Also, in edit poly "edit triangulation" does not show the edges :S
Normal maps are also not shown well, simmetry normals have problems i didn't have with max 2009.
I'm getting too many problems with my max 2009 files. I load some models, and omg, crash, the app does not respond. I've tried the trial in another computer, and more of the same. There are some big issues with this version, fuck.
BTW: this version does not win against modo in subdivs, the perfomance is a bit higher than 2009 but that's all.
edit: i also have the same problems with the new uv. It seems like they rushed and they didn't do the work very well.
Rushed with this whole "uvw unwrap is ok" opinion...it sucks here too with mesh with few k polies... now its sad new unwrap is cool but unusable. Damn you Autodesk!!! More and more modo > max 2012 ;/
Naive question: taking in consideration how much can you perna rip out of max , is it possible to rip out at least some things from UVW to 2009 v ? Peel, relax until flat and making polies square are really cool...
Is there a way to get the old tools back in Max 2012 for the UV editor? I also use TexTools, but considering that several scripts I use are a no go in Max 2012, I'm not too happy, and am afraid I might break something (which reminds me, GOZ doesn't work with Max 2012, and actually corrupted my startup UI files, I had to delete them manually for Max to work again).
Which is a shame, because the Viewport and crashing sessions have been improved considerably...if only scripts worked too as they should be...
It's pretty damn normal that scripts don't work for 2012 yet. It just came out last friday! Give the people a break, they're working on the next update of scripts, I'm sure.
2012 still needs a few bug fixes, but overall, I'm enjoying it. I have no issues with Unwrap UVW. I'm noticing a slight bit of lag when I collapse the unwrap modifier though. But that only lasts 2 seconds. Yes, it's not quite as quick as 2009, you're right. But it'll get there I'm sure. I recall 2009 being pretty bad at release as well, just like any release of Max since, well, ever.
I've noticed corrupted/really weird wireframes from older scenes though. That one's weird.
@Prophecies: True, those are plugins I understand that, but I was specifically referring to the Scripts which are fillets of wonderful small writing able to do the most amazing things without the need for overly complicated installations.
For example, we have currently 2 GOZ options for Max and ZB. GoZ (official thingy from Pixologic) and GoMax (custom made, even better then GoZ sometimes). Neither one works in my case, when they should work, because they're scripts.
As perna said, those always have been backwards A-OK-AY. All the way to Max 2008 usually (and even 9 sometimes pending on Author), I'm surprised many of those broke with Max 2012, especially workflow proven ones.
What surprised me even more is companies like 3d-iO already have updated certain plugins of theirs to work with Max 2012, and KY-Trails Render Effect plugin was released only a couple of days before Max 2012, and on the same day, the author released a new one for Max 2012.
@perna: All they had to do with Max 209 was update the UI graphics, allow maybe a tweak or two in simplicity on how we organize our stuff (shortcuts, bars, etc...) and done. I honestly cannot imagine what else they could have done to make it better, and yet here we are...I don't PolyBoost and I do love CAT, but plugins come and go, software cores stay forever (or long enough for you to loathe them like an abused spouse).
@Prophecies:For example, we have currently 2 GOZ options for Max and ZB. GoZ (official thingy from Pixologic) and GoMax (custom made, even better then GoZ sometimes). Neither one works in my case, when they should work, because they're scripts.
I've looked into GoMax problems and 3dsMax crashes if you have the Nitrous viewport on and attempt to import a mesh from Zbrush with the DirectX material!
Other times it does not crash but the mesh and max file become corrupted. Strange stuff.
Other DirectX fx materials seem to work fine with the viewport, but the one I'm using with GoMax doesn't.
EDIT: GoMax should work just fine if you switch your materials to "standart" in the GoMax options window or disabling Nitrous viewport and switching back to DirectX.
I've looked into GoMax problems and 3dsMax crashes if you have the Nitrous viewport on and attempt to import a mesh from Zbrush with the DirectX material!
Other times it does not crash but the mesh and max file become corrupted. Strange stuff.
Other DirectX fx materials seem to work fine with the viewport, but the one I'm using with GoMax doesn't.
EDIT: GoMax should work just fine if you switch your materials to "standart" in the GoMax options window or disabling Nitrous viewport and switching back to DirectX.
I tried a couple of time, but it keeps on showing me that it is 'importing', and once it reaches full bar, there is nothing in screen. Not even a selection and usually it crashes.
I tried with some other options, but it just shows a never ending import progress bar looping, over and over till I force quit it.
After all those, it crashes. I would like to keep Nitrous if possible for performance reasons naturally (unless I can get the same performance with DX9-Standard, but my results always showed NS being faster).
Also, what Material are you using in ZB when importing to DX or Standard? I was using Cavity, Blinn and Normal, in my tests, thought those would be the most ideal solutions...
Also, what Material are you using in ZB when importing to DX or Standard? I was using Cavity, Blinn and Normal, in my tests, thought those would be the most ideal solutions...
I was referring to the material in 3dsMax. For DirectX it uses a FX material in order to display Zbrush's materials in realtime. That FX material is only used if you selected "DirectX" in the GoMax options window, and while testing GoMax with 2012... it seems to cause problems with the new viewport renderer.
But besides that problem, everything else seems to work fine.
If you could maybe write a "report" of sorts, so that I'm able to reproduce the problem, I'll be glad to look into it!
PM me if you want.
Oh! and btw... GoZ does work with 3dsMax 2012 as well! At least on my machine!
I was referring to the material in 3dsMax. For DirectX it uses a FX material in order to display Zbrush's materials in realtime. That FX material is only used if you selected "DirectX" in the GoMax options window, and while testing GoMax with 2012... it seems to cause problems with the new viewport renderer.
But besides that problem, everything else seems to work fine.
If you could maybe write a "report" of sorts, so that I'm able to reproduce the problem, I'll be glad to look into it!
PM me if you want.
Oh! and btw... GoZ does work with 3dsMax 2012 as well! At least on my machine!
Oh, wow, I didn't realize that you were the one who wrote the Script, stupid me, d'oh!
Thanks for everything, I guess I'll have to thinker more with ZB and 2012 tonight before I write any-type-of-report to anyone and it turns out to be an issue I have. Honestly, I wouldn't be bitching this if I didn't try it atleast 10 times and get frustrated enough to uninstall Max in rage because my current project needed it.
Also, Official GoZ works for you? Holy crap, then I did do something wrong, because it crashed my 3DS and wouldn't allow to start it up again, till I deleted all the UI related files...GAH!
yeah i think Perna hit the nail on the head there. quite often people look for solutions to "problems" that only exist either in their head, or in their lack of skillset.
In the end its not like 3ds max is useless crap. Shame that the best feature in 2012 (unwrap) is now almost unusable. Anyone knows how much time usually autodesk needs to release SP ? I hope they will fix unwrap in SP. Except that 2012 isn't bad.
In the end its not like 3ds max is useless crap. Shame that the best feature in 2012 (unwrap) is now almost unusable. Anyone knows how much time usually autodesk needs to release SP ? I hope they will fix unwrap in SP. Except that 2012 isn't bad.
...unusable? I haven't had a single issue, apart from it taking 2 seconds to collapse the Unwrap modifier. I had to get used to the new placement and the use of the new tools, but apart from that, works like a charm.
in my new 2600k @ 4ghz, 16gb + ati 5770, the new uv tool is unusable. I loaded a fucking model with ~3500 tris, and the thing is that i can't not work as fast as i should. a chunk of less than 1000 tris moves with a huge lag.
I ended uninstalling that crap of software. And furthermore, i can't get the perfomance sathe gets with his older system but with his gtx285.
I tried the trial in my brothers system, a q9550 @ 3,8ghz, 8gb, zotac gtx 285@720mhz, and the perfomance is not like sathe's. nitrous is so good, that we see the same model in a different way lol.
I ended very when i played with the program. They should start a new software from the very beginning and offer us quality, perfomance and better tools. Max is heavily patched and i'm fed up of crashes.
Where is that stability?
What makes me laugh is the installation, pretty installation yes, but the program is not pretty. They could have improved the interface a lot, there is too much space wasted. They could learn from opera and make the things really customizable.
in my new 2600k @ 4ghz, 16gb + ati 5770, the new uv tool is unusable. I loaded a fucking model with ~3500 tris, and the thing is that i can't not work as fast as i should. a chunk of less than 1000 tris moves with a huge lag.
I ended uninstalling that crap of software. And furthermore, i can't get the perfomance sathe gets with his older system but with his gtx285.
I tried the trial in my brothers system, a q9550 @ 3,8ghz, 8gb, zotac gtx 285@720mhz, and the perfomance is not like sathe's. nitrous is so good, that we see the same model in a different way lol.
I ended very when i played with the program. They should start a new software from the very beginning and offer us quality, perfomance and better tools. Max is heavily patched and i'm fed up of crashes.
Where is that stability?
What makes me laugh is the installation, pretty installation yes, but the program is not pretty. They could have improved the interface a lot, there is too much space wasted. They could learn from opera and make the things really customizable.
I think your issues may be with having an ATI card. ATI has never been that great for 3D apps. I unwrapped a 500'000 poly model, and it didn't lag any more than it did in 2010. Sure, it's slower, but that's alot of polies.
And I'm not even an nVidia fanboy. It's just pretty well known that ATI isn't as stable as nVidia when it comes to this.
Also... pretty installation? What? O_o
I agree, 2009 is faster and probably the pinnacle of 3ds Max so far, but I'm definitely liking 2012. Much more so than 2010, but then again, that doesn't mean much, 2010 was just bad. :P
I tried this, and it helped, however... if I unwrapped something like even a 10k tri mesh, the UV window was super laggy, not just moving pieces, but just moving around the mouse in the window.
I opened 2010, did the same test, and it was laggy when moving stuff, but not as bad, and when I moved my mouse, it was smooth as butter.
There are some obvious issues going on. Also, in 2010, I had constant update ON.
OK, so I got Official GoZ to work. It was strange, but I had to do this to it:
-Go to "C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Autodesk\3dsMax"
-Delete everything related to Max 2012
-CCleaner clean up of registry and files
-Clean Install
-Startup Max and Close
-Open ZBrush -> Preference -> GOZ -> Update Paths -> Select new Max
-Open Max and close it again
-Send any object to Max with GOZ (for me nothing showed up, empty Port)
-Close Max, Close Zbrush. Startup Zbrush and send GOZ again.
-Max will startup and at this point, you'll have GOZ in the menu actually working plus Max showing the model.
As for GoMax by Norman3D
-Close ZB if it's open
-Open Max, drag and drop or Runscript the...well, script and follow the instructions.
-Press the small ZB button launch it
-ZB -> Max and Max -> ZB should work
Please note this varies since this is my first actual time of getting the Official GOZ to work as well as GoMax. Before this, it crashed and corrupted my UI.
Another variable is that I stupidly enough didn't look what I was installing, so I installed all the extras such as Algorithmic and all those other so called 'plugins'. This could have played role, since after the uninstall, more of the scripts showed signs of being stable and working. Not once did I receive an issue about the anything crashing of dieing.
I'm not sure what that did, but the peformance for mine stayed the same. I decided to take the Demo Solider from ZB for a spin unwrapping, and so far, at 10K, my performance in the Shaded Viewport is strong while the UV-Editor is laggy (please note the total count is 93K with the Body costing in at 32K).
Still however, it's not too bad, and infact, very manageable. I simply cannot imagine anyone wanting to unwrap a model higher then 10K in a go, and yes, I was able to repack each Unwrapped model in one map after selecting all of them and running a few auto-packing features from the tools (it was laggy and slow as hell, but nothing that wasn't workable considering it didn't require manual hand work and was more about overall relaxing, packing and normalization in the final process/stages.).
Still you are fighting with something you shouldn't. Take modos unwraping. 2012 uvw unwrap copies some modo solutions but modo works smooth ALL THE TIME. At least here ;] It even smooths out uvs. Just making a point that it can be done way much better. Prophecies - good for you ;] shame I can't say same thing. I was really glad 2012 was going to be super fast but it seems its just some weird solutions to work around the problem. Did we need nitrous to boost performance ? Don't think so. Look at 2009. Autodesk shouldn't add new big features and just do something to tidy up this mess.
I believe since 2010 they just bought some small developers and bring them in, just to satisfy subscriber's expectation, which failed miserably, because now it's not only bloated, it's not efficient anymore.
I'm always impressed when they delivered the presentation and coulnd't wait to get onhands, but when it's released, always the same feeling... .
it seems like most ppl get distracted by nitrous in 2012 release. Any updates or improvements in plugins they bought earlier such as slate?
Distracted with Nitrous? Yeah you could say I am distracted by it...I just did a Mass FX simulation with 5k+ Teapots with 1.4 Billion polygons. Mindblowingly distracted if you ask me :P So many teapots! I could watch them fall all day long.
While that may help the lag for some people, it removed the real-time update in the viewport, which you need to eliminate warping, so it's not actually a help at all, especially considering that realtime update works fine in all other versions of max.
I mean, cool that you suggest a solution and all but it's not much of a solution if it fixes one thing and breaks another
Yeah, it's by no means a fix for the problem. It seems there is definitely something very wrong with it. Even people with same hardware specs are reporting different results.
In my case disabling the option "fixed" the problem on my side. By fixing it I mean: it works just as the uvw editor does on 3dsMax 2011. You can work with meshes up to 7000 tris, anything above it is very slow.
Got decent one though a bit old already. Xeon E5530 @ 2.4 Ghz. 12 gb of RAM and Quadro FX 1800. I think you could get similar results with some i5 or i7 with 6 gb RAM and some decent gaming card. To be honest Quadro stuff seams a bit overrated and any good gaming card will be faster. Same goes with Xeon (good as server cpu, but still not the best performance/price wise).
At 1 billion it gets slow, but it is completely managable. Still hasn't crashed, just gets slower as you add more polys, but doesn't throw you to the desktop. On 2010 I can't do undo in some scenes as it crashes it instantly, this version seams miles better.
Prophecies, I installed the trial version in other computers i have, one with Quadro, and in my brother's computer, with a gtx285, and it's all almost the same.
One of the few positive things i found is that i can load exported objects from Zbrush really fast. But as i said, i'm really disappointed with the subdiv perfomance. I can't get what Sathe gets with his iron man . Something is wrong.
The unique thing i noticed is that in a computer with ati the viewports looks totally different when i load a model. Max 2009 performs really well with my ati, as much a with a gtx285.
For me the only lag I get in the UV editor is when I close it, takes 2-3 seconds sometimes. That's only at home, at work on a worse machine with slightly out of date drivers, its fine.
I suspect a few of these things will be worked out in the coming weeks or months and the first service pack will probably tackle a lot of them. It's just the nature of the beasts we work on. There is so much variance in the hardware and endless possibilities of software conflicts that even with a wide open beta program you're going to get some issues that pop up after its released. I think a lot of non-pc gamers tend to forget what its always been like...
It's one of the reasons people like developing for closed console hardware, sure it might be limited but you know its not going to change on you. If it works on one it will work on them all. The same thing Android is facing when competing with Apple, you can have some amazing Android phones but then there is a lot of variance in the hardware.
For me right now I'm getting some weird display issues in Nitrous. Normal maps have stopped displaying in realistic mode but they show in shaded. If I start a new scene normal maps never display. IF I import a material from an old scene it works until I either min/max the viewport or I toggle the shading mode.
The weird thing is I never had UVEditor close lag or viewport display issues in the last release of the beta, which was supposedly the same as the final release...
The terrible lag i have with the uv is moving very small chunks of polygons, in element mode. Let's hope they release a good sp1, because with my models/scenes (edit poly objects + turbosmooth) Max gets totally freezed, and i need to kill the process.
Anyone tested the normal maps with simmetry?. With Max 2009 i had zero issues with that aspect.
Got decent one though a bit old already. Xeon E5530 @ 2.4 Ghz. 12 gb of RAM and Quadro FX 1800. I think you could get similar results with some i5 or i7 with 6 gb RAM and some decent gaming card. To be honest Quadro stuff seams a bit overrated and any good gaming card will be faster. Same goes with Xeon (good as server cpu, but still not the best performance/price wise).
At 1 billion it gets slow, but it is completely managable. Still hasn't crashed, just gets slower as you add more polys, but doesn't throw you to the desktop. On 2010 I can't do undo in some scenes as it crashes it instantly, this version seams miles better.
I actually have an fx1800 installed...and its been a while since I think about switching it for a SLI evga 570gtx. I do mostly vray or mental ray rendering and I thought the fx1800 was gonna cut but I dont find its worth what I payed for it... anyone having switch from a quadro to a single or dual (500+ gtx) here?
this is some kind of a parody I am so glad I am stuck in Zbrush for some time
yeah, that's one hell of a reliable app, perfectly predictable and easy to bugfix if something goes sideways. congrats on staying in such a cozy place.
Well I have gone back to 2011, mainly because the unwrap in 2012 sucks monkey balls. I could not get any sort of consistent results for non normalized uv segments. For example I had about 10 or so screws, that were all the same geometry and size. I used the exact same way to unwrap them and each one came out a different scale and shapes.
Plus my scale tool in the UV editor does not work right now either. For the life of me I can not get it to scale uniformly, even with the uniform scale tool selected. It will only scale in one direction at a time and I haven't found any way to fix it yet.
So I got frustrated with it and went back to 2011 for the time being. The only problem with this is now I have a mesh that has several pieces that are corrupted and have to be rebuilt from scratch. The mesh looks fine until I try to apply normal map or export it into zbrush.
When I apply a normal map the mirrored or symmetrical sides render out as black or much darker then the other half. If I import it into zbrush the mesh imports in as a lump of crazy triangles and nastiness.
Anyway I will sticking with 2011 for now and hoping that renderhjs comes out with a new textools for 2012 that will fix the autodesk insanity.
Plus my scale tool in the UV editor does not work right now either. For the life of me I can not get it to scale uniformly, even with the uniform scale tool selected. It will only scale in one direction at a time and I haven't found any way to fix it yet.
.
It works fine. It's just that now, you can scale in a one-axis constraint, which is fucking win. If you want a uniform scale, hold ctrl-shift. Bam. It might be alt-shift, I don't have it with me right now, but it's something along those lines. I'm loving the UV tools.
OK, I have found beyond shadow of a doubt that max installs conflict with each other, but I suppose Autodesk will still continue to deny that it's possible.
Here are lines that were changed in my 3ds2009 3dsmax.ini after installing 20120. No, this is not user error, I didn't install both programs to the same path or pulled some other dullard move. You'll note that the last section actually references my max 2012 install. I've changed the pathnames to protect the innocent.
Scenes=.\scenes
Materials=.\materiallibraries
Animations=.\sceneassets\animations
Sounds=.\sceneassets\sounds
MaxStart=.\scenes
VideoPost=.\vpost
Expressions=.\express
Archives=.\archives
Photometric=.\sceneassets\photometric
RenderAssets=.\sceneassets\renderassets
RenderPresets=.\renderpresets
Downloads=.\downloads
Import=.\import
Export=.\export
BitmapProxies=.\proxies
RenderOutput=.\renderoutput
Previews=.\previews
Images=.\sceneassets\images
AutoBackup=.\autoback
[XReferenceDirs]
Dir1=.\scenes
[BitmapDirs]
Dir1=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps
Dir2=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\glare
Dir3=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\adskMtl
Dir4=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\Noise
Dir5=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\Substance\noises
Dir6=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\Substance\textures
Dir7=X:\xxx\3ds Max 2012\Maps\fx
Dir8=.\downloads
I'm looking into whatever else they may have changed.
Sigh.. I wish Autodesk... would just stop adding new stuff.. and fix+improve old stuff. When you mess with my 2009 install, that's the last straw, Autodesk. You can screw up 2010, 2011, 2012 all you want, but leave my precious 2009 alone, you bastards.
Hopefully you have shadow copies enabled in windows. Restore a previous version should fix that.
It works fine. It's just that now, you can scale in a one-axis constraint, which is fucking win. If you want a uniform scale, hold ctrl-shift. Bam. It might be alt-shift, I don't have it with me right now, but it's something along those lines. I'm loving the UV tools.
Thanks good to know. I had tried a few key combinations to try and get but guess I didn't try enough of them. There's one issue down and about 40+ to go
Can any one of you fine gents lay out what's changed (if at all) in Viewport Canvas? Been real curious about that one.
Also, I was told that in Maya2012 they added some kind of Crazybump-like utility built in, and that some of that is in Max2012 as well. Can anyone confirm that?
I decided to switch back to d3d as nitrous is just giving me too many weird problems. Faces were showing as flipped when they weren't, no marquee selection was visible, edged faces looked weird at random times (moreso with turbosmooth on & isoline), etc.
I'm just going to wait for the next service pack or hotfixes until I switch it back.
Can anyone tell me if Skin tool is working correctly? The vertices of a model which has Skin on, cannot be edited if you have the Weight Tool pop-up open.
It's a model that was Skin rigged in Max 2011 BTW, no plugins, CAT. The Weight-Paints are fine.
Because if that is indeed a bug, OH MY FUCKING LORD! THEY JUST BROKE SKINNING IN MAX!
Really, something that was 'bugged' since Beta and wasn't patched? Really? Skin modifier? Really? A production proven tool is bugged? In one release? WIthout a day one patch? Really Autodesk, really?
What the hell is being done to Max is outrageous. It's bad enough we have Pilgway, Pixologic, Autodesk, Luxology, Huodini and a whole slew of programs companies out there each one with their own fucking way of interpreting UI's and Normal Maps as well Tool names, and we have to get our head around this issues on a yearly basis from company to fucking company without a streamlined pipeline, but now this?
I mean no harm to any employees at Autodesk, but the industry needs to grow up and realize there is such thing as 'standard', and they should start that by cleaning out their software, this is the backscene industry we're talking about, not the game industry where day-0 patch is fine.
From what I've heard Autodesk didn't have time to completely finish 2012 before it's release deadline (April 8th) and that they plan to have a service pack out much faster than usual.
I just want Nitrous and the UI to run as they stated it would and I'll be happy.
- The willingness of 90% of the user base to switch to a new version even before the first service pack is out ("I'm telling you, the 2012 version will fix EVERYTHING!")
- The stupid concept of a major release every year (I remember hearing that MS forces the same crap on its Office team. This cannot lead to a productive work environment...)
I admire Adobe for not doing this. Their new features are mostly broken (3D ...) but at least with CS5 they showed they managed to keep their program running smoothly, and even better than the previous releases.
Anyways! Max 2009 is still kicking ass, and I just dont grasp why would one need any more than that. Coupled with a few companion scripts, it is still the best. And as far as I know the license still works, so why bother with newer versions ? I dont get it, it's not even too buggy or anything.
Also, I dont get the push for fancy "engine-like" realtime effects. I mean, anyone working in the games industry most likely has access to a ... game engine! It saddens me that so much time and effort have been wasted on such things as opposed to raw performance and toolsets. Meh. All we need is a decent normalmap synching and some hooks for custom shaders. I agree with Per - I don't need max to be a fancy model viewer.
(BTW, I mean all the above from a modeling point of view. Animation/anything else might be a different story)
At one point (on a Blog) I read that they might push back Max to 28 of April...don't take my word for it, but if they indeed had that option, it would have been a better one.
- The willingness of 90% of the user base to switch to a new version even before the first service pack is out ("I told you, the 2012 version will fix EVERYTHING!")
- The stupid concept of a major release every year (I remember hearing that MS forces the same crap on its Office team. This cannot lead to a productive work environment...)
I admire Adobe for not doing this.
Anyways! Max 2009 is still kicking ass, and I just dont grasp why would one need any more than that. Coupled with a few companion scripts, it is still the best. And as far as I know the license still works, so why bother with newer versions ? I dont get it.
Because tools evolve, I'm one of those people who much prefers having PolyBoost and CAT already bundled in Max since I hate having to tackle license call-backs and root cleaning of Registries if I screw-up something.
Max 2009 is great, but it could be better, and that's why people update. Plus, using GPU is simple common sense, something which many results and tests will show (many, MANY times, GPU will outperform a CPU in any type of graphical test) so I was hoping for that in Max to be atleast a uber point, unfortunately, Nitrous is good, breaking of custom shaders, dead UV editor and broken skinning is not.
Unless I personally, can get a script, which does everything else Max 2011 does for Max 2009 (such as shift select edge for loop, and a few other streamlines commands) I simply cannot revert back willy-nilly. I would love to, and I keep a copy at home, but there is just so much I can fit on my Laptops unorganized unsophisticated keyboard.
The thing that bothers me is the current explosions of sculpting applications (ZBursh, Sculptris, 3D-Coat, Silo, even Blenders somewhat robust engine) gave Autodesk a reason to buyout Mudbox and be part of the market.
For me, Mudbox so far has ONLY improved DUE to the competition, I can sculpt on my Lap, about double the number of polies then ZB, and the texturing tools is the equivalent of beating handicapped children with a baseball bat dipped in acid when compared ease of use to 3DC and ZB in my tests.
However, I have the feeling paradoxically that Max isn't improving because they bought out all other competitions, and hacked together parts into Max for better or worse, and then realized this isn't working, so created FBX for a Universal import tool to compensate for that. Now, we have Max 2012 with it's GoZ like tool to export to other packages, I wonder why they're compensating for now.
When Pixologic (who aren't by any stretch angels, their recent updates of breaking stuff and not supporting full 64x is hackney at best lethargic waste at worst) released basic SDK for GoZ, they didn't have any reason to do it, sure it will look nice on paper, but they could very easily have created system of ZSpheres being exported as Bones, Retopology tools that did more, and even a REAL animation tool.
I'm making too much out of my post, and I'm pretty sure a few eagles here will see flaws in my argument, but the thing is Max isn't improving. I read that they were going to rewrite the core, but then was told that it would be the equivalent of NASA doing a rewrite of the entire infrastructure every 10 years, and Autodesk cannot have that delay, and now, I read again that Max 2012 was supposed to be written ground up, but they delayed that till next version or two.
Max is dieing, people will still use it, but it will become Combustion 2.0, only the old version will survive and it will be part of the 'used' pipleline, until new blood enters the industry in 10 years with their fancy new apps and not even know what Max is or was.
Or even better, how about Autodesk in 10 years, released 2009 as open source? Considering what the community did for Blender, Max will be a second free-hub for people to use, because honestly, who the (and sorry my language), who the fuck uses Max 2010 at work? 2011 I understand if you can duke it out with the performance, but c'mon! We work with these tools, not fuck around in them.
I guess I should compile a list of the (free) scripts I use in 2009. There really is no need for Polyboost or Graphite once you install MaxRetopo ; this, plus a few good solid scripts and voila, you got the most competitive polygon modeling application out there.
I am no scripter hence cannot write my own tools, but once you identify the bottlenecks of your workflow and start hunting/asking for solutions, there is always someone willing to help. And then there is also a few unexpected tricks you can stumble on while browsing scriptspot.
All I use is this, plus a few shortcuts and a custom quad menu.
Obviously it took a little while to setup (a few days) but thats the kid of time I would expect any modeler to be willing to invest...
Replies
Normal maps are also not shown well, simmetry normals have problems i didn't have with max 2009.
I'm getting too many problems with my max 2009 files. I load some models, and omg, crash, the app does not respond. I've tried the trial in another computer, and more of the same. There are some big issues with this version, fuck.
BTW: this version does not win against modo in subdivs, the perfomance is a bit higher than 2009 but that's all.
edit: i also have the same problems with the new uv. It seems like they rushed and they didn't do the work very well.
Naive question: taking in consideration how much can you perna rip out of max , is it possible to rip out at least some things from UVW to 2009 v ? Peel, relax until flat and making polies square are really cool...
Which is a shame, because the Viewport and crashing sessions have been improved considerably...if only scripts worked too as they should be...
2012 still needs a few bug fixes, but overall, I'm enjoying it. I have no issues with Unwrap UVW. I'm noticing a slight bit of lag when I collapse the unwrap modifier though. But that only lasts 2 seconds. Yes, it's not quite as quick as 2009, you're right. But it'll get there I'm sure. I recall 2009 being pretty bad at release as well, just like any release of Max since, well, ever.
I've noticed corrupted/really weird wireframes from older scenes though. That one's weird.
For example, we have currently 2 GOZ options for Max and ZB. GoZ (official thingy from Pixologic) and GoMax (custom made, even better then GoZ sometimes). Neither one works in my case, when they should work, because they're scripts.
As perna said, those always have been backwards A-OK-AY. All the way to Max 2008 usually (and even 9 sometimes pending on Author), I'm surprised many of those broke with Max 2012, especially workflow proven ones.
What surprised me even more is companies like 3d-iO already have updated certain plugins of theirs to work with Max 2012, and KY-Trails Render Effect plugin was released only a couple of days before Max 2012, and on the same day, the author released a new one for Max 2012.
@perna: All they had to do with Max 209 was update the UI graphics, allow maybe a tweak or two in simplicity on how we organize our stuff (shortcuts, bars, etc...) and done. I honestly cannot imagine what else they could have done to make it better, and yet here we are...I don't PolyBoost and I do love CAT, but plugins come and go, software cores stay forever (or long enough for you to loathe them like an abused spouse).
I've looked into GoMax problems and 3dsMax crashes if you have the Nitrous viewport on and attempt to import a mesh from Zbrush with the DirectX material!
Other times it does not crash but the mesh and max file become corrupted. Strange stuff.
Other DirectX fx materials seem to work fine with the viewport, but the one I'm using with GoMax doesn't.
EDIT: GoMax should work just fine if you switch your materials to "standart" in the GoMax options window or disabling Nitrous viewport and switching back to DirectX.
I tried a couple of time, but it keeps on showing me that it is 'importing', and once it reaches full bar, there is nothing in screen. Not even a selection and usually it crashes.
I tried with some other options, but it just shows a never ending import progress bar looping, over and over till I force quit it.
After all those, it crashes. I would like to keep Nitrous if possible for performance reasons naturally (unless I can get the same performance with DX9-Standard, but my results always showed NS being faster).
Also, what Material are you using in ZB when importing to DX or Standard? I was using Cavity, Blinn and Normal, in my tests, thought those would be the most ideal solutions...
I was referring to the material in 3dsMax. For DirectX it uses a FX material in order to display Zbrush's materials in realtime. That FX material is only used if you selected "DirectX" in the GoMax options window, and while testing GoMax with 2012... it seems to cause problems with the new viewport renderer.
But besides that problem, everything else seems to work fine.
If you could maybe write a "report" of sorts, so that I'm able to reproduce the problem, I'll be glad to look into it!
PM me if you want.
Oh! and btw... GoZ does work with 3dsMax 2012 as well! At least on my machine!
Oh, wow, I didn't realize that you were the one who wrote the Script, stupid me, d'oh!
Thanks for everything, I guess I'll have to thinker more with ZB and 2012 tonight before I write any-type-of-report to anyone and it turns out to be an issue I have. Honestly, I wouldn't be bitching this if I didn't try it atleast 10 times and get frustrated enough to uninstall Max in rage because my current project needed it.
Also, Official GoZ works for you? Holy crap, then I did do something wrong, because it crashed my 3DS and wouldn't allow to start it up again, till I deleted all the UI related files...GAH!
...unusable? I haven't had a single issue, apart from it taking 2 seconds to collapse the Unwrap modifier. I had to get used to the new placement and the use of the new tools, but apart from that, works like a charm.
I ended uninstalling that crap of software. And furthermore, i can't get the perfomance sathe gets with his older system but with his gtx285.
I tried the trial in my brothers system, a q9550 @ 3,8ghz, 8gb, zotac gtx 285@720mhz, and the perfomance is not like sathe's. nitrous is so good, that we see the same model in a different way lol.
I ended very
Where is that stability?
What makes me laugh is the installation, pretty installation yes, but the program is not pretty. They could have improved the interface a lot, there is too much space wasted. They could learn from opera and make the things really customizable.
I think your issues may be with having an ATI card. ATI has never been that great for 3D apps. I unwrapped a 500'000 poly model, and it didn't lag any more than it did in 2010. Sure, it's slower, but that's alot of polies.
And I'm not even an nVidia fanboy. It's just pretty well known that ATI isn't as stable as nVidia when it comes to this.
Also... pretty installation? What? O_o
I agree, 2009 is faster and probably the pinnacle of 3ds Max so far, but I'm definitely liking 2012. Much more so than 2010, but then again, that doesn't mean much, 2010 was just bad. :P
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showpost.php?p=6941865&postcount=221
I tried this, and it helped, however... if I unwrapped something like even a 10k tri mesh, the UV window was super laggy, not just moving pieces, but just moving around the mouse in the window.
I opened 2010, did the same test, and it was laggy when moving stuff, but not as bad, and when I moved my mouse, it was smooth as butter.
There are some obvious issues going on. Also, in 2010, I had constant update ON.
As for GoMax by Norman3D
Please note this varies since this is my first actual time of getting the Official GOZ to work as well as GoMax. Before this, it crashed and corrupted my UI.
Another variable is that I stupidly enough didn't look what I was installing, so I installed all the extras such as Algorithmic and all those other so called 'plugins'. This could have played role, since after the uninstall, more of the scripts showed signs of being stable and working. Not once did I receive an issue about the anything crashing of dieing.
Thanks Norman, much appreciated for the input.
I'm not sure what that did, but the peformance for mine stayed the same. I decided to take the Demo Solider from ZB for a spin unwrapping, and so far, at 10K, my performance in the Shaded Viewport is strong while the UV-Editor is laggy (please note the total count is 93K with the Body costing in at 32K).
Still however, it's not too bad, and infact, very manageable. I simply cannot imagine anyone wanting to unwrap a model higher then 10K in a go, and yes, I was able to repack each Unwrapped model in one map after selecting all of them and running a few auto-packing features from the tools (it was laggy and slow as hell, but nothing that wasn't workable considering it didn't require manual hand work and was more about overall relaxing, packing and normalization in the final process/stages.).
I'm always impressed when they delivered the presentation and coulnd't wait to get onhands, but when it's released, always the same feeling...
it seems like most ppl get distracted by nitrous in 2012 release. Any updates or improvements in plugins they bought earlier such as slate?
Yeah, it's by no means a fix for the problem. It seems there is definitely something very wrong with it. Even people with same hardware specs are reporting different results.
In my case disabling the option "fixed" the problem on my side. By fixing it I mean: it works just as the uvw editor does on 3dsMax 2011. You can work with meshes up to 7000 tris, anything above it is very slow.
At 1 billion it gets slow, but it is completely managable. Still hasn't crashed, just gets slower as you add more polys, but doesn't throw you to the desktop. On 2010 I can't do undo in some scenes as it crashes it instantly, this version seams miles better.
One of the few positive things i found is that i can load exported objects from Zbrush really fast. But as i said, i'm really disappointed with the subdiv perfomance. I can't get what Sathe gets with his iron man
The unique thing i noticed is that in a computer with ati the viewports looks totally different when i load a model. Max 2009 performs really well with my ati, as much a with a gtx285.
I suspect a few of these things will be worked out in the coming weeks or months and the first service pack will probably tackle a lot of them. It's just the nature of the beasts we work on. There is so much variance in the hardware and endless possibilities of software conflicts that even with a wide open beta program you're going to get some issues that pop up after its released. I think a lot of non-pc gamers tend to forget what its always been like...
It's one of the reasons people like developing for closed console hardware, sure it might be limited but you know its not going to change on you. If it works on one it will work on them all. The same thing Android is facing when competing with Apple, you can have some amazing Android phones but then there is a lot of variance in the hardware.
For me right now I'm getting some weird display issues in Nitrous. Normal maps have stopped displaying in realistic mode but they show in shaded. If I start a new scene normal maps never display. IF I import a material from an old scene it works until I either min/max the viewport or I toggle the shading mode.
The weird thing is I never had UVEditor close lag or viewport display issues in the last release of the beta, which was supposedly the same as the final release...
Anyone tested the normal maps with simmetry?. With Max 2009 i had zero issues with that aspect.
I actually have an fx1800 installed...and its been a while since I think about switching it for a SLI evga 570gtx. I do mostly vray or mental ray rendering and I thought the fx1800 was gonna cut but I dont find its worth what I payed for it... anyone having switch from a quadro to a single or dual (500+ gtx) here?
yeah, that's one hell of a reliable app, perfectly predictable and easy to bugfix if something goes sideways. congrats on staying in such a cozy place.
Plus my scale tool in the UV editor does not work right now either. For the life of me I can not get it to scale uniformly, even with the uniform scale tool selected. It will only scale in one direction at a time and I haven't found any way to fix it yet.
So I got frustrated with it and went back to 2011 for the time being. The only problem with this is now I have a mesh that has several pieces that are corrupted and have to be rebuilt from scratch. The mesh looks fine until I try to apply normal map or export it into zbrush.
When I apply a normal map the mirrored or symmetrical sides render out as black or much darker then the other half. If I import it into zbrush the mesh imports in as a lump of crazy triangles and nastiness.
Anyway I will sticking with 2011 for now and hoping that renderhjs comes out with a new textools for 2012 that will fix the autodesk insanity.
Hopefully you have shadow copies enabled in windows. Restore a previous version should fix that.
Thanks good to know. I had tried a few key combinations to try and get but guess I didn't try enough of them. There's one issue down and about 40+ to go
Also, I was told that in Maya2012 they added some kind of Crazybump-like utility built in, and that some of that is in Max2012 as well. Can anyone confirm that?
I'm just going to wait for the next service pack or hotfixes until I switch it back.
NO FUCKING WAY!
Can anyone tell me if Skin tool is working correctly? The vertices of a model which has Skin on, cannot be edited if you have the Weight Tool pop-up open.
It's a model that was Skin rigged in Max 2011 BTW, no plugins, CAT. The Weight-Paints are fine.
Because if that is indeed a bug, OH MY FUCKING LORD! THEY JUST BROKE SKINNING IN MAX!
EDIT:
What the fuck is this? http://area.autodesk.com/forum/autodesk-3ds-max/autodesk-3ds-max--3ds-max-design-2012/adjusting-skin-weights-in-max-2012/
Really, something that was 'bugged' since Beta and wasn't patched? Really? Skin modifier? Really? A production proven tool is bugged? In one release? WIthout a day one patch? Really Autodesk, really?
What the hell is being done to Max is outrageous. It's bad enough we have Pilgway, Pixologic, Autodesk, Luxology, Huodini and a whole slew of programs companies out there each one with their own fucking way of interpreting UI's and Normal Maps as well Tool names, and we have to get our head around this issues on a yearly basis from company to fucking company without a streamlined pipeline, but now this?
I mean no harm to any employees at Autodesk, but the industry needs to grow up and realize there is such thing as 'standard', and they should start that by cleaning out their software, this is the backscene industry we're talking about, not the game industry where day-0 patch is fine.
I just want Nitrous and the UI to run as they stated it would and I'll be happy.
- The willingness of 90% of the user base to switch to a new version even before the first service pack is out ("I'm telling you, the 2012 version will fix EVERYTHING!")
- The stupid concept of a major release every year (I remember hearing that MS forces the same crap on its Office team. This cannot lead to a productive work environment...)
I admire Adobe for not doing this. Their new features are mostly broken (3D ...) but at least with CS5 they showed they managed to keep their program running smoothly, and even better than the previous releases.
Anyways! Max 2009 is still kicking ass, and I just dont grasp why would one need any more than that. Coupled with a few companion scripts, it is still the best. And as far as I know the license still works, so why bother with newer versions ? I dont get it, it's not even too buggy or anything.
Also, I dont get the push for fancy "engine-like" realtime effects. I mean, anyone working in the games industry most likely has access to a ... game engine! It saddens me that so much time and effort have been wasted on such things as opposed to raw performance and toolsets. Meh. All we need is a decent normalmap synching and some hooks for custom shaders. I agree with Per - I don't need max to be a fancy model viewer.
(BTW, I mean all the above from a modeling point of view. Animation/anything else might be a different story)
EDIT:
Because tools evolve, I'm one of those people who much prefers having PolyBoost and CAT already bundled in Max since I hate having to tackle license call-backs and root cleaning of Registries if I screw-up something.
Max 2009 is great, but it could be better, and that's why people update. Plus, using GPU is simple common sense, something which many results and tests will show (many, MANY times, GPU will outperform a CPU in any type of graphical test) so I was hoping for that in Max to be atleast a uber point, unfortunately, Nitrous is good, breaking of custom shaders, dead UV editor and broken skinning is not.
Unless I personally, can get a script, which does everything else Max 2011 does for Max 2009 (such as shift select edge for loop, and a few other streamlines commands) I simply cannot revert back willy-nilly. I would love to, and I keep a copy at home, but there is just so much I can fit on my Laptops unorganized unsophisticated keyboard.
The thing that bothers me is the current explosions of sculpting applications (ZBursh, Sculptris, 3D-Coat, Silo, even Blenders somewhat robust engine) gave Autodesk a reason to buyout Mudbox and be part of the market.
For me, Mudbox so far has ONLY improved DUE to the competition, I can sculpt on my Lap, about double the number of polies then ZB, and the texturing tools is the equivalent of beating handicapped children with a baseball bat dipped in acid when compared ease of use to 3DC and ZB in my tests.
However, I have the feeling paradoxically that Max isn't improving because they bought out all other competitions, and hacked together parts into Max for better or worse, and then realized this isn't working, so created FBX for a Universal import tool to compensate for that. Now, we have Max 2012 with it's GoZ like tool to export to other packages, I wonder why they're compensating for now.
When Pixologic (who aren't by any stretch angels, their recent updates of breaking stuff and not supporting full 64x is hackney at best lethargic waste at worst) released basic SDK for GoZ, they didn't have any reason to do it, sure it will look nice on paper, but they could very easily have created system of ZSpheres being exported as Bones, Retopology tools that did more, and even a REAL animation tool.
I'm making too much out of my post, and I'm pretty sure a few eagles here will see flaws in my argument, but the thing is Max isn't improving. I read that they were going to rewrite the core, but then was told that it would be the equivalent of NASA doing a rewrite of the entire infrastructure every 10 years, and Autodesk cannot have that delay, and now, I read again that Max 2012 was supposed to be written ground up, but they delayed that till next version or two.
Max is dieing, people will still use it, but it will become Combustion 2.0, only the old version will survive and it will be part of the 'used' pipleline, until new blood enters the industry in 10 years with their fancy new apps and not even know what Max is or was.
Or even better, how about Autodesk in 10 years, released 2009 as open source? Considering what the community did for Blender, Max will be a second free-hub for people to use, because honestly, who the (and sorry my language), who the fuck uses Max 2010 at work? 2011 I understand if you can duke it out with the performance, but c'mon! We work with these tools, not fuck around in them.
I am no scripter hence cannot write my own tools, but once you identify the bottlenecks of your workflow and start hunting/asking for solutions, there is always someone willing to help. And then there is also a few unexpected tricks you can stumble on while browsing scriptspot.
All I use is this, plus a few shortcuts and a custom quad menu.
Obviously it took a little while to setup (a few days) but thats the kid of time I would expect any modeler to be willing to invest...
Here's how to built a custom interface in Visual Maxscript :
http://vimeo.com/15997907