Batching in max? any ideas

[kalografik]

I'm in big archiviz project and I have to manipulate and change materials in all xrefs all the time so I'm wondering is there some kind of batching tools to:
-open repeatedly all the max files from a folder
-update all scene materials from ready material library (or some other scripted action)
-save and open next from the folder

for example there is a script for photoshop for batch merging in layers all the files from a folder

any ideas?

[instinct]

it is very well possible to script that. it is so specific tho that i seriously doubt that there is a ready made script for that.

Regards,
Thorsten

[muzzy]

I wish materials can be instanced material library with xrefs. That will be great.

[kalografik]

instinct: I found this in MAX Help

3dsmax.exe -q -mi -U MAXScript \\server1\folder\myScript.ms \\server2\folder\file.max - for command line batching to open files and start a script,

but I cannot find how to script the "update materials button" in "Map Browser"
Listener don't hear those button at all and in the maxscript help I succeed to find just a command to assing a specific material from specific library to specific object which is little bit nonsense command for me

Lele help please!

muzzy: We would expect this functionality may be in MAX R15sp2 or may be later. Since max 3, when I started with MAX the mapBrowser and xrefscene stays poor and unchanged.

...But I'm waiting. There's no time to change the software at my age.

[instinct]

well materials can be XRefMaterials. just not based on a matlib. But if you instance the material into all files from one basefile then you can indeed get to "one button changes all files".

I wouldnt suggest doing it via a commandline-batch. I would do it completely within max. You can use maxscript to enumerate files in a dir, open each, do something, save etc. Did that for mass changig scene-scale for example.

Thorsten

[kalografik]

[quote="instinct"]well materials can be XRefMaterials. just not based on a matlib. But if you instance the material into all files from one basefile then you can indeed get to "one button changes all files".

Thank you Thorsten. That's what I needed. Never payed attention to the "xref material" in the list of the mat/map browser.
Be happy

[studioDIM]

Err, yes, some form of interface could be scripted for good.
The only thing is that as Thorsten said, it can be very specific.
Not so much as for filenames and folder structure, but for the materials assignment and naming conventions used.
I suppose that too could be scripted to be open to the user...
If anyone wants to send me a scene with the required basic elements, I might give it a go, why not...
Did something similar a long while back to create matted planes from a folder with rgb and matte AVIs inside...

Lele

[kalografik]

Hi Lele.
The suggested from Thorsten workflow with xrefed materials to an external max file really works for me. It's pretty covenient to rearange once all the xrefed scenes to get their materials from the separate "matlib" max file, and to change just those file when needed.

Thank you for the attention and don't waste time for this.

Of coarse if you interested in creating such batching tool I'll be the first happy user. It would allow us to start some simple custom scripts over a folder with max files if such user friendly batcher exist. It can be further developed to have some useful "buttons" to make some commonly useful operations, such an extract, merge and update scene materials from and to matlibs, xrefering all the files from folder to new one and so on. I think it could even become commersial.

Regards
George T.