CompuServe Messages

Aha ….. it could definately be operator error, The tools in Alias are extremely powerful but they also have a fairly intense learning curve. Have you done tests on various export levels to try to alleviate the problems? Creating polygons from NURBS is a task unto itself, first of all you need to make sure your Alias model is well constructed and that you properly set all of your levels, i.e. – if you're creating polygons from NURBS surfaces, you have to pay really close attention to thresholds, tolerences, subdivision type and levels, direction, etc. Then when you export to DXF you need to check your rebuild tolerences, scaling factors, significant digits, etc. As you can see, it's not quite as simple as clicking on an "export dxf" button. 🙂 In Alias V6 there are even more options so you have even more control over the process. I can tell you that we've never had a problem moving the models back and forth, and we move some pretty complicated stuff. We've also DXF'd into Wavefront and SoftImage as welss as 3DS. Additionally the Alias model format has changed in V6, so if you get ready to buy an external translator, make sure it supports V6. Otherwise in 45 days, you'll have a useless translator. If you use an SGI based translator that was written from the Openmodel Toolset then you may be O.K., but Even Alias doesn't directly support one format to the next when they release new versions. You have to run your old models through Alias provided converters to bring them into the latest versions.