click to reload the linked file within Max. The Preset panel lets you define file linking presets, and the Rendering panel lets you define how shapes are displayed in the viewport and in the renderer. Using i-drop To make accessing needed files from the Web even easier, Autodesk has created a technology known as i-drop that lets you drag files from i-drop-supported Web pages and drop them directly into Max. With i-drop, you can drag and drop Max-created light fixture models, textures, or any other Max-supported file from a light manufacturer’s Web site into your scene without importing and positioning a file. This format makes it possible to add geometry, photometric data, and materials.
New Feature
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Accessing File Information As you work with files, several dialog boxes in Max supply you with extra information about your scene. Using this information to your advantage can help you keep track of files and record valuable statistics about a scene. Displaying scene information If you like to keep statistics on your files (to see whether you’ve broken the company record for the model with the greatest number of faces), you’ll find the Summary Info dialog box useful. Use the File➪Summary Info menu command to open a dialog box that displays all the relevant details about the current scene, such as the number of objects, lights, and cameras; the total number of vertices and faces; and various model settings, as well as a Description field where you can describe the scene. Figure 3-23 shows the Summary Info dialog box.
Figure 3-23: The Summary Info dialog box shows all the basic information about the current scene.
The Plug-In Info button on the Summary Info dialog box displays a list of all the plug-ins currently installed on your system. Even without any external plug-ins installed, the list is fairly long because many of the core features in Max are implemented as plug-ins. The Summary Info dialog box also includes a Save to File button for saving the scene summary information as a text file. Viewing file properties As the number of files on your system increases, you’ll be wishing you had a card catalog to keep track of them all. Max has an interface that you can use to attach keywords and other descriptive information about the scene to the file. The File➪File Properties menu command opens the File Properties dialog box. This dialog box, shown in Figure 3-24, includes three panels: Summary, Contents, and Custom. The Summary panel holds information such as the Title, Subject, and Author of the Max file and can be useful for managing a collaborative project. The Contents panel holds information about the scene such as the total number of objects and much more. Much of this information is also found in the Summary Info dialog
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box. The Custom panel, also shown in Figure 3-24, includes a way to enter a custom list of properties such as client information, language, and so on.
You can also view the File Properties dialog box information while working in Windows Explorer by right-clicking the file and selecting Properties. Three unique tabs are visible: Summary, Contents, and Custom. The Summary tab holds the file identification information, including the Title, Subject, Author, Category, Keywords, and Comments.
Figure 3-24: The File Properties dialog box contains workflow information such as the scene author, comments, and revision dates.
Viewing files Sometimes, looking at the thumbnail of an image isn’t enough to help you decide whether you have the right image. For these cases, you can quickly load the image in question into a viewer to look at it closely. The File➪View Image File menu command opens the View File dialog box shown in Figure 3-25. This dialog box lets you load and view graphic and animation files using the Rendered Frame Window or the default Media Player for your system.
The Rendered Frame Window is discussed in more detail in Chapter 43, “Rendering Basics.”
The View File dialog box includes several controls for viewing files. The Devices and Setup buttons let you set up and view a file using external devices such as Video Recorders. The Info button lets you view detailed information about the selected file. The View button opens the file for viewing while leaving the View File dialog box open. The Open button opens the selected file and closes the dialog box. At the bottom of the View File dialog box, the statistics and path of the current file are displayed. The View File dialog box can open many types of files, including Microsoft videos (AVI), MPEG files, Bitmap images (BMP), Kodak Cineon (CIN), Combustion (CWS), Autodesk Flic images (FLC, FLI, CEL), Graphics Image Format (GIF), Radiance HDRI Image Files (HDR), Image File List (IFL), JPEG images (JPG), Portable Network Graphics (PNG), Adobe Photoshop images (PSD), QuickTime movies (MOV), SGI images (RGB), RLA images, RPF images, Targa images (TGA, VST), Tagged image file format images (TIF), Abekas Digital Disk (YUV), and DirectDraw Surface (DDS) images.
CrossReference
Note
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Figure 3-25: The View File dialog box can open an assortment of image and animation formats.
Max’s ability to import MPEG files is new to 3ds max 7, but Max cannot export to the MPEG format.
You use the Gamma area on the View File dialog box to specify whether an image uses its own gamma settings or the system’s default setting, or whether an override value should be used. Summary Working with files lets you save your work, share it with others, and collaborate across teams. This chapter covered the following topics: ✦ Creating, saving, opening, merging, and archiving files ✦ Understanding the various import and export types ✦ Importing models from other programs, such as Illustrator and Poser ✦ Using externally referenced scenes and objects to work on the same project at the same time as your fellow team members without interfering with their work (or they with yours) ✦ Configuring XRef paths to help Max track your XRef Scenes and Objects ✦ Working with the file utilities, such as the Asset Browser ✦ Using the Summary Info and File Properties dialog boxes to keep track of scene files By now, you should be feeling more comfortable with the user interface, but if you’re not, the next chapter covers how to customize the user interface. ✦✦✦
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