It sounds like you have the wrong type of material applied to your object. First of all, make sure that you have sc2_objects.ms inside your 3ds max plugins directory. Then in your material editor, instead of using the Standard material, you will need to use the Starcraft 2 material type. You will probably need to make sure that every object that will be exported has a Starcraft 2 material applied to it otherwise that type of error can occur.
Currently there are no plugins that I am aware of that will allow you to import an M3 file into AutoCAD or SolidWorks (unless either of them support maxscript, which I'm pretty certain they dont). Your best bet is to use 3DS Max to import the M3 file using NiNToxicated01's tools and then export it from there to a file type that AutoCAD supports. It would be a bit of a mess I'd imagine, but it should work mostly. If you dont have 3DS Max, you can always get a 30 day trial free from Autodesk.
From the tutorial you linked, I think you've skipped over part of step 3...
"3. Click on the hammer icon on the default right hand side pane, and click on the MAXScript button. If you didn't have 3ds max automatically load it upon launch, click 'Run Script' from the rollout dialog and locate the script you want to load."
Once youve clicked MAXScript, there is a dropdown box called utilities within that section. Thats where you'll find the export tools. Since youve added them to your startup scripts directory, they should just appear there. If theyre not, then just click the Run Script button and load them that way.
Also, just a FYI, the exporter / importer scripts should work fine on max 2009. Ive used them myself on 2009, 2010 and 2011.
Yeah you can use the view perspective thing. I'm assuming you actually mean the Field-of-View tool in the bottom right of the screen since that matches your description. The trouble with that is it works exactly like its supposed to and changes the field of view. Using this to zoom in will cause the field of view to be set down to 1 degree from the default perspective of 45 degrees. Its a personal thing really, but I find it difficult to work with my model distorted to that level.
My method, while more involved and having its own drawbacks, does allow you to still maintain the 45 degree field of view and thus your models will still look in the correct perspective.
And JB4times4, if you look at what NiNtoxicated01 said, its a bug with the dark templar model. It does actually work, but there is an attachment point seemingly in the wrong spot, causing the zooms to mess up. If you select just the main mesh and isolate it, you should be able to see it fine.
The trouble is that all models (at least all the ones Ive tried) are imported and are extremely small in the 3ds max viewport. There are a couple of things you can try in order to zoom in on them.
First of all open up the list of objects in the scene (H is the keyboard shortcut) and select the main mesh. For example "DarkTemplar_00_0". You can usually tell which one is the main one by how many triangles (faces) it has, that can usually be seen on the right side of the objects list window. Once you have the object selected, click OK and to go back to the max viewport. The quickest way to 'zoom' to your selected object in this case is to use Isolation Mode. The keyboard shortcut is Alt Q, or you can find it in the Tools menu. This will hide every other object in the scene that isnt currently selected and zoom your view to the selected object/s. You should then be able to use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out to your leisure.
One common problem when dealing with extremely small models like the SC2 ones is that the max viewport has a default clipping plane that will clip (make invisible) any objects that are too close to the viewport's camera. In other words, because you have to zoom in so far to see the small object, the viewport will automatically make it disappear because its too close. You can override this setting by going to the Views menu and opening up the Viewport Configuations window. On the Rendering Method tab, you will need to make sure that the checkbox "Viewport Clipping" is checked (its off by default). Then select OK. When you're back at the main viewport, you will see a yellow bar down the right hand side of the viewport. It will have two yellow arrows next to it. One at the top and one at the bottom. Click the bottom one and drag it down to near the bottom. This will move the near clipping plane closer to the viewport camera and enable you to zoom in closer on small models. I have attached some screenshots to hopefully make this a bit clearer.
Also as a side note, its probably not a good idea to try and scale the models larger. Although its a pain in the butt working on a small model, trying to scale it larger will often break the skinning for animations and cause even more trouble when you try to re-export it. Give it a go if you like, but it usually only ends badly in my experience.
I had a bit of a look over the code and it appears that it only looks at materials that are applied to the objects you are exporting. Everything else should just be ignored as far as I can see. However not being the original author, I could have missed something and may be incorrect in saying that.
Maxscript is generally speaking a very slow language in terms of how long it takes to process things. Physical scale wouldn't have any real affect on the export. I suspect the reason its taking so long and possibly crashing is simply because of the number of tris involved. The script needs to essentially read out every single polygon / vertex / material id etc etc and then work out how that fits into the new file format. The more information you try to feed it, the longer it will take.
There is only so much optimization that can be done to maxscript to handle models like you are trying to. It eventually gets to the point where using a maxscript is not really economic and the only way to get it to process things in a reasonable time is to make it a C plugin for max, essentially rewriting it all. Using a C plugin instead gets past most of the bottlenecks of maxscript and allows for much better processing of larger models.
Also a bit of a disclaimer, I'm not the best coder, so if someone with better knowledge says otherwise, listen to them :-p
Hmm... I'm not sure how you plan to use them in your map, but you are aware that the portrait models are only what you see in the portrait I hope? In other words they're only really good to be viewed from the front. As an example I've done a quick screenshot of the archon portrait model from the side.
Its simply a case of using the Starcraft 2 Material type in 3DS Max and having an appropriate texture. When you apply a texture to an object using the SC2 material type, there is a checkbox to use the texture's alpha channel as the team colour. You can do it on the diffuse texture if you like, or on another slot if you prefer (eg. Emissive). When the checkbox is checked, the alpha channel of whichever texture is in that slot will be used for the team colours.
In the pic, I have just applied a green texture to the whole box, but the alpha channel has black over every face except for the top of the box. Therefore as you can see, the team colours are applied to everything except the top face (the one with the white alpha channel)
Edit: Probably should mention that this is using NiNtoxicated01's export tools for 3DS max
You will need to make sure that your objects are an Edit Mesh or Editable Mesh type object. You can do this two different ways.
1. Select the object then right click in your viewport. In the far bottom right of the menu that appears, choose Convert To: and then choose Convert to Editable Mesh
2. Select the object then open up the modifiers panel on the right. From the Modifier List dropdown menu, choose Edit Mesh.
Try exporting again once all the objects you want to export are edit mesh.
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@Akranne: Go
It sounds like you have the wrong type of material applied to your object. First of all, make sure that you have sc2_objects.ms inside your 3ds max plugins directory. Then in your material editor, instead of using the Standard material, you will need to use the Starcraft 2 material type. You will probably need to make sure that every object that will be exported has a Starcraft 2 material applied to it otherwise that type of error can occur.
0
@happy04: Go
Currently there are no plugins that I am aware of that will allow you to import an M3 file into AutoCAD or SolidWorks (unless either of them support maxscript, which I'm pretty certain they dont). Your best bet is to use 3DS Max to import the M3 file using NiNToxicated01's tools and then export it from there to a file type that AutoCAD supports. It would be a bit of a mess I'd imagine, but it should work mostly. If you dont have 3DS Max, you can always get a 30 day trial free from Autodesk.
0
@aggressivEn00b: Go
From the tutorial you linked, I think you've skipped over part of step 3...
"3. Click on the hammer icon on the default right hand side pane, and click on the MAXScript button. If you didn't have 3ds max automatically load it upon launch, click 'Run Script' from the rollout dialog and locate the script you want to load."
Once youve clicked MAXScript, there is a dropdown box called utilities within that section. Thats where you'll find the export tools. Since youve added them to your startup scripts directory, they should just appear there. If theyre not, then just click the Run Script button and load them that way.
Also, just a FYI, the exporter / importer scripts should work fine on max 2009. Ive used them myself on 2009, 2010 and 2011.
0
@NiNtoxicated01: Go
Yeah you can use the view perspective thing. I'm assuming you actually mean the Field-of-View tool in the bottom right of the screen since that matches your description. The trouble with that is it works exactly like its supposed to and changes the field of view. Using this to zoom in will cause the field of view to be set down to 1 degree from the default perspective of 45 degrees. Its a personal thing really, but I find it difficult to work with my model distorted to that level. My method, while more involved and having its own drawbacks, does allow you to still maintain the 45 degree field of view and thus your models will still look in the correct perspective.
And JB4times4, if you look at what NiNtoxicated01 said, its a bug with the dark templar model. It does actually work, but there is an attachment point seemingly in the wrong spot, causing the zooms to mess up. If you select just the main mesh and isolate it, you should be able to see it fine.
0
The trouble is that all models (at least all the ones Ive tried) are imported and are extremely small in the 3ds max viewport. There are a couple of things you can try in order to zoom in on them. First of all open up the list of objects in the scene (H is the keyboard shortcut) and select the main mesh. For example "DarkTemplar_00_0". You can usually tell which one is the main one by how many triangles (faces) it has, that can usually be seen on the right side of the objects list window. Once you have the object selected, click OK and to go back to the max viewport. The quickest way to 'zoom' to your selected object in this case is to use Isolation Mode. The keyboard shortcut is Alt Q, or you can find it in the Tools menu. This will hide every other object in the scene that isnt currently selected and zoom your view to the selected object/s. You should then be able to use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out to your leisure.
One common problem when dealing with extremely small models like the SC2 ones is that the max viewport has a default clipping plane that will clip (make invisible) any objects that are too close to the viewport's camera. In other words, because you have to zoom in so far to see the small object, the viewport will automatically make it disappear because its too close. You can override this setting by going to the Views menu and opening up the Viewport Configuations window. On the Rendering Method tab, you will need to make sure that the checkbox "Viewport Clipping" is checked (its off by default). Then select OK. When you're back at the main viewport, you will see a yellow bar down the right hand side of the viewport. It will have two yellow arrows next to it. One at the top and one at the bottom. Click the bottom one and drag it down to near the bottom. This will move the near clipping plane closer to the viewport camera and enable you to zoom in closer on small models. I have attached some screenshots to hopefully make this a bit clearer.
Also as a side note, its probably not a good idea to try and scale the models larger. Although its a pain in the butt working on a small model, trying to scale it larger will often break the skinning for animations and cause even more trouble when you try to re-export it. Give it a go if you like, but it usually only ends badly in my experience.
0
@IskatuMesk: Go
I had a bit of a look over the code and it appears that it only looks at materials that are applied to the objects you are exporting. Everything else should just be ignored as far as I can see. However not being the original author, I could have missed something and may be incorrect in saying that.
Maxscript is generally speaking a very slow language in terms of how long it takes to process things. Physical scale wouldn't have any real affect on the export. I suspect the reason its taking so long and possibly crashing is simply because of the number of tris involved. The script needs to essentially read out every single polygon / vertex / material id etc etc and then work out how that fits into the new file format. The more information you try to feed it, the longer it will take. There is only so much optimization that can be done to maxscript to handle models like you are trying to. It eventually gets to the point where using a maxscript is not really economic and the only way to get it to process things in a reasonable time is to make it a C plugin for max, essentially rewriting it all. Using a C plugin instead gets past most of the bottlenecks of maxscript and allows for much better processing of larger models.
Also a bit of a disclaimer, I'm not the best coder, so if someone with better knowledge says otherwise, listen to them :-p
0
@Dhaminater: Go
Err.... no.... its actually correct. Take a look through this thread: http:forums.sc2mapster.com/development/artist-tavern/8497-team-colors-and-textures/
You were actually the last poster in that thread too lol...
0
Hmm... I'm not sure how you plan to use them in your map, but you are aware that the portrait models are only what you see in the portrait I hope? In other words they're only really good to be viewed from the front. As an example I've done a quick screenshot of the archon portrait model from the side.
0
Its simply a case of using the Starcraft 2 Material type in 3DS Max and having an appropriate texture. When you apply a texture to an object using the SC2 material type, there is a checkbox to use the texture's alpha channel as the team colour. You can do it on the diffuse texture if you like, or on another slot if you prefer (eg. Emissive). When the checkbox is checked, the alpha channel of whichever texture is in that slot will be used for the team colours.
In the pic, I have just applied a green texture to the whole box, but the alpha channel has black over every face except for the top of the box. Therefore as you can see, the team colours are applied to everything except the top face (the one with the white alpha channel)
0
@GhostNova91: Go
You will need to make sure that your objects are an Edit Mesh or Editable Mesh type object. You can do this two different ways.
1. Select the object then right click in your viewport. In the far bottom right of the menu that appears, choose Convert To: and then choose Convert to Editable Mesh
2. Select the object then open up the modifiers panel on the right. From the Modifier List dropdown menu, choose Edit Mesh.
Try exporting again once all the objects you want to export are edit mesh.