unrealexp.dle
Exporter plugin for 3D Studio Max R3

Installation:

Copy the unrealexp.dle to your plugins sub-folder that is in your Max3 installation folder.

Exporter usage:

• Ensure all objects and there animation sequences fit within the -128 to 128 range on the x, y, and z axis.
• All 'geometry' objects will be exported into a single unreal mesh: See 'Excluding objects by name'.
• Name your file myobject_d.3d (The '_d' indicate the mesh data file).
• The exporter will automatically create myobject_a.3d (The animation file).
• If the animation file exists you can either overwrite it, or append to the end of the file (functionality may be extended for frame insertion and deletion).

Excluding objects by name:
Objects that are not geometry (lights) will be ignored by the exporter.   However, Max will convert undesirable objects to geometry for export (bones for instance).  To alleviate this, name objects for exclusion by using one of the following prefixes (not case sensitive).

• !
• bone
• bip (for biped's many objects)
• link

Only the beginning of the name is checked so 'bone01' and 'linkFace1' will not be exported, whereas '01bone' will be exportered.

Materials:

• Name the materials skinX where 'X' is a number from 0 to 9.
• If you require different effects (ie: translucency) but want the same texture, use another material but name it the same thing (ie: skin0).
• The following effects use material name suffixes (with a leading dot '.') to flag the polygons on export:
  • Weapon placeholder polygons: use the suffix '.weapon' on the material name.
  • Mask polygons: use the suffix '.mask' on the material name.
  • Modulate polygons: use the suffix '.modulate'.
  • Flat polygons: use the suffix '.flat'.
• The following effects use the actual material properties in Max's Material Editor to flag the polygons (so you can see the effect in Max):
  • Two-Sided polygons: check the '2-sided' box in the material's 'Shader Basic Parameters' roll-out.
  • Translucent polygons: reduce the material's opacity from 100.   Translucency in the Unreal engine in not variable as it is in Max.
  • Unlit polygons: Uncheck the 'color' box in the 'Self-illumination' section and increase the value from 0.
  • Enviroment mapped polygons: Apply a diffuse texture to the object (as usual) and change the coordinates button from 'Texture' to 'Environ'.
  • No Smooth polygons: In the diffuse texture properties, under the 'Bitmap Parameters' roll-out, change the filtering to 'None'.  Note: this effect turns off texture filtering.
• Support for multi-materials is not recursive (don't make a sub-material of a multi-material into another multi-material).