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I think from Next Limit's perspective, they say that the license is cheaper now that you can buy the plug-in license and Studio separately. I don't actually know whether this is true, since it is such a long time ago that I bought v3 with the plug-in and Studio together. I agree it would be nice to have a special offer to upgrade to a combination of plug-in and Studio. I'm still on version 3, which works for now. In general I find Next Limit's support disappointing. When I start a support case, I typically get a first reply pretty quickly but after that first reply it may hang indefinitely. Some of my problems: v3 refused to run freshly installed on my new MacBook. This was solved remotely after more than a week of emails back and forth. Turned out to be the result of a spelling mistake in a file name and the license file being misplaced in the directory structure which can't have been user error because it was a completely fresh install... I can't access the online materials library anymore with MXED v3. It used to be possible on previous machines. My support case seems to have been abandoned. Next Limit changes the URLs of their support database which means that links in blogs, tutorials and even on their own website tend to be broken. This is a real killer for community building. // Tom

Hi Andrew, It may have to do with the Extents settings of your reference plane. If you need more resolution (i.e. smaller units) for modelling a very small object (e.g. a watch, a molecule 🙂 ) then typically your total scene will be smaller so you can reduce the Extents of your grid. Typically it does not make sense to have a very large grid in combination with very high resolution and FormZ does not support this: if the Extents of your reference plane are very large, FormZ refuses to further increase the fineness of the grid. If you go to menu Palettes/References Plane Parameters and then reduce the Extents of your references plane, does that help? // Tom

So far I've been rendering in 4:3 aspects ratio using Maxwell v3. When I switch to 16:9, the rendering in Maxwell looks different from the preview in the FormZ window. Clearly, I would like them to look the same so that the Maxwell rendering is an accurate reflection of my preview in FormZ. I can remember this being discussed a long time ago but I cannot find the thread anymore. Can anyone enlighten me? // Tom

Hi, I notice that there are many dead links from the Help Topics to the Maxwell site. Of the following, only the 'Maxwell Render Dos and Donts' works for me. Any chance of fixing this? I notice in general that Next Limit tends to change the URLs of their help section, so that many blogs with tips and techniques are turned useless. Such a shame. Help Topics Installation and Licensing Problems and Solutions Improving Rendering Speed: Speed Bottlenecks in Maxwell Photography Techniques for Interior Rendering Maxwell Render Dos and Donts

OK, I finally figured it out: grass should be set through the Attributes for Maxwell panel. In the Materials panel, the Maxwell pane should be set to 'Translate shaded', *not* to 'Referenced MXM'. How counterintuitive is that?

I notice Maxwell 5 for FormZ is now available on the Next Limit portal. Does this mean the plug-in is also finished or is the 'glue' between FormZ 9 and Maxwell 5 missing? // Tom

No one at all who can help me out? Even when I start a completely new project, draw a simple rectangular plane, add a physical sky and apply this grass MXM material, I still get this 'UVW channels on this object are not enough' warning.

I'm getting this error message when trying to render grass. I found this thread (http://www.formz.com/forum/old/messages/35953/61315.html) but still can't figure it out. I'm on FormZ 8.6 and Maxwell v3. I've already put an 8-bit PNG texture on the 'Shaded' material type of the Materials Parameter panel but it doesn't help. Also, I do not understand what to do with the three buttons 'Update shade..', 'Preview' and 'Use MXED'. Which one do I click and where do I see the feedback which one is active? Any help greatly appreciated. // Tom

Hi Chris, Many thanks for your reaction, that’s helpful. In this case it does not really matter to be 100% accurate and I actually have information on the actual dimensions of the chair so I can scale things. But I can imagine situations - for example with an organically shaped object or when ‘packaging’ components within a housing when dimensions really matter - in which it would be nice to understand the scaling that is applied on import. Since it is an existing chair on a site for choosing project furniture, it is hard to believe it was modelled at an arbitrary scale. Thanks again, Tom

Hi vva, Many thanks for your reply. There are many horrible things in the world that I do not have much control over 🙂 In this case I can live just fine with this model: I do not have to alter it, I do not have to 3D print it. I simply put it in a garden and it renders just fine. I was just hoping for some scaling advice. It would surprise me if the model of an existing chair that's in production were modelled at an arbitrary scale. // Tom

Hi, I'm confused about scaling an imported model, can anyone help me wrap my head around this? I'm bringing in a SketchUp model of a garden chair from caddetails.com (https://www.caddetails.com/Main/Company/ViewCompanyContent?companyID=4138&view=Models3D#vm70210-fermobusa-luxembourg-chair-3d). The model imports beautifully but I can't figure out the units it is in. I'm working in metric but the site is in Imperial. According to the specs, the chair should be 20.5" wide. When I bring it into FormZ, it comes out at 594.7cm. So there's a factor of 594.7/20.5 = 29. I don't recognize this factor as inches to mm, feet to cm. 20,5" is 52.07 cm. 594.7/52.07 = 11.42!? I realize I can scale to my heart's content but since I have to do more models it would be nice if they all came out the right size automatically. Any help greatly appreciated, Tom 4138-029 - Luxembourg Chair - SketchUp.skp 4138-029 - Luxembourg Chair - PDF.pdf

Hi, I'm struggling with printing at 100% from the FormZ layout application. The app insists on splitting up my drawing when printing at 100%. This is my flow: I want to laserprint on A4 so I choose 'ISO A4' from the 'Standard Paper Size' drop down menu in the Layout Project Settings. But if in the print dialogue box I set 'Scale' to '100%', my drawing is split into two pages. On the other hand, if in the print dialogue box I set 'Scale' to '99%', my drawing prints on one page As a workaround, if I choose a 'Custom Paper Size' that is slightly smaller than A4 (say, 5mm less at 28.7x20.0) then I can use 100% and print on a single page. Is this expected behaviour? I expected that I needed to choose the paper size of the printer in the 'Standard Paper Size' menu. Regards, Tom

Hi, I'm trying to print a dimensioned drawing. Though the dimension arrows look fine on screen, they are misaligned when I print them or when I create a PDF from the print dialogue box (see attachments). I have vector output switched on. Is there anyway to get round this? Should first export in a different way? Any help greatly appreciated, Tom MacOSX.14.6, FormZ 8.6.5

Thank you, Des. Yes, that's an option. But it would be nice to be able to export an FBX file without lights directly into the Unity assets folder and being able to make changes to the FormZ master file without extra effort.

I'm exporting to FBX and notice that the lights are also exported, even if I switch them off. I'd rather not delete the lights from the FormZ file. Is there a way to keep the lights in the FormZ file but prevent them from being exported? Any help greatly appreciated. // Tom