The Area

Animation Store

2012-05-24T10:38:17+02:00

This is really cool : http://autodesk.mixamo.com Been using Mixamo for a little while but I can bring character right into my scene and preview in viewer. Is anyone else using this? Very Exciting!

Max 9/RPC's/mr/Daylight - Does it work?

2012-05-24T06:37:34+02:00

I'm using Max 9 and have always used the scanline renderer. I'm now learning mental ray (using the daylight system) and find that my RPC content renders as solid planes. Is there something I need to do to fix this, or does the plug-in not work under these settings? Thanks, NHAnimator

Animation Playback Pauses Randomly

2012-05-21T04:43:05+02:00

Hey there, first time posting and I really need some help debugging this problem. When I play back an animation in 3d Max 9 sp2 it randomly pauses. The play button is still depressed and it looks like it's still playing [areas of the UI are sort of flickering like it's updating the window] but it just sits there. If I hit stop it just stops right on that frame or the frame before. I can still move the mouse around and buttons react to my mouse over. If I leave it "playing" it seems to pause for ~5 seconds and then start up again from another point in the animation, I'm guessing 5 seconds ahead of where it stopped? It does this pretty much constantly. I am running in DX9, windows XP, up to date drivers, nvidia 7700 graphics card... I am at a complete loss, I thought the service pack would fix it but it didn't. The real tricky thing is that this also happened in Max 8. I recently reformatted my computer, installed Photoshop and Max 8 and the stuttering started. It's obviously something with my computer but don't know what it is. I figured I'd post it in the Max 9 forum because that's what I use now. Any help or referral some place else is GREATLY appreciated. Thank you. Eric

Problem: Cannot see my objects in any viewport!

2012-05-17T12:12:30+02:00

When I first create an object, let's say a standard cube, I can see it fine. As soon as I deselect the object, it disappears. I can still select the object, but it is completely invisible. I can see the bounding box/selection box around it. If I make it an editable mesh or poly and go into sub-object mode, I can see the vertices and when I select polys, they highlight red and I can then see them. Leaving sub-object mode, I cannot see them anymore. If I do a reset Xform, I can see the object again, until I select it, then it disappears again. Did I hit some sort of hotkey to make this happen? I have re-installed 3 times... 3ds Max 9 with SP2 on Windows Vista

Please need help reinstalling 3dsmax-2008

2012-05-15T13:37:20+02:00

Somehow my 3dsmax have corrupted and I try to reinstalled and didn’t fix, y try to clean all the registers, rebooted, reinstalled and steel the same,…it can run. My question, is there a way to uninstall the 3dsmax and at the same time clean all the registers?... Please explain step how can I do. Thanks in advance.

Tutorial files on Install DVD . . . are they there?

2012-05-01T15:53:37+02:00

In the past there really wasn't a need for me to use the tutorials on the Max Installation Discs. However, the past few discs, as tutorials they have a series of Max files that show the progression of the file. This is in my mind, dumb. There is no real documentation showing what was done between the files. Max has way too many buttons and settings for me to run around and find what was changed; it may be one thing or it may be several. I will admit I may be overlooking something, but I have searched the entire install DVD for any .pdf or .chm files . . . nothing dealing with what I need, most deal with Vault5. In case you are interested, I am trying to loop the [i]runloop.bip[/i] found on the DVD. I have tried the motion mixer (not really sure what I'm doing), but I am not really familiar with character animation at all. My problem is looping the animation so the animation continues after the first cycle. Currently, I can get it to loop, but the position continues to jump back to its starting point. I have tried the out-of-range keys, but to no avail. Help with either of these, the DVD tutorials or how to actually do what I'm trying to do would be much appreciated. Thank you much

Can't open file or file has no audio streams

2012-04-26T15:32:23+02:00

Im using 3D Max 7 on XP and have recently moved to a different PC since the old one died [i]quad core, xp[/i] . Max otherwise seems to be behaving fine but when I come to add a sound to a scene under [i]Track View - sound - properties[/i] get the error message: [i]can't open file or file has no audio streams[/i] It displays the WAV in trackview though - you can clearly see the spikes of the audio stream on the the timeline. Its just theres no sound coming out when you scrub the timeline, preview or render. Nothing. The WAV file plays fine in all other windows programs, and is an uncompressed WAV. Ive tried WAV files that have worked in the past, but they now don't. I thought it may be an audio codec issue, but surely the WAV wouldnt play in any program if that was the case? Ive Googled it and see that the problem has existed for other user going back some years, but I cannot see a solution. Ive lipsynched sound and animation like this hundreds of times before on the previous computer without problem. Im frankly baffled.

3ds Max r3.1 on Windows 7?

2012-04-14T02:41:02+02:00

Does Max 3.1 run on Windows 7, or has anyone tried it? Currently running 3.1 on one machine with XP and another with Win2k. Considering a System/OS upgrade, looking for a 64 bit system that actually has a printer port for the hardware dongles for Max 3.1. May have to go with a PCI LPT1 card on that. Yes, still kickin' it with Max 3.1, and 2010. Steve

3ds Max 7 and Windows Vista

2012-04-10T04:44:36+02:00

I recently installed my copy of 3ds Max 7 onto my new laptop, which is running Windows Vista. I am having several problems with it that I did not have on my old laptop running Windows XP. The 3 main issues are: 1. The viewport blanks out quite regularly, but refreshes when I click on an object within the scene. 2. My right mouse button and middle mouse button/wheel do not always function correctly, especially when trying to use them to zoom, rotate, and pan the viewport. 3. Often when exiting Max, I get an error message and am asked if I want to save a backup of the scene. Are these known issues with 3ds Max 7 running on Vista? Or could it be other problems with my computer? I suspect that the viewport issue has to do with my video card, which is an NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS. I downloaded and installed an updated driver for the video card, but the problem persists. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

3ds Max 2008 - 'Unregistered' and 000 Serial - Help please.

2012-03-26T09:44:24+02:00

Just installed 3ds Max 2008 on Win 7 Ultimate x64. First installation of the software on a clean OS. I think there was a problem when it came to registering in that although I am an admin on this machine I didn't actually run Max as admin (right click 'run as admin') and although it registered and activated successfully Windows bleeped and complained right near the end - something about being unable to write registry data as not an Admin (thanks Windows...). Never the less Max reported that it had been successfully registered. However when I load Max it says 'Unregistered Version' at the top and when looking at 'About Max' it gives a 000000 serial number. License is permanent with indefinite expiration date so technically I shouldn't have any problems using it, but something's obviously not quite right either... I do have the correct activation/serial codes and had it not been for that tiny Windows error message and noticing that it said 'Unregistered Version' at the top I wouldn't know I had a problem (though I haven't actually been using Max really yet as only just installed it!). I did have to change the computer's date back to 2008 to get it to run the activation properly (apparently a Max 2008 issue) but don't think that has anything to do with it, am pretty certain it was that Admin problem. So far I don't seem to have any issues with the software, but as I say clearly it shouldn't be displaying as unregistered and without a serial key... Any thoughts on how to fix this? I've not tried anything yet as wanted to check here first. Thanks in advance for your thoughts. Robert