#3D Studio wishlist
14 messages in this thread
Here's a few thoughts for your wishlist in-basket:
-have the 3DS flic player load flics into RAM when it plays them. If it
can render in RAM, why not play back? I'd rather not leave 3DS to play flics
with a 3rd party program.
-add numbers 1 to 256 in the RGB and HLS slider areas in the materials
editor. It would make it a lot easier to tune colours than guessing the
location of the sliders, and to compare settings when tweaking materials
(23,184,0 is easier and more accurate than "about 1/4" from left, just to right
of middle, 0")
-have an installation option for materials maps. I'd rather run all of
them off the CD than fill my my hard-drive with a few megs of bitmaps that I
usually don't use at all (until I get a message saying that the renderer can't
find one I erased that's used for a reflection map or whatever, but doesn't
seem to be on the CD, for which I have added all map paths in 3DS.set).
Actually, running off the CD would do for just about anything, except possibly
the main EXE file and whatever else is continually needed for fastest
rendering.
-include the postage stamp materials maps images on your next CD, or an
updated equivalent. It would be a lot easier to use the supplied maps if you
did (though I hasten to add the R3 CD is a GREAT improvement in my opinion over
R2 CD, much more useable stuff and the indexes are great!)(As are the images of
the fonts, which I promptly printed out for constant use).
-a little more in the way of using flics would be nice. Specifically,
in Video post, I'd like to "mirror" flics. For example, I just did a pendulum
clock which spins 720 degrees one way, then 720 back the other way, and so on.
I would have preferred to render 1/2 of the flic, then just reverse that to
complete the second half, rather than render the flic the whole way through (at
4-1/2 minutes per frame x 180 frames = 14 hours which could have been 7).
Possible Animator would do this, but I don't have it, and I don't want to shell
out a grand to do this. Just a wish.
-there are a number of commands that can be run by clicking on unmarked
areas of the screen. I call these "bonus" commands, because I never seem to
stumble across them except by accident. Possibly they could be a little more
formalized.
-as a veteran AutoCAD user, I really miss object snaps for creating
things. I realize that views can be oriented to faces, but I'd like to be able
to draw a box with a vertex snap, for example. Possibly I just need to read the
manual some more.
-anyway, that's it for now. thanks for your time & consideration.
-Gary Sim, 71175,2104
Gary:
Great additions to the wishlist!!
You've got aaplayhi for flic playback out of RAM right?
Your pendulum flic could have been done by rendering only
half the frames but rendered to targas. You could then
make an .ifl in ascending order then an .ifl in
descending order and video posted them together into
one flic.
Time for me to add to the wishlist:
1. Need the ability to zoom in whilst in the middle of a command.
2. I would be so grateful if you could double and triple wildcard
object names in all of the select by name menus.
3. In the keyframer I would like to be able to link objects by name
not only by hitting on them. Its painful to zero in on the
tiny parent object hidden away in the mesh jungle.
4. Saveable hide lists – anybody got a workaround for this now? I
find myself rendering many options of the same scene with various
components excluded/included. If I could save the setup for option A,
B, C, etc. then I could go back to them to rerender as my client
made revisions to materials, lighting, etc. Saving separate .prj
files
doesn't cut it because many modifications would be done to all
options.
As far as linking goes, I ALWAYS link by name. All you have to do to do just
about any command by name is hit the H key instead of using the cursor to
click, and you'll be presented with a dialogue box containing the list of names
for you to mark. As I said, this goes for most other menu commands as well.
hope this helps,
John Tissavary (La Luna cie)
John:
Thanks for the tip. Back to the manuals for me. 🙁
Bob
>> In the keyframer I would like to be able to link objects by name not only by
hitting on them. <<
Robert, Cntrl-H will be your best friend, and it works in the 3d editor as too!
🙂
One down anyway! <G>
-JE
JE, PMJI, but in the interest of accuracy, Cntrl-H will HOLD, while a simple H
will list. <g>
Yessir, "H" it is, just checking to see if anyone was awake. <G>
I know I wasn't 🙂
-JE
>>Saveable hide lists –
The By Color option works great for this! Just assign areas of the model –
I've been using them for hiding and unhiding (and fastdraw & freezing) for a
while now and it really is a speed boost for complex prj's.
– Phil
uh, is anyone saving this?
Just kidding!!!!
Thanks, these are valuable requests.
Nik
Phil:
Great idea! I hadn't come up with a good use for the By Color option. Thanks.
Bob
Thank you Phil – a better idea than mine.
Robert – Something like saveable hide lists is easy using the 3
lettered selection sets. Select one set of object with A highlighted
and another with B, etc. You can hide all selected… you get the
idea. There are anly three, but that's better than none.
I was using the A B C selection groups but I needed more flexibility.
You know your always going to reuse A a million times so you're
really left with only two choices. Anyway, I think it was Phil
Miller who clued me into using colors for grouping objects. Its been
all of one day that I've been doing this and I can't live without it.
So scrath that item off the wishlist, its in there.
Gary,
Regarding your wishlist items, unless I misunderstood something,
>>-add numbers 1 to 256 in the RGB and HLS slider areas in MatEd
This information should be at the very top of your screen, given in
both RGB and HLS color spaces.
>>-installation option for materials maps
Just pick Info/Configure/MapPaths from the menu and choose the CD-ROM
drive, or edit the 3DS.SET and put the CD drive there. I never copy
maps from CD to HD.
>>commands that can be run by clicking on unmarked areas of the screen
What commands are you referring to? Could you elaborate?
BTW, I like your "flic-in-ram" idea. Also, as you suspected, you can "mirror"
a flic with AniPro. I think of AniPro as almost a necessity with 3DS. (You
should be able to find it for much less than $1000)
JKJ