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The 3DS MAX plugin seems to exhibit progressively worse material behavior as time goes on (number of save/reloads of the scene). I'm getting fairly frequent problems now where Maxwell MXM materials (the only thing I use, and presumably the only thing that needs to be there anymore) just revert to blank - not just the names (which was already happening consistently), but now the MXM file locations as well, so I am forced to rebuild them.

Stability is a really big thing for me - integration with MAX isn't such a big deal. Is there some chance we could get a workaround or fix for this in short order that removes some functionality but doesn't corrupt material data?

One thing I thought of that would be foolproof would be if we could have a checkbox in the Maxwell render dialog that was something like "export material names as MXM locations", with a corresponding material path. Then we just use the Standard MAX material and give it a name like "MAXWELL:wood". When the scene exports, it just looks for materials named MAXWELL:* and takes the * part and looks for that file in the material path with an MXS extension. This would be 100% stable because there would be no actual Maxwell material plugins to cause problems.

- Casey

i suffer from the same phaenomena. seriously this plugin is not yet v1.0

Pues no! Trabajar con la Version 1 es IMPOSIBLE desde 3dsMax!!

casey wrote:Stability is a really big thing for me - integration with MAX isn't such a big deal. Is there some chance we could get a workaround or fix for this in short order that removes some functionality but doesn't corrupt material data?

I use 3DSMax to create my mxs files, but use the beta system for applying materials.

What I mean is, I assign a Maxwell plastic material for anything with an image map and load that map into the colour slot.

Then export to MXST and assign mxm materials in there. In fact I do all my materials inside studio, much less of a headache. As long as you have UVWmaps applied to any mesh you want to have an image map before export, everything should be okay.

I know it doesn't solve the 3DSMax plugin issues you're having, but is a workaround that works.

I gave up assigning mxms in Max when the first ones I imported didn't show properly.

Tim.

I haven't had a problem with losing the link to MXM files, can you find a sure fire way to reproduce this problem?
Losing the material names is a big problem though.

I'm using Max8, and using MXM materials without the need for maxwell studio. I'm finding the whole process pretty straight forward.

j_man wrote:I haven't had a problem with losing the link to MXM files, can you find a sure fire way to reproduce this problem?
Losing the material names is a big problem though.

I believe if you just copy the material from one slot to another you will lose them, but I'll have to check to see if it always repros. Sometimes, this also happens without you having done anything - ie., just from loading the file. But I have no idea what makes that happen specifically, although I assume it's just a different manifestation of the same bug that makes it happen during copy.

- Casey

casey wrote:I believe if you just copy the material from one slot to another you will lose them...

This is true, you cannot copy a MXM material from one slot to another (known issue!) bit of a hassle, but not the end of the world.
This seems to be because you cannot have two copies of the same material in teh editor.

J.

j_man wrote:This is true, you cannot copy a MXM material from one slot to another (known issue!) bit of a hassle, but not the end of the world.
This seems to be because you cannot have two copies of the same material in teh editor.

Well, for example, suppose you have, lets say, 100 materials in a scene. You cannot have 100 materials in the material editor. Is there any way to edit them without using Get Material From Scene, and then Put Material To Scene, which (since it is a copy operation) strips all the MXMs?

So it seems like it actually is the end of the world in some sense unless your scene happens to always have less than 32 materials (or however many slots there are at max in the material editor... I don't remember).

- Casey

hang on Casey,

it does work as long as there isn't already an instance of the material in the material editor.

j_man wrote:This seems to be because you cannot have two copies of the same material in teh editor.

wind back the doomsday clock!

J < :

On the work with max and maxwell , i on proves use the same(similar)
way i use for real time projects with baking textures .

i say : i model my scene and apply standard materials with know names for each ( floorwood 1 , wallwhite , etc ,.... ) . When finish , i close
max , open de editor of maxwell for materials , and work
each mxm needed and save . one time i have all mxm made , close
material maxwell , open max archive and replace standard by created mxm that i saved with same name of standard .
This make that i can concentrate on creation materials with nothing more ,
and with the material editor stable , and max too .
If after i must change some materials settings , i open the mxm and
change with material editor alone , and render with command line .

How do you see ?

I actually use a different technique. I apply a single multi-sub-object material to everything in the scene, with several dozen slots. Each object just sets its material ID to pick out a slot. Since you can name the slots in the multi-sub, you can still see what everything is even though the MXM materials in those slots lose their names from time to time.

- Casey

I'm working from max8 SP3. I've found that material names are updated after launching a render and restarting material editor. FYI

Fernando Tella wrote:I'm working from max8 SP3. I've found that material names are updated after launching a render and restarting material editor. FYI

hey so they are! Nice one Fernando!

J.

in one word.... crap!