I am just running into some problems with the material editor and Vue importing. Example: Import an object that let's say has 10 separate groups, and within each group there are 3 subgroups in each one, Vue is not importing all of the groups, leaves some out, looks kind of random. Now this has to do with just a wavefront object. Now, we get to the material editor, when I go to the summary of material used with an wavefront object, that was exported out of Poser, some materials I can change and some I can't, it says no material was assigned and it is going to close the editor and destroy material....also while in the editor, I clicked on scale of one of the materials and it deleted it. Can anyone shed some light on this....should I down load that update for these fixes or is the update still taboo. Sharen

Yes..taboo. Bill

Okay Bill, what do I do, report this to Vue or I am doing something wrong?

Do you have a sample object that has this behaviour we could download and look at ?

Yes, I do. I can email it to you if you just tell me where. Will you be looking into the material aspect also as well as missing groups? Sharen

I dunno Sharen...so many things happened that I got lost when I was doing three images for the DAZ3d contest. All I remember was that I took "Headache" pain killer tablets. I know that the Material Editor is still not perfect and this depend on what you are working on...it can be the model, it can be the format of the file you import...etc. In Win2K, it sort of quit on you with Bill Gate telling you that Win2K encounter a blahhh..blahh.. I encounter funny things like, for example, if you give a basic colour the first time to an imported poser file (say you wanna change the texture), you would see the model does not change to the basic colour you just applied and have to repeat the second time, which usually works. Its good that if we know exactly or can simulate the effect before giving it to e-on, otherwise, it may be just our system or other stuff we have running that is disturbing Vue 4.02.

Sharen, I'm using the Vue 4.02b patch, and everything seems fine so far. I've also seen the same sort of thing as you say. Don't know what causes it, but something does, and it's not really random. I have one Poser character which will never import with the head, as a PZ3, but as a .obj, it does. shrug I also have a hair model which will never import asa part of any PZ3, ever...though it will as a .obj..... I have to say, I don't understand that "no material" message either, and yes, I've seen it too. :/

The new 4.02b is good. It resolves the problems that were originally being had with the update. So it's not taboo any longer. The material problems you're describing here sound similar to what Bloodsong reported having 30-some materials simply vanish out of his scene. That, too, was with Poser imports. Not enough details to say it's exactly the same problem, but it sounds similar enough to make me very suspicious about it. :/

Oh BTW, has anybody know why I can't see an object place underwater with the camera place in a cube halfway submerge in water. Bryce 5 does that all right so is Vue 2 (in one of his tutorial). I tried with Vue 3 once but can't remember if I had any success. Bill

if you can export your model as 3DS, try this one... I had problems importing something I made in Lightwave and then exported as Wavefront obj... somehow I was missing one surface after importing. But with Lightwave 5 or 3DS format, everything was perfect. Was a simple model... just a picture freame with 3 surfaces in Lightwave

Another thing, Sharen, is you don't have to import it all at the same time. In File>Options, uncheck the "resize and center on import" box and then you can import your trouble body parts, or whatever as .obj separately from the rest of the scene. They'll fall perfectly into place, assuming you haven't moved any of the objects in Vue, then you can group them with their appropriate objects, and move everything as you wish. There's always a way around everyhing, and I can say that I never have any trouble importing anything, if I wan to badly enough. Sometimes you have to work around certain things tjhough, such as converting from one format to another, etc... Vue has problems with certain DXF formats, probably the older ones, I guess, or maybe the newer ones... shrug ..I have no idea what's what in DXF Land. Also, Lightwave models more recent than version 5.6 can't be imported into Vue, but converting it to a version 5.6 .lwo works. Oh well, I'm rambling now... :)

Oh one other thing...If you have textures on something in Poser, don't even think about exporting as .3DS, unless you're ready to retexture everything in Vue, and I don't even know if that works at all anyway. Curious Labs royally screwed up their 3DS export.. I mean in a real bad sort of way.....

I agreed with Mike with 3ds export from Poser...its very unpredictable. Even exporting a Poser file and having it import into Vue 4, rotating or twisting...etc..the model gets broken up or seperated with gaps even if they are grouped. This likely has to do with how the model is boned or exported.

I will try all your suggestions to see if there is a way around it. Thanks for your help. Sharen

Here's an example, Sharen: Say you have a Poser figure. You can export half of the body as .obj, by selecting the body parts in the hierarchy window which comes up in Poser. Then, separately export the other half of the body. Then open Vue, make sure "resize and center..." is UNchecked, first, and import the first half. Then, without moving anything, import the second half. The body parts will fit together perfeclty once it's all imported, and that's not limited only to body parts, either. Like, say a Poser character is holding something...anything and everything will import into Vue in it's identical relative position as it had when it was exported from Poser. But,you cannot mix the 3DS format with the .obj format. For that matter, i don't think you can do it with the 3DS frormat at all.... Incidentally, you can do the same thing with the PZ3 import, only instead of having an export dialogue, any Poser character parts which are hidden, will not import into Vue. Not just transparent, but, literally, hidden, in the hierarchy. I've found that one need not limit oneself to what the Vue/Poser combo tries to force on us...there's a way around everything. :)

I figured out the problem, you will not believe this...okay I have had some problems with Poser with the export dialogue box and never was able to get around it until today, and I posted a question regarding it, it has to do with conflicting .dll files in Windows, Poser and Vue, I was able to break it down, and with alot of help from the Poser forum I fixed it, now Vue works exactly right and so does poser....it is a stupid fix but it does work. Whew what a relief. I am a PC tech on the side so when things mess up with software I can't rest until I can figure out the problem....I think they call me a Mike compulsive obsessive people. Oh well, I can't thank you all for all your input and quick responses to aid me. It is a nice feeling that you all are ready to help us...especially when you think somedays, you wonder why you get out of bed just so someone can kick you. This place is our refuge and we thank you all....You have no idea how it lifts our hearts to have you all. Thank you again. Sharen & Mike

Hey, that's the whole point, ya know. :)

Yes...it is...Sharen