autocad solids in max

[woz]

Hi all,

 

I recently modeled a building in autocad by extruding polylines then exporting as a .3ds - big mistake i think! When i start applying materials some solids are inward facing, most annoying, and i tried some tricks such as making the materials 2 sided but that seemed to lead to other problems such as a refusal to respond to any lighting.

 

Although at the moment remodeling everything as 3d faces or using line thicknesses seems the way to go I was wondering if anyone has some tricks up their sleeves that can help me salvage all the work I have already done?

Also, can I somehow turn my solids into a series of 3d faces? Im not too sure how it all works here, but I tried exploding the whole thing and I think i just ended up with alot of 3d regions (diff to faces?) and when i tried exporting into max again I just ended up with the same result.

[Fernando Lino]

one solution could be ...breaking up the model in pieces

with ADT you can convert the solids in 3dfaces...

before to break the model in peaces...try to explode the object in elements in 3ds Max...it always works for me!!!

 

Good Luck!!!!

[muzzy]

When you are importing DWG file to max, check unify normals button. That should solve the problem.

 

If you still have the problem, assign a normal modifier to object ( in max), check unify normals option. and play with flip normals.

 

I hope it works

[William Alexander]

I recently modeled a building in autocad by extruding polylines then exporting as a .3ds - big mistake i think! When i start applying materials some solids are inward facing, most annoying, and i tried some tricks such as making the materials 2 sided but that seemed to lead to other problems such as a refusal to respond to any lighting.

 

woz,

 

I would be assuming you are using a max version that can't import or open dwg. Been a viz user and not familar with max5 and down, although 5 & viz 3 are not very good at importing and generating correct normals from acad.

 

Use the flip normal in mesh or polygon editing to change the backfacing surfaces.

 

The areas that refuse to respond to light may have coplaner faces, a common difficulty with solids modeling in autocad then in max. Working the 3ds export weld settings may help. Usally when there are touching solids the normal intepretaion can be off, or if of the same layer object the vertices do not line up (solid "a" to "b") and all sorts of funky things happen to, normals, surface deviations, smoothing & coplaner faces. It's all about connecting the dots (vertices/endpoints) to make faces.

 

Try another format, however more often than not, you do need to "clean" the model.

 

 

rgrds

WDA

[trhoads]

If I understand your problem, I think I have a solution. Instead of exporting your AutoCAD drawing as a .3ds file, try linking the .dwg file to VIZ. I don't know which version you are in, but linking always works for me. But because it is an AutoCAD model, VIZ does not recognize which face of a solid is outward facing. In your render dialog, check "Force 2 Sided", if that option is still in newer version. I am in VIZ 3i, and it is there. This tells VIZ to look at both sides of faces for 3d solids. This always solves that problem for me. Hope that helps a little.