Exporting Material names from Inventor to 3D Studio Max

[Michael Hewitt]

I was wondering if anyone out there has found a way to import an STP file from Inventor with all it's naming conventions connected.  We having manually changing the materials from a standard material something like Material #45565463 in 3d Studio Max.  Then having to convert them more of a standard name like white plastic. 

 

Regardless, we have to convert them to a Vray material for rendering engine of choice.  But it would be much easier to overwrite the same imported material name using our material library than randomly named standard materials.

 

Is there a better way of exporting from Inventor to 3D Studio Max possibly that carries those names over?

[Cad64]

I haven't used 3ds Max in a long time, but I'm pretty sure you can import the .ipt or .iam file directly into Max without having to export to .stp format. Give that a try and see if the material names translate over.

[Michael Hewitt]

Thanks for the reply Cad64!  Unfortunately, with the models/assemblies that we tend to work with are very dense files.  We have imported .ipt and .iam files from Inventor before into 3d Studio Max.  But the part that complicates bringing them into 3d Studio Max as an Inventor format is that some files tend to take hours to import.  Even on the lowest detail setting it can take between an 1-2 hours for some files to import on a good day.  On the lower settings the models tend to come in blocky and jagged (low resolution polys).  Smaller assemblies or a couple of parts here and there.  But when you have import hundreds of parts becomes a waiting game.

On the other hand with the STP format the come in a matter of minutes, comes out with smoother results and smaller file size.  The drawback is that the materials come in with a random material name.  The RGB values for the standard materials come in correct.  For the most part, this has become a manual process of connecting imported standard materials to their named Vray material counterpart.

 

Maybe their is another format, pluggin /script, CAD conversion software or setting I am missing on export.

 

I've included a pdf of the differences between the two formats.

Inventor_format_versus_STP_001.pdf

[Cad64]

It takes hours to import an Inventor file? Wow! That's crazy. I don't use Inventor and I stopped using Studio Max years ago, so I can't really offer any suggestions. Hopefully someone else will be able to help.

 

Have you tried exporting to .dwg file format?