Spring RTS Engine

My question is this.... Why when I bring my low poly models into 3ds max 7 and UVW map them they stay all blocky? My older models after UVW Mapping them all got nice and smooth but my new ones are not..... what the heck am I doing wrong??

Here are 2 pics to show what I'm talking about..

First the blocky one


Second the smooth one


Just to be a bit more clear on what I am doing, I build the model in rhino, export it as a .3ds file, then import into max.

Any help will be much appreciated.

If you're using Rhino 3.0, download the Bonus Tools and install them. Then you'll want to use them to un-weld the verts, then re-weld them with a greater tolerance (when you select a mesh and then select Weld from the Mesh Tools, it gives you a variable you can change via console).

However, all of that said... when you bring into UpSpring, you are going to see the model get smoothed. The only way to un-smooth objects in UpSpring, I've found, is to drag them into my main uv-mapping utility of choice (I use UVMapper Pro) and then split the verts, for things that need hard edges. In short... I wouldn't stress about it too much. UpSpring will fix it for ya.

Exporting any .3ds out of max unwelds all vertices and removes smoothing groups, its just a matter of rewelding the verts and redoing the smooth groups, which can be pretty time consuming.

What happens if you export as OBJ? I don't use Max as part of my workflow, so I wasn't aware it did something that annoying.

Damn that is so much easier to use than the other UV Mapping program, Argh. I had a working s30 in 5 minutes with it. Thanks for the sharing.

Do models always color totally the team color on UPSWING when you view them altogether? They display correctly when I look at them by texture.

Not unless your alpha channel for texture1 is all white, MadRat... go look at the DDS files that are in NanoBlobs, they'll show you what needs to be what...

Either 254 254 254 white or 1 1 1 black (depends on image editor settings).

If your import removes the smooth groups, simply reapply them by right-click->Convert to editable poly, then select "Smooth" in the rolldown menu (Modifier List) in the editing tab (Modify).

There you can set the smooth group values.

Check the Auto Smooth box then set the smooth amount.