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Old 09-15-2008, 11:39 PM
tobin tobin is offline
WorldViz Team Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 251
Regarding formats, 3DS (and OBJ for Maya) is 3DS Max's export format and it a terrible format for anything but emergency export/import of polygons and basic material properties. These are not formats that convey character information. If you meant the .MAX format, then unfortunately that is not an open format and to be able to read/write to that format you are legally required to have a 3DS Max installed on your working computer. For example, Polytrans is a well known 3D conversion program, but to go in and out of .MAX format 3DS Max must be installed to use that feature.

Regarding the WorldViz approach to content creation, we still believe that Cal3D is the best solution for offering our customers powerful character creation abilities on the one end (in 3DS Max) and programmatical control on the other (within Vizard/Python). It is also our approach to stick to what we we do best (make VR authoring tools) and not even attempt to become a 3D asset creation tool. Too many others attempt this and end up providing customers an all-in-one-solution doesn't stand up against 3DS Max. In our opinion, 3DS Max has an excellent track record and you can be very confident about its longevity and your return-on-investment.

Regarding your comment about System A/B and satisfying customer needs, this is one of the main reasons we stick to 3DS Max & Cal3D as our workflow. You will discover that we do in fact stand behind this workflow and support our customers who use it. We feel the quality of our support would not be the same if we overextended ourselves by connecting to other 3D modeling tools and therefore we are upfront about supported and unsupported options.
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