3dsmax sculptmaking

Hello all I use since lot of time now 3dsamx for my sculpts , but I use the bake texture method ... I have compared the results with the wings exporter or the ones from sculptpaint and its not as precise and sculpts arent so streight , is there another exporter for 3dsmax? I am using the sculpt texture applied to the object and after the baking of it .... is there a better method or an exporter?

Although it isn't officially supported like Maya, Max users are actually very spoiled for choices of prim export schemes.

There's the multi talented Abu Nasu's shader, which it sounds like you might have been using; saying "bake texture method" isn't that precise for determining this. It's the closest to the surface approximation scheme the Maya Mel script produces in my opinion.
Here's the thread I have for that /8/e5/182461/1.html

Chip Midinight has used said shader for an ingenious hack to create a sculpted prim out of arbitrary meshes. (which reminds me that I need to post some time about using a cylinder topology and the sphererize modifier to skip the need for the Photoshop Solidify A filter in his tutorial) http://home.comcast.net/~pixelforgeltd/Tutorial.htm

Gearsaw Stonecutter, who is a wizard with sculpty's, has a template that can be used for authoring. His template and tutorial are here http://www.joe-brown.net/SecondLife/SculptTut/SculptTut.html

And finally, Shack Dougall has done several refinements on a script that allows you to export and import sculpty maps between Max and SL. http://liferain.com/downloads/sculptgenmax/

Personally I find Shack Dougall's SculptGenMax script to be the most accurate method of transferring mesh data to SL given my workflow. I am a polygon modeler used to manipulating loops and edges to create volumes and profiles, so the vert based aspect of the script appeals to me.

Hope this helps.

You're right, Pygora. Max is an embarassment of riches when it comes to making sculpties.

The big difference between Shack's SculptGen and Abu's shader is that Sculptgen creates the sculpt map based on actual vertex positions (at least that's how I understand it) while Abu's shader depends entirely on the UV map. SculptGen will give you greater accuracy while the shader will allow you to use any topology as long as it has the right UV mapping (such as loft objects). An uncut single nurbs surface works fine too, but I hate nurbs modeling with a passion so I don't use them myself.

A variation of my projection modifier hack which will be the second part of my tutorial (if I ever get off my lazy backside and write it) is using the Conform compound object to wrap a mesh around the arbitrary target object. That method has the added benefit of being more easily editable. You can refine the result of the wrap by throwing an edit poly modifier on it and fixing any stray verts. You'd then bake the sculpt map directly off the Conform object, and you can still use a projection modifier on it to bake a texture map from the target object.

When I do them I most often model them by hand, starting with a low resolution plane, cyllinder, or sphere. I edit that to rough out the shape then add a meshsmooth modifier with a couple of iterations and use the control points of the meshsmooth at successive control levels to refine it. The Photoshop Solidify filter is only necessary when starting with a sphere as a base mesh.

There are two main ways of getting sculptie maps out of 3DS Max.

Shader Method:

One day someone said, "I wanna Max shader for sculpties, please." Since the kind of shader was nothing new to me, I tossed one out.

The shader method relies on having proper UVs coordinates. Square and to the edges. No overlap. Arbitrary meshes are fine as long as the UVs are proper. Modeling method doesn't really matter, either. Projection, Conform, Pelt - it's all good. Major pros.

Although, you can kind of forego proper UVs with good use of Solidify.

The major con to the shader method is that it's not very exact. You can mess with anti-aliasing during render and all sorts of other tricks, but you will probably never get a sharp and straight edge straight out of the renderer.

Shader method is good for organic shapes.

Vertex Method:

This method takes a vertice's XYZ position and converts it directly to RGB colour. I believe Shack and Gearsaw use this method.

The super bonus to this method is that it is precise. A vert is a vert and that's that. Nothing to get in the way and no messing with it. Sharp edges and angles are no big deal.

The major con to the vertex method is that it relies on proper vertex count and order. You have to start with the right number of verts and in the right order. This means that you can't start with a low-poly and then refine. No Meshsmooth, Tesselate, or HSDS because they will mess with the vertex order.

It is possible to re-order verts for low-poly + Meshsmooth, but I haven't seen anybody do this yet. Maybe somebody has and I missed it. I started looking into this vertex method variation, but I got distracted with other things.

The vertex method is the cat's meow for precision.

Best of Both Worlds?

I did do some playing around with mixing both methods, but I never did do any complete tests. Just some goofing around for giggles.

Theoretically...
- Export a sculptie map using the shader method.
- Load the sculptie map as an object (Shack).
- Refine and clean as necessary.
- Final export using the vertex method.

It might work. If anybody does go through the motions, let us know how it goes?

Good thinking, Abu. I fogot that Shack added the ability to load a sculpt map back into Max.

Not quite sure about this. I know the vert order issue is true with Wings 3D, but Sculptgenmax is pretty robust. Maybe in the first release this was true? I don't remember, but it's not that way now from what I can tell. I start with a regular cylinder (or torus or plane) from the create panel every time. No template action at all. You can load in template meshes from maps, and there are some included with the download, but it's not necessary.

I typically work by blocking in my sculpts with a low rez mesh then subdividing up when I'm ready for more detail. Never had any issues with vert order problems. You can use multi rez meshes as well since RC2. http://liferain.com/downloads/sculptgenmax-10-rc2-released/

I haven't played with Sculptgenmax since it first came out. I honestly can't remember if it used the shader or vert method. I was just taking a guess with vert method based on some vague memories.

The newer version looks like it uses the shader method, but fills in the gaps. Much like rendering with transparency, then filling in the gaps in a 2d app (Photoshop + Solidify for example). Getting Max to fill in the UV gaps would certaintly explain how it works. Or he could be using something entirely different. I'll add it to my list of things to play with.

I've always found it easier to start with one of the many available template objects which are already properly uv-mapped, because my workflow relies on that uv-map for texturing anyways and it's convenient for me to just start out that way. Seems to me that I would probably do that even in Max with sculptgenmax, unless I'm missing something.

Sorry I'm late to this party.

SculptGenMax uses a gap-filling vertex algorithm. It can handle meshes that are higher or lower resolution than a standard sculptie as well as mixed resolutions, as long as the UV map is somewhat regular.

I'm very interested in specific examples where the shader method performs better, so that I can improve it.

Also wanted to mention that Prim Composer for 3dsMax is out.

http://liferain.com/downloads/primcomposer/

Prim Composer is a complete offline builder for Second Life and OpenSim. Create regular prims and sculpts within 3ds Max and import them into either Second Life or OpenSim as linked sets. Hierarchical grouping and gizmo scaling are supported within 3ds Max.

It is a fusion between SculptGenMax and SL Prims.

The basic workflow in Prim Composer is template-based. Create a sculptie from a pre-existing sculptmap, modify it, link it to other sculpties, export to SL. But SculptGenMax is integrated, so you can also create geometry from scratch at various resolutions, generate a sculptmap, paste the sculptmap into the scene to create a sculptie, link, export to SL.

Feedback, both positive and negative is greatly appreciated.

Here's the sculptmap algorithm in a nutshell:

For each face do
(
Get the vertices for the face.

For each vertex do
(
Lookup the vertex in the UV Map.

If the vertex doesn't fall on a perfect UV gridpoint,
then find the nearest one and store the vertex value there.
)
)

At the end, if a point on the perfect UV grid doesn't have a value, then copy the value of its neighbor to the left or top (gap-filling).