Proces of developing a plugin for 3ds max

Hey all,

Scripting is very new for me. I only have experience with c++ and some webprogramming languages.

I am now learning maxscript with the goal to make my own scripts, plugins, … I am planning to excercise my macscript with some little projects. But I don’t know very good how to begin. (This is really a noob who is talking here)

My idae about a litle project was a “plugin” for 3ds max so I only had to load 1 psd file to have a diffusemap, opcaitymap, specularmap, … for a model. And in the psd I would have everything organised in maps with specific tags.

Now, I don’t have a clear view about how I would begin with this, and what kinda proces I would follow. Or things like : How can I can get 3ds max to read those psd files?

Or is it maybe a bad idae to do this project as a beginner ? I know this is a hard way to learn scripting. But maybe the hardway can be a powerfull way?

What do you guys think?

It’s a great idea. In fact, we do something similar (we work directly with shaders, so it’s not exactly the same).

As far as getting Max to read PSDs, have a look at bitmapLayerManager in the maxscript help. It should give you everything you need.

Ok, thank you very much for the quick response. I will keep this thread updated with my progress with this little project.

you maybe have some tips for me about the proces of making such plugin?

No it is a fine project to do as a beginner! Once you know the syntax and semantics of a language (and the fundamentals of programming, which it seems you do), just jump into whatever project you feel passionate about or need. Generally the help file for MAXScript has most of the info you’ll need, and there are lots of things in MXS that you’ll learn along the way (so your first project will probably be garbage code in a few months).

My suggestion on developing the plugin would be, just work off the examples and stuff and in the help files for now, most of it will come to you. If you get very stuck, search the CGTalk MXS forums and ask there or here.