Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Hey folks! I'm fairly new to 3DS max (any 3D package really), and I'm looking to start doing architectural imagery for a mate who's a drafts person. I've been avidly referring to the '3DS Max 2010 Bilble' and still am learning slowly. I apologize in advanced if this is a fairly simple question that's wasting your timel, but I haven't been able to locate the answer anywhere! My query is: Obviously the scale tool it is based on percentages, instead of using units. How does one manually type in measurements (x,y,z) of an object to bring it to the required size. (as an absolute If this sort of functionality isn't available at all through 3DS max's package, could you possibly reccomend a plug-in that might enable this. Thanks a lot in advance! Nathan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest FlaviusC Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 I assume you want to keep the object's ratio the same,therefore you will only change one value (either x,y,z) that means using uniform scale. I don't know if you can scale by using units,but I'll tell you one thing,and the way to cheat. Let's say you have a car, modeled really well,with details ,with correct ratio and everything, but your car is 0,5 m long.Obviously that's the length of a toy car,and not a real one. So ,you are probably now wondering how to you insert the correct value of 4 m,or whatever the length of the car is. Cheat Just make a box with length= 4 m, align the car to it,and uniform scale the car until the car fits perfectly in the box. You will be 95% accurate or something like that. Bear in mind that 3ds max does NOT have the accuracy of auto cad simply because it doesn't need it. Even in Arch viz, +-3 cm won't matter,because no one will ever notice that a room for example has 5,05 m instead of 5 m. so as simple as that..make a box with the desired dimension and uniform scale whatever you want until it fits into that box. At least that's the way I'm doing these things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Author Share Posted February 4, 2010 You Sir, speak sense! Thank you! That's somethin' I'll use for the meantime, however an accurate alternative would be awesome (even if it's just to help me sleep at night ) I found it sort of bizzare that 'Select and Move' tool had that sort of accuracy but the scale tool didn't. Ah well, I s'pose those are the breaks. Thanks again, and if anyone else has any other suggestions I'd be mighty keen to read them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Author Share Posted February 4, 2010 Also! (sorry to bump) But I was wondering if you folks know of a tool that accurately measures the distance between two elements. (i.e between two parallel edges within a model). I've seen the tape measure, but I was sort've going for something that worked like "Click line 1, click line 2" and presto! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonRashid Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Select Scale. Go to edit on the top bar and you should see transform type in. This will allow you to enter numerical values for your uniform or non-uniform scales Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Author Share Posted February 4, 2010 Select Scale. Go to edit on the top bar and you should see transform type in. This will allow you to enter numerical values for your uniform or non-uniform scales Oh right! Well on the scene I'm working on, that wouldn't work properly under the 'Absolute:local' section (the one I'd want) all fields have an initial value of "9999.999". Annnny ideas as to what I've done to cause this? I opened another file I was working on earlier and it worked fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest FlaviusC Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 use the tape tool with vertex snapping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Author Share Posted February 4, 2010 use the tape tool with vertex snapping. Okie dokie, I'll look into snapping as it's something I've fiddled with but not been able to get it working favourably yet. I'll consult the bible. Thanks again! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonRashid Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 If your values are crazy like that. Go to Utilities and Reset Xform. You will then have to collapse the stack. This should reset your scales to 1,1,1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poika Posted February 4, 2010 Author Share Posted February 4, 2010 If your values are crazy like that. Go to Utilities and Reset Xform. You will then have to collapse the stack. This should reset your scales to 1,1,1 Ok, thanks for that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbysalz Posted December 8, 2010 Share Posted December 8, 2010 Select Scale. Go to edit on the top bar and you should see transform type in. This will allow you to enter numerical values for your uniform or non-uniform scales This only lets me input percentages for scaling, not numerical units (ie. 2m tall for the X-axis) . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Thomas Posted December 8, 2010 Share Posted December 8, 2010 Why not just model it to the correct size in the first place? Why the need to scale? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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