3ds Max: Is there a quick way of placing bolts?

BradMyers82

Hey, just wanted to ask if anyone has a simple solution to this question...

I already know about advanced painter and soulburn scripts. Only problem there is if the object I am painting on is not flat, or in other words Not on a x,y,z axis, then it warps the bolt I am placing. The whole purpose of my using a script like this is to quickly place bolts on a irregular surface and of course not warping there scale.

Anyone have a solution? Am I simply not setting my pivot up correctly or something?

As always, thanks in advance guys!

dejawolf

try turning off all smoothing groups for your object. i always turn off SGs when i use normal align.
makes it fit perfectly onto the surface i'm aligning to.

jbrophy

I don't understand what you mean about AP. I use it all the time on irregular shaped surfaces.

sprunghunt

I also use advanced painter all the time. It shouldn't warp your object. Try resetting the transforms on your bolt before you scatter on your mesh. Max can sometimes have problems with bad transforms on an object causing warping when you rotate it.

Drachis

I typically use the attachment motion controller to place bolts, seems to be quick enough. you just have to make sure your bolt is modeled z up.

Ghostscape

Advance Painter doesn't rescale anything, but the instance/copies it paints are scaled to 100/100/100, so if you have any object-level scaling that will be lost. Drop a reset Xforms on it first.

BradMyers82

Ghostscape: Your right!

Hey guys, reset xform did the trick! Thanks a lot to everyone here! Seriously, this will speed things up a ton, especially on this model I am currently working on.

I often times start with primitives and immediately scale them to get them about the right size. This must have been what was causing the problem.

Mark Dygert

Ghostscape wrote: »

Advance Painter doesn't rescale anything, but the instance/copies it paints are scaled to 100/100/100, so if you have any object-level scaling that will be lost. Drop a reset Xforms on it first.

Reset Xform is a bit destructive, forces you to collapse the stack and it realigns your pivot to the world.

Probably just resetting the scale in the hierarchy tab will do the trick. Honestly Soulburns object painter script is much friendlier to use and accurately copies the scale.

Plus it does:
- Paints on all objects added to the paint on list, not just currently selected.
- Pick a axis to scale randomly instead of scaling them all. Rocks come out a little more irregular that way.
- He also labeled XYZ instead of just leaving you to guess like Advanced Painter.
- Able to assign a usage weight to objects.
- Give the painted objects a prefix name.
- Display painted objects as box.
- Switch between brush and place.
- Save Preferences.

Niels spline painter script also rocks the pants right off of Advanced Painter.

Ghostscape

Vig wrote: »

Reset Xform is a bit destructive, forces you to collapse the stack and it realigns your pivot to the world.

Probably just resetting the scale in the hierarchy tab will do the trick. Honestly Soulburns object painter script is much friendlier to use and accurately copies the scale.

Plus it does:
- Paints on all objects added to the paint on list, not just currently selected.
- Pick a axis to scale randomly instead of scaling them all. Rocks come out a little more irregular that way.
- He also labeled XYZ instead of just leaving you to guess like Advanced Painter.
- Able to assign a usage weight to objects.
- Give the painted objects a prefix name.
- Display painted objects as box.
- Switch between brush and place.
- Save Preferences.

Niels spline painter script also rocks the pants right off of Advanced Painter.

I need to check his out because Advance Painter's spline painting tools are all complete fucking garbage. I mean they are good for making Spaghetti or Toothpaste I guess but I'll be fucked if I ever want to cover the guns I make in toothpaste. I suppose it would be good for welds...

BradMyers82

I'll play with Soulburn scripts some more too. Thanks Vig!