FSX Max 2011 any use?

[Deleted member 1281]

A question for the Max experts...

Reading the posts on FSX-compatibility issues I understand that the current Max versions cannot be used directly for FSX purposes. How about indirectly though? For instance, is it possible to exchange files from max2011 <-> gmax? In other words, do some modeling in Max 2011, save as 3ds, import to gmax and let it (gmax) take care of exporting to FSX mdl? Or import a panel from gmax and do some texture baking in Max2011?

Apparently there are two versions, 3ds Max 2011 and 3ds Max Design 2011. What's the difference, does anybody know?

Manfred

 

[Flying Officer Jevans]

Whatever version, there's no direct export from Max to gmax. The only way to do it is using BFF script to export and then import, but it takes ages to do it well, as it's not automatic and requires a lot of tidying up. I gave up on doing that. It's much better to just build for FSX from the start using gmax, as the FS tools don't work in anything above Max 2008, as you've discovered.

 

[Deleted member 1281]

Sigh ...

Whatever version, there's no direct export from Max to gmax.

And the other way round, ie gmax > max?

 

[n4gix]

GMax cannot export anything other than those formats for which an export module has been written, which pretty much limits its usefulness...

There have been some scripts written that can use the "Listener Window" to create intermediate files that can (with mixed success) allow one to migrate work between Max <=> GMax.

 

[lionheart]

I dont mean to be critical here, and I tend to try to steer clear of negativity, but Autodesk/Max have really abandoned us in this business.

A. They do not wish to sell Max2008 to us, mainly because they are lazy and do not wish to back up the product (customer service issues). Only their newest version (per year, yearly release) is given attention, making your 'present' purchase basically 'abandonware', and at the cost of $4,200.00 USD plus tax and shipping, and an additional cost for updated future versions (Subscription service).

So, getting Max2008 is turning out to be an illegal venture now as you 'could' get Max2008 through buying Max2010 and then the Subscription service. But now Max2011 is coming out and the Subscription cutoff point is now Max2009, so 2008 is no longer available.

B. Autodesk do not realise how fast people go through computers these days. They believe that their program should be allowed only on 2 computers 'total' for the life of your program ownership, lol... Now, how often do you guys go through computers, or rotate through HD's and motherboards as well as graphics cards. Usually if you change out a MB, you have a new computer in the eyes of Registries, etc.

By Autodesk law, you must purchase another Max edition if you need a 3rd computer to put it on. So if lightning strikes, you lose your computer, stolen, virus, etc, etc, etc, and you have it on your mobile laptop for business trips, work, then you must shovel out another $4,200.00 USD plus tax, plus Subscription service, (which I am really wanting to know how much that is).

C. Lets say that you had your Max package and CD's for years and want to sell it for say $50.00 or even $500.00 or more. Did you know you cannot do this? Basically its a 'buy for life' program (abandonware) and cannot be activated for no one buy you and your 2 computers. Thus if you find a used Edition of Max online at Ebay, and you buy it, eeeks... You just lost your money.

D. If you buy Max online from a Autodesk Reseller for less then $4,200.00 USD plus tax, plus Subscription fee if you want it, then you are probably buying Chinese pirated copies. At $250.00 to $350.00, with all their 'Autodesk legal Resellers mumbo jumbo, you can be brought in thinking you are buying something legal. After so long, the program jams and says you have an illegal copy and you have 30 days to finish and it locks up like a demo. So going that route, if your concious 'would' allow you to buy pirated programs, is going to come to an end and at the cost of $250.00 to $350.00...



Max, by my thoughts, is not worth it. They abandoned us and have nothing (they claim) to sell us, and its mainly just for rendering anyways. Gmax does 'alot' of what Max does, and you can easily convert your keys over (shortcut keys in Gmax) to match the new Max shortcut keys.


The down side of this is that working with other team members that work exclusively in Max like some of the famous painters and modelers, and you work in Gmax, means you have to import their work they did into Gmax somehow, which now they have that nice program which compiles into Gmax format, but takes something like several hours (4?) to make the transition. Making it at night during sleep, (oops.. sorry. devs present), during the day when you are asleep, then its not that bad.


That is a heads up on the Autodesk agenda, their rules and your rights on your $4,200.00+ purchase and what you get out of it.


EDIT: Also, the Gmax export system is very very refined and fast. The Max version is not and takes some getting used to. Its really nice to be able to just press a key and bing, you have a MDL file, ready and done.

If Autodesk had their heads screwed on tight and were serious about making money, they would;
* Allow sales of past versions of Max that were needed by certain gaming SDK's
* Allow more computers on their list or just get rid of the 'number of computers' law for your program ownership
* Their inhouse team of Script writers could make a better compiler interface, perhaps even using the Gmax exporter, to enable a proper, refined export system for work.

 

[lionheart]

Another thing that Autodesk could do if they cared enough for their customers needs, is to create a payware Gmax to Max/Max to Gmax import/export program. Selling it at $250.00 would probably amply cover their costs of design at their inflated levels of whatever, and would enable poeple that bounce from Gmax (awesome compiler system) and Max (awesome mapping and rendering systems), but............! but... You cannot get Max 2008, so its of no use..



arrgh.. this has me depressed.

 

[hairyspin]

The only realistic choice now is between FSDS and gmax. You pays your money (FSDS) - or not (gmax) - and you takes your choice!

 

[Deleted member 1281]

Thanks for the feedback, guys, very enlightening stuff. Yes, what an awfully restrictive policy these Autodesk people have, at that price.

which now they have that nice program which compiles into Gmax format,

Which prog is that Bill?

Just a wild thought re gmax -> max2011. Arno's ModelConverterX can create .3ds from a compiled mdl, can it not? So how about the following workflow, has anybody tried? ..

gmax > my_aircraft.mdl > ModelConverterX > my_aircraft.3ds > max2011 (bake textures here)

How does that grab you -- ???

[If anybody has any tips on which they don't want to go public then I'd appreciate an email - manfred dot jahn at uni-koeln dot de]

 

[Flying Officer Jevans]

The script which can convert between Max and gmax is called BFF( Bobos File...something.) I've tried it, and I will guarantee you it's not worth the hassle unless you need to, and it is not a 'one-click' operation. It requires much tweaking and messing around to get it to work well for anything but the simplest of models.

I spent several days trying to convert one model before I gave up and carried on working in Max...

I suspect your ModelConverter method would work in that it would get the geometry from one place to another, but if it managed to get all the animations/materials and what have to over in one piece, then I'd be amazed.

 

[lionheart]

Which prog is that Bill?

BFF, as ArchAngel has stated. Man, I thought it worked. It did work for Eurostar.

Just a wild thought re gmax -> max2011. Arno's ModelConverterX can create .3ds from a compiled mdl, can it not? So how about the following workflow, has anybody tried? ..

gmax > my_aircraft.mdl > ModelConverterX > my_aircraft.3ds > max2011 (bake textures here)

How does that grab you -- ???

Nice...! One wouldnt need animations really in a texture bake, I wouldnt think.



Bill

 

[Flying Officer Jevans]

I think part of the problems I had when trying to use BFF for the Starship was that the aircraft was not designed from the ground up for FS, and it was an extremely complex file. As delivered to me it had over 1000 parts and over 400,000 polys. It's got nowhere near that number now, after optimisation, but I was trying to get it into gmax to work on in the first place. Eventually I just couldn't get all the geometry to stay in scale, transform and locked into position when exported across, even when doing it in small chunks.

It may work better for you: it's a tiny download, so it's worth a shot if you already have a copy of Max: of course, if you don't, buying it just to see if it works is not an option...

 

[Heretic]

The only realistic choice now is between FSDS and gmax. You pays your money (FSDS) - or not (gmax) - and you takes your choice!

Or, if you could get your hands on it in time, Max 9 or 2008.

I suspect your ModelConverter method would work in that it would get the geometry from one place to another, but if it managed to get all the animations/materials and what have to over in one piece, then I'd be amazed.

Nota bene:

"Geometry" in MCX's case means polies only. Not even parts and part names will be kept.


It's going to be a good day when Arno manages to implement materials and Animations.

 

[hairyspin]

It may work better for you: it's a tiny download, so it's worth a shot if you already have a copy of Max: of course, if you don't, buying it just to see if it works is not an option...

Download Max 2011 from Autodesk - you've got 30 days and it turns up its toes, but if you can't make progress with BFF in 30 days.....


If you're determined to export from gmax to Max, MdlCommander lets you save an .X file and the XPorter plug-in gets the .X file into Max. Animations will be compressed between keyframes 0 and 1 and all part names will be lost. Good luck!

 

[arno]

"Geometry" in MCX's case means polies only. Not even parts and part names will be kept.


It's going to be a good day when Arno manages to implement materials and Animations.

That's mainly because the MDL format does not store the parts and their names. Everything is combined per drawcall.

Getting the FSX materials in the 3DS format will be hard due to the format restrictions I think. But I want to export the animation keyframes later on.

 

[Heretic]

That's mainly because the MDL format does not store the parts and their names. Everything is combined per drawcall.

I see. Hence the really weird lump of seemingly unrelated parts you'll get when opening stuff in Max.

Getting the FSX materials in the 3DS format will be hard due to the format restrictions I think.

I've just checked. Exporting as .3DS form MCX preserves texture coordinates, so that's another problem gone.

But I want to export the animation keyframes later on.

Is that actually of any use if the parts are just a lump of polies when exported?

The simplest way would be writing an .x IMPORTER for Max/Gmax since MCX apparently (judging from exported .x/.xanim files) exports .x files fairly well - material settings et al.

 

[hairyspin]

The simplest way would be writing an .x IMPORTER for Max/Gmax since MCX apparently (judging from exported .x/.xanim files) exports .x files fairly well - material settings et al.

Xporter v1.23 - available at www.maxplugins.de It's on the Max 2011 import/export plug-ins pages. Earlier versions are also available for earlier versions of Max.

 

[Heretic]

Xporter v1.23 - available at www.maxplugins.de It's on the Max 2011 import/export plug-ins pages. Earlier versions are also available for earlier versions of Max.

Or here for Max 9 and up: http://mofo.pns.to/wibs/#5


And dang, it works! Parts, complete parts!!!!! With hierarchy!!!!!!
(See attachment.)


However, you'll still need something for importing animations...I think Max's .xaf format would work but I have no idea how one could translate .xanim to .xaf.
Maybe via direct export from MCX...?

 

[hairyspin]

Reanimating animations

Have you tried playing the animations with the >, <, End and Home keys?

When I tried importing a gmax model into Max (2009 trial version, iirc) via the MDLCommander/Xporter route, I found the animations, although compressed into the space between keyframes 0 and 1, were still there! Max doesn't depend on fixed interval keyframes like gmax.

If you change the Key Mode (it's a button on or near the Track Bar I think), the animation will step through the key frames using > and < for a selected object, one by one. So, if you note the key frame number for each keyframe in gmax - for each animated object in turn - you can step through and edit the animations in Max to restore the correct keyframe sequence. You do this backwards: think about it...

It's a bit of work, but it lets you recover the animations you may have spent weeks on in gmax.

 

[arno]

Is that actually of any use if the parts are just a lump of polies when exported?

Yes, since each animated part has its own drawcall. So they can be identified. I don't think the type of animation can be exported with 3DS, but the keyframes should be possible.

The simplest way would be writing an .x IMPORTER for Max/Gmax since MCX apparently (judging from exported .x/.xanim files) exports .x files fairly well - material settings et al.

Not sure how easy that would be for GMax (I don't use Max myself so can't comment on that). GMax is quite restricted for importing or exporting other formats.

 

[Deleted member 1281]

Been following all this most attentively.

Re creating an .x import for gmax:

Not sure how easy that would be for GMax (I don't use Max myself so can't comment on that). GMax is quite restricted for importing or exporting other formats.

Arno, if the community gave you some trial max-generated x-files, would you have a look and check whether such an import was at all feasible?