thanks guys for your answers, so far yes, baking the light into the diffuse. found lots of vig posts in all the different 3d forums when i searched for this subject ! :) i gotta say i'm not against scripts or plugins - so if anyone has something else than this NEON-script - let me know :D this whole mental ray stuff is not…
The best and fastest way I've found without using plug-ins or scripts, is to use Mental Ray. http://www.quality3dmodels.com/Tutorials/3dsmax/neonlight/neonglow.html http://www.freeitsolutions.com/3ds/viewTutorial.aspx?id=202
while this looks like the ideal solution it somehow doesn't want to install the script. get an error everytime i put the mzp into max. maybe it's too old, last release was 2002 if i read that correctly :/