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Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 02:33:12 am

Title: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 02:33:12 am
Firstly, i guess, with 3ds max, do I need to apply the sub divide modifier before I export? or does max handle triangulating objects automatically? (and if sub dividing isnt want I need to do, then what do i needa do?)

if the answer to the above question is yes, do I need to do that before I UV map?

also is there anything quirky about max that I needa be aware of? like any inverted normals... just anything me and my noobness could miss that would make life miserable for me.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Black Wolf on December 09, 2008, 02:41:33 am
Max autotriangulates everything, you can't export without triangulating.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 02:48:17 am
so that means all the crap that got triangulated when they were boolean joined... i can de triangulate it so i can UV map more better???  :D :D :D :D
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Black Wolf on December 09, 2008, 03:10:46 am
You can detriangulate and make more sensible tris, but it'll always export triangulated.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 03:37:25 am
oh thats just fine :D i just love that I can remove some of these triangulated edges so I can UV map a whole lot easier. I've already knocked off damn near 300 faces just cleanin this mess up :p
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Col. Fishguts on December 09, 2008, 03:39:55 am
You do realise that quads are just a prettier visualization in your 3d modelling app? Ingame, everything is triangulated.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 03:44:02 am
oh yeah i know. I didn't manually triangulate anything on this model. When i boolean joined some objects together, some parts of them got triangulated and it just makes a mess of UV mapping.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Col. Fishguts on December 09, 2008, 03:46:00 am
Ah yes, I know what you mean. Sometimes it will automatically select a quad spanning over the joined edge, and it get's annoying to select the right group of polies.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 03:51:20 am
I do gotta say tho I love max's ability to unwrap. It's just so damn simple I might actually make a full time hobby of this  :lol:
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Black Wolf on December 09, 2008, 03:54:06 am
Really? I got so annoyed with Max's UVing that I swore I'd never use it again and have been on Lithunwrap ever since.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 04:00:50 am
Well... maybe I just didn't understand LU but in max, for example, if i select all of the faces on the top part of the saucer of this ship to uv map, i can hide the rest of the faces, flatten them and they come out perfectly circular and scaled to each other. I never could do that with LU. It just seems so much easier to me.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Col. Fishguts on December 09, 2008, 04:08:59 am
Really? I got so annoyed with Max's UVing that I swore I'd never use it again and have been on Lithunwrap ever since.

I used Lith for years, until somebody gave me a crash course in the 3dsMax unwrapper, which I use since then. The main advantage for me was the ability to planar map a group of faces to the average normal of those faces, which is extremely useful (and AFAIK is impossible in Lith)
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 04:15:27 am
ooo can i have a crash course in max UV mapping?  ;)
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Col. Fishguts on December 09, 2008, 04:26:39 am
Well, I got mine from DaBrain via ICQ :P . There are quite good tutorials available on the net though. Google is your friend.
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 04:43:48 am
 :lol: fine, be that way!  :p srsly tho, ive been doin a learn as i go thing here and its going quite well. I dont think i'll have any problems UV mapping. The snag i'm gonna have is making the textures :p I have 0 artistic capability. I'll end up making this ship look like a deformed Christmas tree
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Hellstryker on December 09, 2008, 07:03:48 am
:lol: fine, be that way!  :p srsly tho, ive been doin a learn as i go thing here and its going quite well. I dont think i'll have any problems UV mapping. The snag i'm gonna have is making the textures :p I have 0 artistic capability. I'll end up making this ship look like a deformed Christmas tree

Modeling is an art.  :nod:
Title: Re: to triangulate or not to triangulate? 3ds max question
Post by: Vertigo 7 on December 09, 2008, 07:21:51 am
lol well i can play connect the dots when the lines are already drawn :p its the fill in the blank parts i have problems with