OK... Thanks to Mianiak, Kyle, Woochoo and all who answered questions about this...
I finally got all 32 miles of track, terrain, and the butt-loads of other objects comprising my track into 3dsMax. It took about 40 hours.
Since my track is ~10 times longer than most (~ twice as long as Nordschleife), I'm having to be creative to make it manageable. [Trying to even move the viewport 'camera' is sometimes not possible with everything displayed.]
So this morning, I continue compartmentalizing things....
--"Layers" for Track, Terrain, Structures, Vegetation, Walls, People, etc....(for quick visibility setting)
--"Groups" for grouping of small pieces....(managability)
-- "Containers" (new to Max 2010), as my track is split into 26 sections...(for SPEED)...
From what I read, and the little bit of testing I've done, "Containers" are cool...
I'll be keeping my track in 26 sections that are ~ a mile long (as I had it in BTB). Each section will be in a container. These containers (and every object in them) can be UNLOADED from the scene... while you are working on it.
So... If you have a huge model like mine, it becomes difficult to even move it on the screen, and everything in MAX bogs down. Even when you "Hide" everything but a mile or so of track, terrain, plants, walls, & buildings, you are still "lugging around" this huge model in memory, so everything you do is slowed down. [Even "Save" is particularly painful.... ~20 loooong seconds]
With 'containers', you can unload everything you aren't working on in the scene to files .. NNNN.maxc One per container (track section), which then live on the disk. In the Max help files, containers are also shown to be usefull in collaborative work (for obvious reasons).
Also, with only a single container open (when track is saved and shut down Max), my track loads about 25 Times Faster (accordingly... 'save' is also that much quicker..). [So far, I have only tested this with 2 containers... one huge, one small... but will make the rest of them today.]
Appearently, there is a container setting (Override Object Properties or something like that) which allows you to -- for instance -- have only one (track section) container of many open, and use the "Layers" to make visible what (of the single track section) you want displayed (ie.. Track, Terrain, etc..). So, even though most of the objects in those Layers are in containers that are not even loaded into memory, you can still use "Layers" to control the visibility of the container(s) you have open.
I'll start dividing the track up in this manner today, and let you know how it goes.
Finally... a precise toolset to work with.... (!) ..
Thanks again for all the help getting it into Max....
I finally got all 32 miles of track, terrain, and the butt-loads of other objects comprising my track into 3dsMax. It took about 40 hours.
Since my track is ~10 times longer than most (~ twice as long as Nordschleife), I'm having to be creative to make it manageable. [Trying to even move the viewport 'camera' is sometimes not possible with everything displayed.]
So this morning, I continue compartmentalizing things....
--"Layers" for Track, Terrain, Structures, Vegetation, Walls, People, etc....(for quick visibility setting)
--"Groups" for grouping of small pieces....(managability)
-- "Containers" (new to Max 2010), as my track is split into 26 sections...(for SPEED)...
From what I read, and the little bit of testing I've done, "Containers" are cool...
I'll be keeping my track in 26 sections that are ~ a mile long (as I had it in BTB). Each section will be in a container. These containers (and every object in them) can be UNLOADED from the scene... while you are working on it.
So... If you have a huge model like mine, it becomes difficult to even move it on the screen, and everything in MAX bogs down. Even when you "Hide" everything but a mile or so of track, terrain, plants, walls, & buildings, you are still "lugging around" this huge model in memory, so everything you do is slowed down. [Even "Save" is particularly painful.... ~20 loooong seconds]
With 'containers', you can unload everything you aren't working on in the scene to files .. NNNN.maxc One per container (track section), which then live on the disk. In the Max help files, containers are also shown to be usefull in collaborative work (for obvious reasons).
Also, with only a single container open (when track is saved and shut down Max), my track loads about 25 Times Faster (accordingly... 'save' is also that much quicker..). [So far, I have only tested this with 2 containers... one huge, one small... but will make the rest of them today.]
Appearently, there is a container setting (Override Object Properties or something like that) which allows you to -- for instance -- have only one (track section) container of many open, and use the "Layers" to make visible what (of the single track section) you want displayed (ie.. Track, Terrain, etc..). So, even though most of the objects in those Layers are in containers that are not even loaded into memory, you can still use "Layers" to control the visibility of the container(s) you have open.
I'll start dividing the track up in this manner today, and let you know how it goes.
Finally... a precise toolset to work with.... (!) ..
Thanks again for all the help getting it into Max....