Re: [Plib-users] R: PLIB 1.8.4 model readers ehancement

[<st...@sj...>]

> Rony,
>
> Do you refer to the native .gmax format? Is it documented? Can you please
> post a link to the format description?
> As most of you probably know since the end of 2006 Gmax is no longer
> available as a standalone product, but only along with games (and related
> game pack). I'd like to know if such versions still save the .gmax format.
>
> Currently the only bridge towards the 3DS Max world is the .ase ASCII
> export
> format, but I suppose it is not a GMax-supported export format.
>
> Anyway should somebody be willing to do it, it is not difficult to add a
> new
> format reader to Plib/SSG - beyond the available readers' code, I'm sure
> developers and advanced users can help on this.

ASE comes from an example plugin that comes with 3DS - but it's only an
exporter.  You can't import ASE into 3DS Max.  I searched for a 3DS plugin
to read ASE - and the only one out there only works with version 4 and 5
of 3DS.  Since 3DS is up to version 8 now, I think it's pretty clear that
3DS doesn't support ASE anymore.

If gmax supports plugins you might stand a chance of getting the example
ASE plugin exporter working in gmax - but it sounds like you'd need to do
some significant effort to write an importer for gmax.

It's pretty easy to adapt PLIB to read/write new formats - there are
dozens of example readers and writers to use as examples.  The issue is
usually a matter of whether you can find documentation for whatever file
format you are dealing with.