Ok... here's the problem... I imported the object of the lighthouse (after having saved it as a 3DS file from TrueSpace 5.0) and imported it into vue... the object came in good... the textures however didn't. So, I attempted to create the maps on the lighthouse myself, but no matter what I did, I couldn't get the red and white stripe on the outside of the object... The main object is a hallow cylinder... In TrueSpace the stripe is a proceedure, not a map... the closest thing to it in Vue is vertical stripes but even they don't map to it. The entire object of the lighthouse is a bunch of glued together primatives in Truespace before it was saved as a single object as a 3DS file. Can anyone help with this? Thanks ahead of time. -=> Jim! <=-

Attached Link: http://www.uvmapper.com/

Hi Jim, I don't think that Vue can handle imported Truespace procedural material. If you are not happy with what you get in Vue, you could create a map for your object in the free UVmapper software. You can apply it in Truespace if this is possible and export the finished lighthouse as an OBJ file. But you also can map your lighthouse in Vue with the Bitmap you may creat from the template. I don't have Truespace and don't know at all how it works, but I think there is no better solution then UVmapper. Anybody has a better one ? Guitta

UV Mapping it and creating a new texture would be a good way to go about it, but it can be done with procedurals....

In the Color tab select simple materials and Object Standard. Load a solid color...whatever you want, then in the color map box add a red (or whatever) color and get them to mix, something like in this picture....

Notice that I raised the function scale to 20.0 for all 3 axes. A higher increase will spread the stripes....

In the Color Production box, right cleck and choose Load Function. In the Layers library, select Rectangular Stripes....

Under the Effects Tab, check off "Rotation", and press the Edit button. Where it says "Twist" make "Y to X" 45.00.... Set all other settings to 0.00....

There are probably many ways of doing this, but this is the first way I found. of course changing the function scale for color production will alter the spacing of the stripes, and of course the colors themselves can be changed. it's not gonna win any awards as a Lighthouse, but at least it *does* have a digaonal striping to it. Hope this helps you some.

Different colors with "rotation" (Y to X) set to 10.00, and tyhe color production function scale to 5.00 on all three axes....

Hmmm... reading back it sounds like you might want to go ahead and use UV mapper to map the object. if you can save it out of TS as a .OBJ and load it into UV Mapper and give it a Cylindrical Capped mapping that might solve that problem. I don't know, but I would assume you could do it in TS as well before exporting. I know virtually nothing about True Space.

That's great, Mike:-) I did not speak about that, because Jim said that the light house is in only 1 piece as a single object. If he does map it this way, the stripes also will go on the top?

Yeah, I guess. I didn't think about that though. maybe he can cut the top back into a separate object in TS. I know you can do it in UV Mapper. Maybe playing with the altitude controls in Vue would work.

In the image Jim posted, it appears that although the lighthouse is a single object, it has more than one material zone, so I think following Mike's procedure would work on the tower section. Although instead of this: In the Color Production box, right cleck and choose Load Function. In the Layers library, select Rectangular Stripes.... Not Rectangular Stripes. Right-click and select Edit Function. Then in the lower left of the new window, click open the drop-down (drop-up?) and select Spiral =or= Spiral Expanding. Experiment to see which looks better faster. I'd also suggest keeping all the function scales at 1.00 until you know what part is doing what, and then if something needs altering, you'll know what to alter. If the overall scale needs to be larger or smaller, use the global Scale setting on the material itself. Okay, there. I've just confused him even more now. :)

Yeah....I bet if you sat down and tried you could probably find several ways of doing it, actually, since you can control virtually all of the parameters for all of the functions, and filters. That would make a good exercise one time: Pick a pattern and see how many different approaches can be used to get the same thing.

Attached Link: http://davisworks.net/art/index.htm

Thanks... Mike's well structured and fully graphical tutorial there helped me out alot... who knows... once I start getting good at this, I may end up doing the same thing! Oh... BTW... if anyone would like to see any of my previous work, try the link. I've got a ton of other stuff I've done in Truespace... gonna have to port it all over to Vue now! :)

Well, you're most welcome. :) Pretty cool stuff you have on your site, and I especially liked your drawings. I didn't have alot of time to check it all out, but I bookmarked it to get a more thorough look later :)

Thanks... I've been an artist all my life... It's so nice to be able to share my stuff with everyone! Thanks so much again!

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=163596&Start=1&Artist=LrdSatyr8&ByArtist=Yes

Okay... this is how it turned out at the end... Thanks to everyone that helped! If you'd like to see the complete image, the link is included.