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3DS and LODs

arno

arno

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I have a question for you. I am working on exporting LOD information to the 3DS file format. The problem is that the format is old and has some annoying limitations. For example the part name can be 10 characters maximum.

LODs will need a name like _LOD_nnn, which uses 8 characters already. So for the remaining two I can use a number to make them unique. That works, but when exporting in GMax you get loads of warnings when an object name starts with a number.

So what is more annoying? Renaming all parts? Missing part of the LOD information? All suggestions are welcome, I want it to be as easy to use as possible.
 
What about numbering LOD + 160d and showing the resulting number in hex?

This way you'll have A0 to FF as prefixes. This means 95 different LOD'd.

Cheers
 
Hi,

That might be an option indeed. I was hoping to keep the _LOD_nnn in the name, so that the user does not have to setup the proper LOD naming again. But maybe there is no way to keep that schema with only 10 characters.
 
Dumb question - but, while understanding that one wants to avoid groups, if one creates an GRP1_LOD_100; GRP2_LOD_050, and groups all LOD 100 parts under GRP1_LOD_100, etc., would not the LOD visibility be controlled by the topmost GRP1_LOD_100 node?

That way, it's easier selecting all XX_LOD_400 parts and making them children of the one GRP1_LOD_100 node and teh part name could start with an alpha character, instead of a numberic character.

?
 
Hi Felix,

I would have to check if I can do groups in the 3DS format, not sure about that. Also I don't know if they would have a similar short restriction on the naming length.

Else I should maybe just use letters instead of numbers to identify parts. So starting with AA, AB, etc.
 
I have implemented that now and it is in the next nightly build. Should make exporting again from GMax a bit easier :).
 
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