Maxwell Render | Official public forum

Hello,

Since I use XSI and since nobody has made a maxwell plugin for XSI I decided to try make one myself.

Here is a link to the .xsiaddon.

Please note that it is very limited and does not yet export any UV information (no textures can be used), the exported normals appear extremely smoothed (only 1 normal per vertex) and there are many bugs.

It writes a .mxs file which has all the materials and geometry that can be easily opened in Maxwell Studio to recalculate normals, which will give a much better result.

Usage

Open the Maxwell Material Editor and create all the materials needed for your scene. Export each one as a different .mxm file in a common directory. (eg. C:\\gold.mxm)

In XSI
1. For each object in the scene goto get->Material->mxm to apply a mxm property.
2. In the mxm property of each object set the name of the Maxwell Material that it should have (the name of one of the materials you exported). (eg. gold)
3. De-select all objects and click on Render->MaxwellRender1. This applies a MaxwellRender1 property to your scene root which has all the information for the maxwell scene. Set all the attributes.
4. Go to the Render tab of the MaxwellRender1 property and set mxmpath to the common directory for the saved material files (eg. c:\\mats)
5. Set mxspath as a full path as to where the maxwell scene (.mxs) must be saved. (eg. c:\\ )

*Always use 2 backslashes (\\) for file names*

Then click on render.

I know this version will probably not be of much use yet, but maybe we'll get an official XSI plugin for maxwell soon.

Ps. I wasn't too sure where to post this.

Well, thanks for this, mate, will give it a try, brilliant!

Thanks. It might not be much but its something new to try.

rmw wrote:Hello,

Since I use XSI and since nobody has made a maxwell plugin for XSI I decided to try make one myself.

Here is a link to the .xsiaddon.

Please note that it is very limited and does not yet export any UV information (no textures can be used), the exported normals appear extremely smoothed (only 1 normal per vertex) and there are many bugs.

It writes a .mxs file which has all the materials and geometry that can be easily opened in Maxwell Studio to recalculate normals, which will give a much better result.

Usage

Open the Maxwell Material Editor and create all the materials needed for your scene. Export each one as a different .mxm file in a common directory. (eg. C:\\gold.mxm)

In XSI
1. For each object in the scene goto get->Material->mxm to apply a mxm property.
2. In the mxm property of each object set the name of the Maxwell Material that it should have (the name of one of the materials you exported). (eg. gold)
3. De-select all objects and click on Render->MaxwellRender1. This applies a MaxwellRender1 property to your scene root which has all the information for the maxwell scene. Set all the attributes.
4. Go to the Render tab of the MaxwellRender1 property and set mxmpath to the common directory for the saved material files (eg. c:\\mats)
5. Set mxspath as a full path as to where the maxwell scene (.mxs) must be saved. (eg. c:\\ )

*Always use 2 backslashes (\\) for file names*

Then click on render.

I know this version will probably not be of much use yet, but maybe we'll get an official XSI plugin for maxwell soon.

Ps. I wasn't too sure where to post this.

Have you posted it here

www.xsibase.com

You should! might get some help there

A

rmw,

fantastic, thanks. I'll give it go...

rmw,

I've installed the addon but can't see the Get->Material->mxm or Render->MaxwellRender1 options that you mention.

The addon seems to install correctly, with no error messages.

I'm using XSI 5.11 Foundation, what version was used to compile this addon?

It was compiled on version 5.0 Ill try compile it on 5.11 but it should work.

Try running this VBscript to apply the property to the scene root just to see if the custom property is loaded. After the code is executed the scene root should have a MaxwellRender1 property.

rmw,

sorry I get this error:-
it looks like the addon isn't working here, although the addon is recognised by XSI and the two ddl's are in my users directory.

Any ideas?

rmw,

Just an idea. With some addons (e.g. RC Tools) you have to run a reg.bat file after installation to register the dll's (using regsvr32) with Windows.

I'm not sure if this will help but I thought I'd mention it.

rmw,

Again, not sure if this helps but...

File->plugin manager gives me this:-



The MaxwellRender1.dll has a red warning triangle next to it. When I right-click->properties it says "Library not found".

rmw,

I guess your busy, maybe even at Siggraph? I've sent you a couple of pm's - I still can't get your version of the plugin to work with my version of XSI 5.11. I'd really love to give it a go and help out with any suggestions that may improve it.

Thanks,

Thanks for the effort any how.

Hi rmw,

Congrats for your nice work
Please feel free to ask us about any aspect to improve the plugin.

Juan

Juan,

did you actually get it working? With XSI 5.11? If so could you please give me some tips on how to get it going, thanks.

Maybe, with rmw's permission, NextLimit could use this plugin as the basis for their own officially sanctioned version?

...please!

oz42 wrote:Juan,

did you actually get it working? With XSI 5.11? If so could you please give me some tips on how to get it going, thanks.

Maybe, with rmw's permission, NextLimit could use this plugin as the basis for their own officially sanctioned version?

...please!

I second that Juan