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P3D v4 Understanding GMAX and 3DSMax

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unitedkingdom
Recently, I have been making scenery's in airport design editor. I have wondered how they make runway and taxi textures like real life. I have came across GMAX and 3DSMax programs and I had several questions. I was wondering for a new person like me which one will be most suitable for learning and understanding the concept of making runway textures, taxi textures and hopefully most importantly I would like to also create a terminal building. I know the whole converting to object then importing it to airport design editor as I done a practise run with sketch up but it seems like this programs are more interesting as well as seems to make things look much more realistic, hopefully I didn't bother you guys a lot but thank you in advance,

Bulent.
 

jtanabodee

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thailand
Making runway and taxiway using custom texture is called Ground Poly. Yes, you can do it with Gmax, 3dsmax and Sketch up. In ADE, you can do ground poly as well. It is quite easy to learn. You can read how to do it in the accompany document of ADE program.
Please read how to do it in Gmax/Max here http://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/index.php?title=Ground_Poly_Tutorial_for_the_year_2014+
I am not familiar with Sketch Up and making GP in ADE. So someone else can guide you more about those two programs.
 
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53
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unitedkingdom
Making runway and taxiway using custom texture is called Ground Poly. Yes, you can do it with Gmax, 3dsmax and Sketch up. In ADE, you can do ground poly as well. It is quite easy to learn. You can read how to do it in the accompany document of ADE program.
Please read how to do it in Gmax/Max here http://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/index.php?title=Ground_Poly_Tutorial_for_the_year_2014+
I am not familiar with Sketch Up and making GP in ADE. So someone else can guide you more about those two programs.

Thank you for the reply firstly, I was wondering when I was doing research everyone got sets of FSX game pack on top of their GMAX program. I don't have it do I need to acquire it before I do anything?
 

tgibson

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If using GMAX, you must export to some sort of an MDL file (or other format MCX accepts) before you can use ModelConverterX to create the ground poly. Therefore some kind of FS game pack would be required. If using ADE, it creates its own geometry and you do not need to create a shape in GMAX.

Note that there are two types of ground polygons, FS2002 and P3D types. FS2002 types can be used in FS9, FSX, and P3D v1 and v2. P3D types are used for the later versions of P3D - I don't know if they support the FS2002 type anymore.
 
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unitedkingdom
If using GMAX, you must export to some sort of an MDL file (or other format MCX accepts) before you can use ModelConverterX to create the ground poly. Therefore some kind of FS game pack would be required. If using ADE, it creates its own geometry and you do not need to create a shape in GMAX.

Note that there are two types of ground polygons, FS2002 and P3D types. FS2002 types can be used in FS9, FSX, and P3D v1 and v2. P3D types are used for the later versions of P3D - I don't know if they support the FS2002 type anymore.

Oh, I assume I will need to use the P3D version as I got P3D V4.. Have you got any suggestions on how to start? I looked at the previous comment and took a look at the pdf file but it seemed hard for me. Of course modelling in general is not easy but it seemed hard for me to follow. I saw some YouTube videos too but they jumped from step to step without explanation. Sorry if I am being a pain once again.
 
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Bulent, when I learned Gmax I began with the many tutorials, just like you have. What I was doing was pure imitation, felt slightly brainless, and stopped the tutorials frequently while I figured out what I had done differently than the teacher. After a few weeks, something happened. Perhaps "epiphany"? Anyway, I started to really get the structure of the program...what the stack really represented.

Gmax was built from version 4.0 of 3dsmax. While long in the tooth, version 4 of 3dsmax was quite advanced from the beginning of max's life. Max has always attempted to be backward compatible, so there are preferred and not preferred options still presented to you, and it took a while to figure out which tool within the program was the more current. The program also offers a variety of ways to do the same thing, so that could be confusing. Finally, the process of modifying 3dsmax to create gmax, created bugs that were never fixed...so the gmax user needs to learn those bugs exist and how to avoid them. The most obvious one is mirror tool from the ribbon is unreliable, but mirror modifier on the stack works as you expect it to.


Certain actions I'd see made no sense, like "collapsing the stack". I've seen some debate on this, and a lot of incorrect reasoning being used. Still, whether your stack is collapsed at export time or not, it will work either way.

A question I asked early on, why is there both editable poly mode and editable mesh mode? Gee, they look nearly identical. Well, suffice to say that Editable Poly is more modern, and contains a very valuable sub-object mode (border) that editable mesh does not. Later I learned that if a perfectly good mesh won't accept a weld operation, sometimes converting to editable mesh and back to editable poly will fix it. Sheesh! But I never work in Editable Mesh.

As others have said, this is more for your terminal building goals than for your ground poly goals. Still, Gmax can do both, but there are other (more modern) tools than gmax for ground polys. For 3dobjects like buildings, you can use Gmax for free. By learning it, you are learning the program interface of 3dsmax also. If you imagine using 3dsmax in the future, learning gmax now does makes sense.

Give yourself time to be baffled. That's not bad, in my mind. Just keep at it, and it will click. People on this forum give of their knowledge freely and patiently. All it takes to enjoy the skills of masters is to really work at learning it.

There are people who desired more features than Gmax provides, or simply never wanted to learn the max interface. For those folks, Blender represents a valid options. This is open source tool that serves similar markets as 3dsmax. The interface is quite different from 3dsmax. As a max user now for over 15 years, Blender is completely mysterious to me, but of course, Blender users probably feel that way about 3dsmax.
 
Messages
53
Country
unitedkingdom
Bulent, when I learned Gmax I began with the many tutorials, just like you have. What I was doing was pure imitation, felt slightly brainless, and stopped the tutorials frequently while I figured out what I had done differently than the teacher. After a few weeks, something happened. Perhaps "epiphany"? Anyway, I started to really get the structure of the program...what the stack really represented.

Gmax was built from version 4.0 of 3dsmax. While long in the tooth, version 4 of 3dsmax was quite advanced from the beginning of max's life. Max has always attempted to be backward compatible, so there are preferred and not preferred options still presented to you, and it took a while to figure out which tool within the program was the more current. The program also offers a variety of ways to do the same thing, so that could be confusing. Finally, the process of modifying 3dsmax to create gmax, created bugs that were never fixed...so the gmax user needs to learn those bugs exist and how to avoid them. The most obvious one is mirror tool from the ribbon is unreliable, but mirror modifier on the stack works as you expect it to.


Certain actions I'd see made no sense, like "collapsing the stack". I've seen some debate on this, and a lot of incorrect reasoning being used. Still, whether your stack is collapsed at export time or not, it will work either way.

A question I asked early on, why is there both editable poly mode and editable mesh mode? Gee, they look nearly identical. Well, suffice to say that Editable Poly is more modern, and contains a very valuable sub-object mode (border) that editable mesh does not. Later I learned that if a perfectly good mesh won't accept a weld operation, sometimes converting to editable mesh and back to editable poly will fix it. Sheesh! But I never work in Editable Mesh.

As others have said, this is more for your terminal building goals than for your ground poly goals. Still, Gmax can do both, but there are other (more modern) tools than gmax for ground polys. For 3dobjects like buildings, you can use Gmax for free. By learning it, you are learning the program interface of 3dsmax also. If you imagine using 3dsmax in the future, learning gmax now does makes sense.

Give yourself time to be baffled. That's not bad, in my mind. Just keep at it, and it will click. People on this forum give of their knowledge freely and patiently. All it takes to enjoy the skills of masters is to really work at learning it.

There are people who desired more features than Gmax provides, or simply never wanted to learn the max interface. For those folks, Blender represents a valid options. This is open source tool that serves similar markets as 3dsmax. The interface is quite different from 3dsmax. As a max user now for over 15 years, Blender is completely mysterious to me, but of course, Blender users probably feel that way about 3dsmax.

I would like to firstly take time out and say thank you very much for this information as it actually made me more comfortable, thank you Bob. I have gmax and blender installed but it seems like I like gmax better (interface wise, looks good to my eyes and I feel like I will be able to find tutorials too on YouTube with the same software). There are indeed videos on YouTube I guess I just need some time to adapt myself to them because its not simple like ADE plotting a runway down and taxi routes then done. Hopefully one day I will be able to come back here and have a laugh at my self. Thank you Bob once again for this important motivation as well as lovely information you shared with me.
 

n4gix

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unitedstates
I higly advise skipping any of the "speed tutorials" as they are deliberately speeded up 10x (or more) just to show off. They blow through menus so fast you don't have a snowball's chance in hell of learning anything at all.

I also do not recommend spending money on the "GMax Bible". I bought it 12 years ago and frankly while it is full of interesting stuff, virtually none of it is germane to either scenery or aircraft modeling. It does however make a sometimes usefull doorstop. :laughing:
 
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53
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unitedkingdom
I higly advise skipping any of the "speed tutorials" as they are deliberately speeded up 10x (or more) just to show off. They blow through menus so fast you don't have a snowball's chance in hell of learning anything at all.

I also do not recommend spending money on the "GMax Bible". I bought it 12 years ago and frankly while it is full of interesting stuff, virtually none of it is germane to either scenery or aircraft modeling. It does however make a sometimes usefull doorstop. :laughing:

Hahaha, cheers Bill :) Will take a look
 

jtanabodee

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thailand
I remember that I started my Gmax work from the tutorial in FS2004.
I think if you want to learn Gmax, start one of the tutorial and build something. That is the way to learn how to do. Reading only does not make you experience anything.
 
Last edited:
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1,484
Tic's point is critical. I'd put a spin on it by suggesting something simple. Its easy to get frustrated if you set your goal to do a complicated structure while you are just starting out.
 
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53
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unitedkingdom
I remember that I started my Gmax work from the tutorial in FS2004.
I think if you want to learn Gmax, start one of the tutorial and build something. That is the way to learn how to do. Reading only does not make you experience anything.

Will do :)
 
Messages
53
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unitedkingdom
Tic's point is critical. I'd put a spin on it by suggesting something simple. Its easy to get frustrated if you set your goal to do a complicated structure while you are just starting out.

I'm thinking to do only do the runway textures only in GMAX for now. I think once I get the hang of it it will help me more to do other stuff in the future, but for now I guess staying simple will be beneficial for me :)
 
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