3ds max and accuracy

dejawolf

hi everyone, just wondering, how do i turn up the accuracy of everything in 3ds max?

i'm currently working with unit setting:

1 unit = 1 inches, which is the default, and which sucks, as its inaccurate as piss shit using the metric system, and causes everything to be gigantic in the UVW view, causes all manners of problems with weld tresholds, fillets and chamfers in editable spline, and well, and all sorts of spinner problems, and just in general, is just a retard mayhem.

Ryno

You talking system units or working units?

dejawolf

system units.
work units i change as i feel like it. even made a shortcut button on the main toolbar for the units setup, as i continously change between milimeters, centimeters and meters.

renderhjs

if you work for engines better stick with generic units and not inches, centimeters and alike- those are just a way of juggling with the internal units by adding a bunch of digits.
Most export scripts are exported with these generic units anyway they often dont know meters or inches.
Its the same headache we have with Photopshop and its default mm or inch units setup while the software itself works with pixels.

In 3dsmax a meter setup is usefull when working with mental ray as many of the effects are based on real physics and thus heavenly rely on metric units.

Rob Galanakis

Yeah stick with generic units. I find a good scale to be 1 generic unit = 1 centimeter (don't use metric/etc.).

dejawolf

well, i don't change the system units all the time, i change the display unit scale.
i make models for a military sim, and its set up so that the max units are 1:1 to the in-game units.
also since i only use the default scale i don't get all that juggling with unit scales that happends when you use a units setup different from the max one.
i'm forgetful, so having default system unit setup is very helpful.
back when i had my default as 1 unit = 1cm, i used to forget it, and sometimes ended up with a system unit setup of 1 unit = 1 inches.

kite212

centimeters make for better lighting, and radiosity, for baking light maps

renderhjs

regarding centimeters:
I assume because mentalImages (company behind mentalRay) is a company located in germany where they measure things in meters and centimeters.

But from a personal expierence switching between the modes can cause alot of pain - since I switched to generic units witout any translation between I have no scale and alike issues anymore. Its just that in some cases mentalRay renderings dont work the way they should.

dejawolf

thats not the problem. the problem is that the smallest fillets i can get is 2.54cm increments, when i want 0.5cm increments. is there any way to adjust it so the spinner makes 0.5cm increments?

Rob Galanakis

AFAIK you cannot change spinner/slider increments (though you could build a custom spinner and stick it somewhere, I wouldn't recommend that).

ArtsyFartsy

also, for any number field - if you select it and type r##, where ## is the incremental increase you want, it will add that number to the current field.

For example if you value currently is 3.64
Select the filed and type r.04 and enter, and the new number would be 3.68.

Or to subtract
if your value is 4.53
Type r-.05 and enter, and you'll get 4.48

It's a quick way to get exact displacement. It basically adds or subtracts the number you type.

Though I must say i'm not sure why you're getting so upset over this. max has so many possible unit configurations, surely one must work for what you need.

dejawolf

oh, thats pretty nifty. except it doesn't work for the fillet tool or chamfer tool since the values resets after you fillet or chamfer.

the reason i get upset with this is because if i change unit settings, all sorts of stuff gets messed up when i xref or merge. like physique. or skin. and i'd rather not have that, because i merge stuff quite a bit.