Preserving imported vertex normal data.

GIS3000

Hi guys.

I've imported a collada (.DAE) file into 3DS max. It comprises of a scene with a few individual objects. Some of them are smoothed and some have hard normals.

The trouble is that merging these meshes together cause the smoothed objects to harden or become faceted. I tried freezing transforms, turning to poly modifier, reset setting to the normals using "Edit Normal" modifier, but they all result in the smoothed objects becoming faceted.

The imported normals are all Explicit (Green). Is there a way to merge all the objects without losing the normal data?

thanks
GIS3000

GIS3000

Bumped up.

Any advice or opinions would be nice.

Thanks!

Noors

By merging, you mean attaching ? This doesnt seem to alter the explicit normals for me. Are your objects editable poly ? Do you attach them with the editable poly attach ?
Also you can specify to use smoothing groups in the fbx importer. Might be of some help.

GIS3000

Sorry for the late reply.
Yes, I meant attaching and I use the "editable poly" modifier. However, when first imported, the objects are in mesh mode and problem persists even when I'm in "Editable mesh" mode. It seems to make no difference whetehr if I'm in mesh mode of Ploy mode.

My question seems pretty similar to this guy on cg society back in 2011.
link is here.
(http://forums.cgsociety.org/archive/index.php/t-995601.html)

The difference though is that he is importing from sketchup, while mine is a collada from an in house editor.

Mean while, I'll go check to see if the fbx importer will import my smoothing groups via FBX importer. BTW, I'm using the latest version of the importer for 3DS Max 2011.

Thanks for the help!
Regards
GIS3000