kbartlez

Sweet! Love how the reflections fade off. I always end up doing this in post. Is there a setting where it would render like this? Sorry if this is a stupid question, as I'm obviously too lazy to look into it myself right now.

It's great to see the history. I've been using EIAS since the late 90s. Though I don't have much mad skillz to show for it, since my media has always been in print. I remember the by-gone days of meeting up at the EI User Groups at New Media in Hollywood. Really happy the program is in very capable hands. Ken

Great interview, Tomas!

I'm not any where near the skill level of the experienced folk that are on this forum. But I do work in LA. Well, sort of. I live in LA but work in Irvine. So I'd love to make some connections. To show my age and also just how little I've improved, I used to belong to the EI user group way back in the 90s that met in Hollywood.

I don't have an answer, but I'm just chiming in here. I get the same issues under Mountain Lion 10.8.1. This is odd, as I just assumed it was because of that OS. Other that this odd little behavior, I haven't had anything else happen to me.

KB, For the most part, Method 1 works just fine. Although, oddly, I remember having to always horizontally flip the texture, map it to the opposing side, and move it forward. I don't need to actually do the taking screenshots part since my texture file is basically the print mechanical for the box itself and so dimensionally it matches my model. I was just hoping from something more magical like Method 2 where I wouldn't have to keep prepping and aligning all these textures. And since my source is an actually Photoshop file, something like Hexagon, where you do direct painting isn't an option either.

Thanks, Tom. Second approach sounded perfect until I found out there's no new MacOS version. And I don't have ready access to a Windows machine. Wawawaaah. I couldn't find a workable alternative after a quick search. Guess I'll try the first method. Which seems like a refinement of what I do now. Ken

My apologies in advance for the incredibly N00b question here. I've been using EI3D to make simple packaging comps for around 10 years now. That I haven't really progressed much in skill level is very lamentable, I know. Hey, at least I'm loyal. At any rate, what I've pretty much been doing is making IMG of each face, flipping them in Photoshop. Then mapping onto each surface with negative Z turned off. Can't really use the map to polygon feature (I think) because I like putting subtle bevels on my boxes. So I spend a non-zero amount of time adjusting positioning and size. Is there a better way to do this task? And "it will be much easier in version 9" is a totally acceptable answer for me. Thanks, as always. I think one of the reasons why I remain loyal is the great support community here. That, and I don't really have the time to learn a new piece of software. Hard enough staying current with updates. Ken

Thanks Richard. Glad just knowing it's not just me. I thought I was going mad. Encouraging to know it opens well in v9. Looking forward to that.

I can import the model just fine. It's just that when the default file type of "FACT" is set, all FACT files exported from VIACAD are grayed out. So I have to set to "All Files" to be able to select it. More of an annoyance than anything.

What? Gahhh! I thought I did it right. POP_r2.fac.zip

Thank you, Tomas. Here's a typical model file exported from VIACAD Pro 7.

Sure. Except that I can't seem to figure out how to get that file into "My Media" so that I can post it here.

Oh. Duh. I just realized that all a master material is a holding device for various attributes as well as texture maps and shaders. Now it's all so clear. Thank you! Also, thank you for the link to the samples. From the first reply, I went there, downloaded every jpg, and then made a handy contact sheet of them.

So we purchased MForge, and I have to say it's impressive in it's complexity. But I am starting to figure it out, having gone through all the tutorials and manual. But one question still persists, and I'm sure it's a really stupid answer. How do I access any of the presets that I've downloaded? Thank you.