I don't know if this will help or not... I don't use 3D Studio Max. I'm using Lightwave, Rhino and a little Maya. I've worked with importing quite a few .obj and .3ds files into bryce and have found the following to be true: - The larger the file size the more likely Bryce is to screw up importing it. Therefore, I export individual parts of the model as separate files from the software inwhich it was originally created. The trick is to first create a simple box around your entire model and to include it with every part of the model you export. By including the box your ensure that every part of the model will import into Bryce in the proper place and at the proper size. Then I just delete the boxes in Bryce. - I prefer using .obj files simply because it eliminates the need to mess with smoothing the model in Bryce. However, .obj files are usually larger then .3ds files; so if file size becomes critical I will use .3ds instead of .obj.