Hi everyone,

just a quick, trivial question: I just got myself a copy of 3ds max 9 from a company that went bellyup. I installed sp2 (as max 9 natively doesn't do *.dds-files) and installed niftools. I can now import an export *.nif-files except: no textures!
I thought sp1 fixed the *.dds issue and so max 9 should be able to read the textures as well. In the import dialoge, I have the "import textures" box checked, and it should show the textures in the perspective viewport, but no luck so far. Can anyone help me out?

Cheers!

3ds max 9 has an error involving the use of .dds files when its on windows vista; at least I think vista was the problem. Dont think a fix for that particular problem was ever made, could be wrong though.

Sorry, forgot to mention: I am running Windows XP sp3, 32 bit version. There's http://www.ageinc.com/Morrowind/Thanos_Tower/Download/ModelingforMorrowind.pdf Beginner's Guide. But alas, I don't get any textures in my viewport and consistently they are not linked to the exported *.nif.

I have the same problem what I do is download Niftools, nifskope and "skope" around the file and change the texture references. 'til then I preview the mesh in 3ds max with textures in another format.

Have a look at you max/plugcfg folder. When you install the nif-plugins, a MaxNifTools.ini file will be copied there. Scroll to the [Morrowind]-section:

InstallPath=[HKLM\SOFTWARE\Bethesda Softworks\Morrowind]=@"Installed Path"RootPath=${InstallPath}\Data FilesExtractFolder=RootPaths=${RootPath};${MeshRootPath};${ExtractFolder}TextureRootPaths=${RootPath}\Textures;${TextureRootPath}\Textures;${ExtractFolder}\TexturesTextureExtensions=.dds;TextureSearchPaths=${RootPath}\Textures;${TextureRootPath}

The first five lines are fairly innocent. Now where it says

TextureExtensions=.dds;

it was

TextureExtensions=.tga;

when I first looked. Maybe thats all you need to do. The line beginning with

TextureSearchPaths=

is where the importer would look for textures. A bit further down you'll find

MeshRootPath=F:\Games\Morrowind\Original EN\Data Files\MeshesTextureRootPath=F:\Games\Morrowind\Original EN\Data Files\Textures

Just make sure the paths make sense. For some strange reason, "out-of-the-box", the TextureRootPath was correct, but the

TextureSearchPaths=

read

TextureSearchPaths=${RootPath}\Textures;${TextureRootPath}\Textures

in my case. So at least the 2nd texture search path would have been F:\Games\Morrowind\Original EN\Data Files\Textures\Textures - which of course doesn't work. So all I did was change the texture extension from *.tga to *.dds and changed ${TextureRootPath}\Textures to ${TextureRootPath}.

Max 9 does render the textures in the viewports and exports them correctly. Saves you quite a few mouse clicks as well