Hi folks.

I downloaded an amazing truck scene from volunteer graphics, and am having a little trouble getting the materials working properly.

It's a .3DS file, and as I'm using Max 7 (with Brazil), I opened it with the Import command, so far so good right?

Wrong.

It opens fine, and looks lovely, but when I come to render I'm getting results like this...



The materials for the truck seem to be there in spirit at least, when I open the material editor I cant find them, but if I click on the 'Standard' button in the material editor and select 'Scene' they are all there, nicely organised - with what appears to be designations as to which parts they go on (there is something like 100 seperate materials listed, so I'm sure you can appreciate going through them one at a time is a bit much).

Presumably I'm missing something simple, such as a way of applying these materials to the model - but I'm at a bit of a loss

Little help?

Try downloading the scene and not the .3ds file.

you can try select the truck,than go rendering menu/material/map browser,than hit M and drag drop into it,than select thr right textures

Quote from LineR32 :

Try downloading the scene and not the .3ds file.

Not sure what you're getting at here....

I assumed that the .3ds file was the scene - it's the only thing avaliable to download. It says it's for Max 8, but includes the .3ds (I assume for the purposes of importing into older versions).

Is that where the problem lies?

Or am I being a retard and missing your point entirely?

I have 2 or 3 versions of that truck scene, 1 of them is a box with the basic shape of the truck and trailer. The scene I have works with MAX 7, it isn't the most up to date version, but it has a NASCAR stocker on the tailgate lift.

I can upload it here if you want?

Quote from drew555 :

...when I open the material editor I cant find them, but if I click on the 'Standard' button in the material editor and select 'Scene' they are all there, nicely organised - with what appears to be designations as to which parts they go on (there is something like 100 seperate materials listed, so I'm sure you can appreciate going through them one at a time is a bit much)...

You don't see it in the material editor doesn't mean the materials not there. The material editor is just like a paint palette that you can recall any material on the slot to work on, and they kept in the memory. The maximum slots you can have is 16. It doesn't mean that you can only have 16 materials in the scene. I have worked in a scene with hundreds of materials. they don't have to all show up in the material editor.
When you start up a new file in max. The material editor is all blank(because no materials has created), then when you import a .3ds object to your scene, it doesn't automatically fill the material editor slots with its materials. You will have to highlight a free/new slot, then recall the selected object's material. One easy way is to use the eyedropper icon to select the material from the object. Any problems, please refer to the 3ds max manual. It is very clearly show you how to select materials.

Yeah do so LineR32 I would like to have that scene in .3ds format because then I can import it into Blender

Quote from LineR32 :

I have 2 or 3 versions of that truck scene, 1 of them is a box with the basic shape of the truck and trailer. The scene I have works with MAX 7, it isn't the most up to date version, but it has a NASCAR stocker on the tailgate lift.

I can upload it here if you want?

That would be great... at least it would ensure I'm using the right thing.

Quote from samyip :

You don't see it in the material editor doesn't mean the materials not there. The material editor is just like a paint palette that you can recall any material on the slot to work on, and they kept in the memory. The maximum slots you can have is 16. It doesn't mean that you can only have 16 materials in the scene. I have worked in a scene with hundreds of materials. they don't have to all show up in the material editor.
When you start up a new file in max. The material editor is all blank(because no materials has created), then when you import a .3ds object to your scene, it doesn't automatically fill the material editor slots with its materials. You will have to highlight a free/new slot, then recall the selected object's material. One easy way is to use the eyedropper icon to select the material from the object. Any problems, please refer to the 3ds max manual. It is very clearly show you how to select materials.

Selecting the materials and where they go wasn't the issue really (the materials are all there, and labelled with where they go in these brackets>> [ ] ), it was the sheer number of materials there to be allocated. I suppose I was kinda hoping that I'd missed something simple, or there was a quick way of assigning them to all the right places at once.

Oh well, I'll have a bash with Liner's version and see if I have anymore luck

You need to use a Multi-Sub material first, with standard ones 'inside' that.

Quote from drew555 :

Selecting the materials and where they go wasn't the issue really (the materials are all there, and labelled with where they go in these brackets>> [ ] ), it was the sheer number of materials there to be allocated. I suppose I was kinda hoping that I'd missed something simple, or there was a quick way of assigning them to all the right places at once.

If all the materials are in the scene assigned to the objects, than what is the problem? If it is the skin of the truck you want to edit, just use the eyedropper icon from the material editor to select the truck's body. Then the skin material of the truck will come up on the slot for you to edit.

just a post a picture of your material editor it will be easier for all of us