30 years of MAX

oglu

I started with MAX 3.1. That was 20 years ago. 


https://beforesandafters.com/2020/06/04/a-visual-history-of-3ds-max/

Blaizer

They count 3d Studio from MS-DOS as 3ds Max?
"MAX" was the windows version.

I started with kinetix's 3ds Max in windows, 1997 (but i used the ms-dos version too).

We are getting old... oh man I used to use a lot Truespace and Lightwave.

Ruz

ha ha I loved truespace Blaizer, could n't get the hang of lightwave though

I used imagine for dos before I switched to 3ds max 1.1

Obscura

The first version I tried and used a little bit was 5 and it was around 2002-2003. I was like 13.

sprunghunt

Blaizer said:

They count 3d Studio from MS-DOS as 3ds Max?
"MAX" was the windows version.

I started with kinetix's 3ds Max in windows, 1997 (but i used the ms-dos version too).

We are getting old... oh man I used to use a lot Truespace and Lightwave.

I agree that that's a making a big assumption. 3Ds max was a completely different program to 3d studio. You couldn't even use a mouse in 3d Studio but max had all the modern features like a modifier stack and mouse viewport movement. 

I started with 3dstudio and used version 1.0 of max. 

Eric Chadwick

Wait what. We used a mouse in 3dstudio DOS. IIRC we had to do some goofy trickery with DOS memory and crap. 

Anyhow I started in whatever version was there in late 1991. Most memorable was moving our pipeline to the first version of Max, from DOS, and doing it mid-project, while outsourcing for Westwood on Blade Runner. That was fun.

sprunghunt

Eric Chadwick said:

Wait what. We used a mouse in 3dstudio DOS. IIRC we had to do some goofy trickery with DOS memory and crap. 

Anyhow I started in whatever version was there in late 1991. Most memorable was moving our pipeline to the first version of Max, from DOS, and doing it mid-project, while outsourcing for Westwood on Blade Runner. That was fun.

What I meant was there wasn't interaction with the mouse. From what I remember there was a lot of typing stuff into the keyboard instead of dragging with a mouse. 

Eric Chadwick

Sure there was. Check the videos.

sprunghunt

Eric Chadwick said:

Sure there was. Check the videos.

I checked the videos and everytime they want to do something (eg: loft an object) it involves bringing up a dialog box that requires keyboard input. That's how I remember it. There's very little interactive mouse control over anything. When 3ds max came out you could select faces and drag them around in the viewport and add modifiers and real-time adjust the values - that's the sort of thing I mean. 

kanga

Ha! I remember starting on Raydream, Electric image and Animation Master, with a Mac no less, before discovering the pc and Max.

JacqueChoi

I started in 1996 using 3D Studio R4 for DOS
And I also learned Alias/Wavefront Power Animator (which later became Maya)!

I am..   so.. old

thomasp

Hmm... according to that history Nitrous was introduced in Max2011, is that really true? It's the last version I used and I do recall at the office we skipped several updates because nobody wanted to deal with being a beta tester for a new viewport in production.

Anyway, Softimage 3D on SGI (at Uni) was my entry into the fold but I do recall playing with that 3D Studio DOS as well. I only really clicked with 3D though as soon as I found Nendo. And Max 4.0 was the first one I used seriously, not the least because some of the modelling features from Nendo had been ported over as a script) - edgeloops, edgerings, connect/divide, expand selection - that stuff wasn't possible earlier. http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/meshtools

Neox

thats not true, nitrous (noise mode) came with 2012.

i use 2011 i can chose between

OGL

and

Direct3d 9.0 or 10.0

DavidCruz

kinetix - days.

JacqueChoi said:

I am..   so.. old

Aging like fine wine, but i agree, i hear it happens with time.  

spacefrog

Neox said:

thats not true, nitrous (noise mode) came with 2012.

i use 2011 i can chose between

OGL

and

Direct3d 9.0 or 10.0

Its most likely a mix up of year and release version, as Max 2012 was released in the year 2011

Neox

yes. still sorta embarrasing :P

poopipe

There's a few things in there that don't fit my memory of events.

I amuses me that they've completely ignored max 5 despite that being the version in which RTT was introduced (it's okay though, anyone who used it would probably rather pretend it never happened)

I'm pretty confident biped was there earlier than max 4 ( i'm sure i remember using it on 2.5 )
CAT wasn't fully integrated iirc until max2012 (after they bought softimage out) although the plugin was available before that 

Ruz

30 years of max and when was the last update to the hair  or the cloth system for that matter.

Max is really falling behind these days.

Obscura

That is actually a question in general.Some of the tech we are using today are very old and needs a facelift.