SCIFI3D Export / texture confusion

Im new to 3D animation and Ive just been using some SCIFI3D.com star wars meshes to get myslef started in 3DS MAX 8 but ive hit a sang either with exporting files or importing files, im not advanced enough to know myself.

Ive made a star field and I want to import the coruscant planet off SCIFI3D.com into it. But when I import it all the textures seem to have gone, but whats even stranger is when I take off the atmosphere layer the clouds are there ok but the core is like a bright red colour.

with atmosphere on:
http://s157.photobucket.com/albums/t48/the-sound-guy/?action=view&current=redplanet.jpg

with atmosphere off:

http://s157.photobucket.com/albums/t48/the-sound-guy/?action=view&current=noatmosphere.jpg

as you can see the core is a strange red colour below the clouds, all the layers are there just the textures are missing I thnik. I dont know how to relocate things like jpegs either? (if thats what I need to do)

everything is fine in its original file as shown below its just when I export it then import it into my star field file that it messes up. does anyone know whats causeing this?

normal in its original file:
http://s157.photobucket.com/albums/t48/the-sound-guy/?action=view&current=planetoriginal.jpg

im stuck here guys any help would be appreciated. (also I tried importing my star field into the planet file and nothing was there!)?

 

That's how it's supposed to look, at least in the viewport. If that's how it looks when rendering (you do know what rendering is right?) then it looks like it doesn't know where the paths are to the textures. To fix this, go to Customize-->Configure User Paths-->External Files--> then click Add and just go to the folder where the textures are.

By default it will look in the same folder that the .max file is in for the textures, so if it's not then just do that.

 

I'm also new to this 3d program. Just got it in yesterday. I told the program where to find the skins. It worked good for the millinium falcon model i download from scifi 3d, but the slave 1 3ds max version aint working. I'm telling the program where to find the exact skins for it, but for some reason it aint adding the skins to the model. Its still gray when i do the render. The falcon though looks good.

 

When you tell it where the maps are it should add them to a list of places to look for maps. Make sure that it's doing that, if it is then that's weird. Or maybe not all of the maps are in the folder.

 

it should be reading it. I orginized where each file is tommorrow. For example i have the slave1 stuff under F:\Autodesk\Download\Slave1

and the Falcon i have under
F:\Autodesk\Download\Falcon

The falcon seems to work, but i dont know why the slave 1 aint.

I'm looking under the list and i see that the slave1 folder is on the list, but it aint working. Only like a few spots on the slave1 have the real color.

 

That slave 1 model is having worng filenames for the parts. At leats the .3ds version is. When I imported it into Maya I had to redo some textures to get them right again.

 

So how do i fix this? Do i have to change the name of each of the files? Because when i open up my project it says "missing _________" and it names off all the skins. Should i just change the name of the skins to match whatever name its saying is missing?

 

Perhaps, it might have shortened the file names for the file upload so perhaps it just needs them to be longer. So I would guess you'd have to fix the file names or just redirect each material to the renamed file.

 

Ok i just opened the Max version instead of the 3ds versions. Those have the skin.

But i have another question if you can help. When i put a coroscant background photo, the image stays still. Meaning when i render the clip and the camera lets say goes from looking up to looking down, the coroscant background is dead center with the footage.

How do i keep the background in one location so it doesn't look like all the buildings in the background (not individual buildings, but a background photo that has buildings) to stay in one location.

 

^^^ any input on this question.... if you can even tell what i'm trying to ask.

 

Open both the environment window and the material editor, drag the background texture map from the button in the Environment Window to an empty slot in the Material editor, have it as instanced instead of as a copy, in the material editor there should be a drop-down box currently set to Screen, change that to Spherical and the background will be like an environment where it moves around as if it were mapped to the world on a sphere. Just make sure that your map is able to work as a spherical map. And that's Coruscant.

 

I'm on my work computer now. I can't wait when i get a chance to go try this out. Thank you though for helping me with all my questions.

Just gotta say it again... i really love this program so far.

 

I like it a lot, especially after I started with Animation Master (ugh). I also use Maya now, since I'm using it in class I try to use each for what I need to get done, Max isn't the best at everything, but it does have some really great features.

 

Hey i have another question if thats alright. I downloaded the Max version of slave 1. But when i highlight the whole slave 1 and try to move it, the wings dont move. They stay still. Even when i try to click on the wings by themself and try to drag them, they wont movie.

Its not frozen, so thats not the problem.

So is there a button that kinda combines all the objects into one so i can move everyone as one?"


edit ok dont worry about it, it looks like i might of figured it out.

 

It might be linked to some kind of rig for animation which means that something else is controlling their movement.

You can Group things together to make them more like one single object, you can also setup selection groups so that you can select multiple objects without having them grouped together as a single object.

 

would you happen to know why when i add a star background the stars get all twinkly even if the camera just moves alittle bit. Its hard to describe but unless the camera is not moving, the stars are very twinkly and blurry.

Is there someway to fix that?

 

It might be because your image is too small and doesn't have enough stars, in the material editor, in the slot where you dragged the texture map for the environment and changed it to spherical, there should be a Tile option, currently set to 1.0 for both U and V, by increasing that amount you can make it repeat the texture map, so instead of having 1.0 you can double how many times it's repeated (tiled) by changing it to 2.0.

To make them not twinkle you need motion blur. Go to the Rendering window, click on the Renderer tab, and scroll down in the window until you see a section called Image Motion Blur, there should be a box that is unchecked that says Apply to Environment Map, so check that box. And to add motion blur to your objects, just select them and right click in the viewport and click Object Properties, in the new window that comes up there should be a section for motion blur in the lower right hand corner, have it set to Image Motion Blur with a multiplier of 0.5.

You can also preview your environment map in the viewport by going to the Views menu, then click Viewport Background (Alt+B)Check the box that says Use Environment Background and the box that says Display Background. Then it will show up in your viewport (at low quality, but that's not a big issue, it'll at least give you an idea if your tiling of the environment map is enough).

I use Image Motion blur because it's the fastest method and it looks the best, but sometimes I have to use Object motion blur, like if I want to add a glow effect to a lightsaber blade without taking it into After Effects to add the glow and I want to do it all in 3ds Max, I can use Object motion blur so that the glow will be applied to the whole motion blur instead of just where the actual blade is---which would be the case if I used Image Motion Blur.

 

you know i'm looking at my footage frame per frame, and the stars look to be changing possitions each frame. The camera is moving, but not that much. And the stars look like they randomizing each frame, but not when the camera is still. When the camera is still the stars stay where they are. Plus they are clear when the camera is still. I'll keep playing around with it though. Maybe i missed something on your last post.

I thank you though for answer all my questions.

edit: ok i missed a thing you wrote. I'm making it a bigger screen, so lets see if that works.

edit2: as of now i can't figure it out. I put the thing at 2. I put the blur on the enviroment and on the object like you said.

The screne is big enough. i did it 600x400. But its still got that look of all the stars flickering and twinkling.
Very weird.

 

Here actually. i uploaded how the scene looks like. Go here

Click here

The file is like 5MB. ignore the planet at the end when it stops rotating. The main thing is the Stars. Why do they twinkle like that?

side not. It took my computer 3 1/2 hours to render that clip.

 

I'm sorry i just realised that link i provided wasn't the right link. It was just a photo of another scene. Heres the link i'm sorry.

Link to Video Clip

Some input would be great. Thank you.

 

Superb! I only watched the streaming version and it looked great. The only nitpick is the lens flare, it looks a little fake but other than that it looks good.

 

Oh yea, i forgot to say that. That lens flare has got to go. I just gotta learn how to make the engines glow, and how to fix the darn stars from twinkling.

 

I can't really tell why the stars are twinkling, perhaps you have too many stars? As far as that sun glow is, turn off the auto/manual secondary effects and make it more yellow. And the planet shouldn't be rotating at all, you can't tell if a planet is rotating in space.

 

Alright finally i got the stars to look pretty good. Of course more tweaking wouldn't hurt. But this is what i did.

I made the radious of the sphere to be 180,000 instead of the 1200 that the manual says. Heres a photo of the stats.

[image=http://static.filefront.com/images/personal/g/GeoMFilms/93134/pbbowxjrmu.jpg]

Plus heres the video clip to see how the star field looks.

Star field test

So thats cool.