MatManager

47 votes
Version: 
BETA 0.7
Date Updated: 
06/04/2009
Author Name: 
Marco Brunetta

 

MatManager is a collection of tools created to help
you, the artist, control your materials and allow you to make the most of
them. It was designed to complement 3D Studio, keeping a clean and
streamlined interface where every action takes as few clicks as
possible.

Normally 3D Studio only allows one material library to be open at any time, and saving a material for later use on another project requires a very tedious procedure. So tedious that most users don’t reuse materials or keep an organized database of the ones they have created.

MatManager gives you the ability to store an unlimited amount of materials. There is no need to browse for a material library or scene file, once you have stored a material it will always be there, just one click away. Plus, the materials can be organized into different libraries so that they can easily be found, even if you have hundreds stored. And of course there is no limit to the number of libraries you can have.

This however is only the start, MatManager comes with a lot more features.

MATERIAL EDITOR AND SCENE LIBRARIES
MatManager allows you to easily browse and manipulate materials in the scene and the material editor thanks to two special libraries. Both of these libraries are updated automatically and can be used to do things like quickly identify which objects are using a certain material, or find shaders with missing bitmaps.

AUTO.STORE BITMAPS
When saving a material that uses bitmap files, MatManager will automatically copy the bitmaps to a pre-configured location. This will automatically keep your bitmaps organized and you will never have problems with missing bitmaps!

MATERIAL PREVIEWS
MatManager will display a preview of your materials and also of all the sub-materials and textures that those materials use. It’s also capable of recognizing different kinds of shaders (standard, mix, blend, etc.)and adjusting the tree accordingly.

STORE UVW MAPS
Besides the material itself, you can also store the UVW modifier that material is using. This way you won’t have to waist time re-creating the UVW coordinates for your architectural materials.

MATERIAL SHARING
All the materials are stored in .mat files in your hard drive, this makes sharing of materials and libraries really easy even with people who do not have MatManager installed.

COMPATIBILITY
MatManager is compatible with any and all materials and rendering engines. As long as your 3D Studio is able to load the material, so will MatManager. And of course the previews can be rendered with the engine of your choice.

OTHER TOOLS
Besides all of these features, MatManager comes bundled with extra tools that will give you even more control over your materials and allow you to work faster and more
efficiently.

Additional Info: 

THIS IS A COMMERCIAL SCRIPT.

If you have not authorized MatManager, it will run in Demo Mode. While in Demo Mode, only 5 custom libraries can be created, and they can only store up to 5 materials each. All other features are fully functional. MatManager licenses can be purchased trough PayPal at the website.

NOTE: MatManager is still considered BETA, so it is possible that you might encounter a bug, if so please report it either here or to me directly trough the link in the webpage.

To install the script just extract to your Max folder and look under the tools category for MatManager.

If you need any help, or you wish to learn more about the script you can download the help file below.

 

NEW IN MATMANAGER 0.7

- Fixed: bug in Random Materials Tool
- Fixed: "Unknow struct member" bug
- Fixed: bug in demo mode - MatManager would not load more than 4 materials instead of 5
- Fixed: the "Remove Map" option no longer shows up on first level map nodes
- Fixed: bug when assigning materials - MatManager assigned an instance of the stored material instead of a copy

- Tweaked: when the Material Editor is open, selecting a material from the MATERIAL EDITOR library will make the corresponding slot the one currently active
- Tweaked:Forced Vray log window off when rendering previews
- Tweaked: several small changes to accomodate for new Modifier Saving
ability (changed UVW: label to Modifiers: / created rollout for
importing several modifiers / changed right click options)
- Tweaked: better support for Mray, Vray & FinalRender when creating previews

- Added: right click menu when clicking on empty area of the treeView
- Added: Sorting of libraries alphabetically to right click menues
- Added: ALL modifiers can now be saved and retrived using XML format
- Added: treeView resizing when extending the floater
- Added: Isolate Objects option to Scene Materials right click menu
- Added: modifier options to Options Panel
- Added: material previews display floater
- Added: double clicking the Material Editor library opens the Material Editor
- Added: import multiple materials rollout updated. It now uses checkboxes and displays modifiers associated with the materials

NOTE: IF YOU HAVE A PREVIOUS VERSION OF MATMANAGER INSTALLED, MAKE SURE YOU OPEN THE OPTIONS PANEL AND CLICK OK AFTER INSTALLING THE NEW VERSION. This will update the .ini file with the new options regarding modifier storage, you might enocunter some errors otherwise.

NOTE Nº2: The new modifier storage system is not compatible with the old UVW storage, so previously stored UVW maps will not work. I'll make a small tool to update the old ones automatically in the next few days.

 

Version Requirement: 
MAX 9 sp2
Video URL: 
AttachmentSize
MatManagerDemoSample.jpg98.57 KB
MatManager 0.6 Help.rar527.38 KB
MatManager_0.7_BETA.zip696.51 KB

Comments

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Marco Brunetta's picture

I just tried it, and yes,

I just tried it, and yes, changing the library storage path is indeed troublesome. I'll fix it and upload a correct version ASAP.

BTW, if you still want to use your own path, make sure you end with a "\" at the end, that might be causing the problems with the previews.

Marco Brunetta's picture

- can't use the buttons on

- can't use the buttons on the options windows

Yes, most of the stuff on the options panel is just for show right now. These will be working on the final release. It's all pretty easy stuff to do, so I've been focusing on other more complicated maters.

- if change the library storage path creates new "Material editor" and "scene materials" and cant delete the matlibs and do anything

You mean besides the ones that should already be there? That's odd, I'll look into it. The code that takes care of the changing of the storage path has always been a bit quirky, so a rewrite is probably needed.

- cant import some matlibs (just imported 1 from 8 i have)
This is just a demo, so the script will not open libraries that hold more than 5 materials...sorry.

- when apply a material with uvwmap twice creates uvwmap twice
Well yes, that's the way it's supposed to work. The script always adds the UVW automatically. The best I could do would be have some sort of confirmation dialog pop up if the object already has a UVW Map modifier.

- can't generating any preview
I am guessing this is related to the problem with the library storage path as the same path is used to store the previews. Does this still happen if you use the default path?

Francisco Hermida's picture

- can't use the buttons on

- can't use the buttons on the options windows
- if change the library storage path creates new "Material editor" and "scene materials" and cant delete the matlibs and do anything
- cant import some matlibs (just imported 1 from 8 i have)
- when apply a material with uvwmap twice creates uvwmap twice
- can't generating any preview

I think its fantastic script look eager for final release

Marco Brunetta's picture

Well, what kind of error is

Well, what kind of error is it giving you? I'm running it without problems in MAX 2009.

Francisco Hermida's picture

i can't make this work fine

i can't make this work fine on MAX 2009 :(

Marco Brunetta's picture

Yes, anything from MAX 9 sp2

Yes, anything from MAX 9 sp2 onwards should work without problems. Do keep in mind that the .mat files are not backwards compatible, so any library saved in MAX 2009 WILL NOT open in MAX 9 for instance. This however is a (stupid) limitation imposed by Autodesk and not a problem with the script.
Eventually I expect to create my own library format to be able to circumvent this issue.

Francisco Hermida's picture

This script works on max

This script works on max 2009?

Marco Brunetta's picture

Updated version is up!

Updated version is up!

Marco Brunetta's picture

Crap! seems like the server

Crap! seems like the server where I had stored the file has died. No matter, the next version is almost ready, hopefully it will be up on the weekend.

Marco Brunetta's picture

It's actually not very far

It's actually not very far off from finished. The MatManager code is about 97% done, and right now I'm mostly working on a set of additional tools to go along with it (stuff like "assign random materials" and the "syncronise materials" that robert suggested above).

Be sure to mail the bugs to [email protected]

thanks!

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