The new home of David Sparks, retired 3D artist (but still playing around)
Welcome to the Tools Page
The following tools, scripts and scenes are available free for download. These are offered "as is" with no warranty written or implied. Use at your own risk. DAS is not responsible for damages caused by the use or misuse of these tools. All scripts, utilities and tools are copyright © Digital Animation Services and may not be re-distributed without consent from DAS. To Download an item, Right-Click and choose "Save Target As..." Most of these tools have been used in production work and are offered here simply as a courtesy to those who might also benefit from them. Note that these are not considered "bullet-proof". It is still possible to break them and you may still get an error now and then. Where necessary, a readme file has been included with the .zip download containing instructions.
DAS_My Viewport 2.0:
Feb. 17 2018
This MaxScript is the culmination of years of development. It started as a way to assist me with screen captures and grew to a life of it's own, offering me mastery over all aspects of my viewports. I realized I'd spent all these years in max jumping around through various tabs, dialogs, drop-downs, menus and panels just to control how I'm seeing things in my viewports. I wanted these controls centralized in a compact interface and this script is the result. I had plans to release this commercially and included licensing options but later became weary of the support necessary to keep up with user's potential problems and queries. It just never got released even though I continued to use the script at all times during my max work. Now retired, I've finally gotten around to releasing it, free for anyone to use. Though the last version I supported for myself with the script was 3ds max 2018, I find it still working today. Note that your results may vary. Below is a screen capture of the interface. Included in the .zip download is a detailed help file pdf with complete information on the script, it's features and functionality. The script includes some useful viewport options that are not exposed to the Max user interface as well as a "Render Link" option that allows the user to embed common render settings into scene cameras and set up an "Active Link" between the renderer and those cameras whenever they are chosen as the active viewport.
DAS_Time Tag Manager 1.0:
July 20, 2024
This MaxScript allows you to export Time Tags to a tab-delimited text file. With the script you can also then import those Time Tags from the file giving you a workflow to exchange Time Tags between Max scenes. Some additional features allow you to create Time Tags based on time in seconds rather than just frames and give them a custom label. There's also a button to delete all Time Tags in the scene. I don't use Time Tags much but they can be a useful tool depending on the nature of your work. Thanks to my old friend Jason Brummett for suggesting the script!
Export FBX w/LODs for Unreal Engine
I created a post about this over on the blog but here is the download link to the regular .ms maxscript version of Anders K. Nielsen's "Mass Export FBX to UE4" macroscript. Check out the post for details.
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Here's a link to Anders site which includes several other maxscripts of interest:
http://www.mcgreed.dk/maxscripts.html
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Thanks Anders!
Scripted Editor Blueprints (Blutilities) for Unreal Engine
I've been creating these as I needed for some projects. Thought about uploading them for sale on UE Marketplace but decided I'd make them available here. They are included in a little sample scene for testing. Once in the project, you'll find them in the content folder called "Blueprints":
Note these won’t work in anything BEFORE 4.24. I have found them to be compatible with UE5. These are provided as is. Use at your own risk. I warrant nothing.
Bulk Texture Replacer
Bulk Asset Renamer
Bulk Material Instance Parameter adjustment (vector and scalar)
Bulk Material Assignment (Assets and Actors)
A help file is included (pdf) and you’ll need it for at least the Texture Replacer and the Renamer which have specific instructions. If you want to view the help documentation and see specifics about each utility you can check out the pdf here:
DAS_Path Object Selector:
May 7, 2008
This MaxScript selects all objects assigned to a path or paths. Use the "Pick" option to click a single path in your scene interactively or use the Selection Dialog button to select multiple paths at once. Additional functionality allows you to then assign these objects to a unique layer or selection set for quick recall in the future. Note this script is an encrypted .mse file and is compatible with all versions of Max back to release 2.
DAS_Move 2 Surface:
May 23, 2011
Move2Surface is a quick little MaxScript for aligning objects to the surface of another. This Maxscript is very similar to one of the beginning tutorials (if you can still find it). Think of placing floating trees on a ground terrain. Objects can be above or below the surface. The function uses a Ray Intersect method to place objects at the maximum Z point on the surface directly above/below the object's pivot point. In my version, multiple objects can be placed on multiple surfaces in one click.
DAS_Quick Material Renamer:
February 18, 2023
I've had this little MaxScript in my tool bag for quite some time. It renames Materials based on the names of the selected object they are assigned to. If the same material is used on multiple objects in your selection, it uses the name of the last object in the collection that it processes.
DAS_LoadPointClouds1.0: November 10, 2019
This MaxScript will allow you to load multiple point cloud files at the same time and control several key parameters at import. Please see the included README file and the demo video below for more details.
DAS_Tire Creator 1.0: November 9, 2019
This MaxScript will create a "Tire" (3ds max "Tube" primitive) based on the specifications on the sidewall of a real-world tire. Can be used to create dimensionally accurate tires for cars/engineering & reconstruction work.
DAS_Rename Generic Material Names 1.1:
February 20, 2018
This MaxScript renames any materials that contain variants of "Material #***" or that contain the word "Default".
The materials must be used on an object in the scene. Simply being present in the Material Editor is not enough.
DAS_Material Control 1.6:
June 6, 2019
DAS_Material Control 1.6 is a MaxScript I developed years ago for making changes to a group of materials all at once. I've made some updates along the way, hence version 1.6. It only works on Standard Materials with the exception of adjusting the Ambient Occlucion settings on a Mental Ray material, now of course obsolete. A setting that might not be obvious on the script is "Use Diffuse Map Color Average". When enabled, this will take the average of the colors in a texture map (if set in the Diffuse Color property) and use that as the diffuse color itself. It will not remove the Diffuse texture map, simply set the Diffuse Color to that color. Obviously, you would need to have some Mental Ray Materials in your selection to make use of the Ambient Occlusion property. Likely not an issue for anyone at this time. To change a property offered in the script interface, you will need to enable that property. If you do not enable the property, it will not be changed. This is important if your selection of materials might include some unique properties you do not want to change on the entire selection.
DAS_Angle Bisector LookAt Constraint 2.5:
May 6, 2014
A custom scripted LookAt Constraint for 3ds Max in which the source node looks at 2 other objects but always perfectly bisects the angle between them. The common 3ds Max LookAt Constraint has the source node looking at the midpoint between the 2 targets which is not the same if the targets are diferent distances away from the source node. Click on the thumbnails below to see a comparison of the LookAt Constraints as well as the full Bisector script dialog.
Note, this is an encyrpted maxScript (.mse)
Time Bandit 2.0:
Updated May 5, 2014
A revision to the original Time Bandit macroscript which allowed you to quickly and interactively control the timeline with precision. This new revision allows you to save preset time ranges and recall them later. A great feature suggested by my colleague Jason Brummett. Thanks Jason!
DAS_Reset Material Editors:
November 9, 2019
I originally wrote this Maxscript (Macro) to help me clean out unused materials hanging around in both the Compact and Slate Editors, typically after a "File/New" or before a "Save Selected" type of operation. The easiest method was to simply "Reset" the Material Editor, ensuring the only Materials still present in the scene were those already assigned to an object. Though there has long been a macro for doing this in the Compact Editor (under "Utilities" menu), there wasn't such a macro available for the SME. This script calls the Compact Editor macro and adds a few lines of code to accomplish a similar task in the SME, looping through the number of graph view "Tabs" and removing any materials from those tabs. As you know, removing materials from the tabs or from Editor "Slots" does NOT remove them from the scene if they are assigned to an object. However, as has been pointed out to me, this script workflow might not be exactly what the user wanted so in response, I have renamed the script moving forward. To those of you who have downloaded the script and been bothered by the behavior, my apologies for the confusion. I hope this clarifies things. Be aware, this is offered as a Macroscript. If you do not know how to install macros, please see the Max help. You will find this macro (and all DAS macros) under the name "DAS Tools". Note: I have added a further refinement to the previous Bug Fix below regarding SME "Tabs" where the script does nothing to the SME if it has not yet been opened during the current Max session. It now quickly opens and then closes the SME (if its not already open) to ensure access to the "Tab" count. It is not likely to expect any further updates to this particular script. I hope it comes in helpful for some of you as it has for me over many years.
DAS_Purge Empty Layers:
April 6, 2015
For Max 2011 - 2015. This is a macroscript that deletes all empty layes from the Layer Manager/Layer Explorer. In max 2015 with the new Layer Explorer, it offers the option to maintain nested layers. See the included README.txt file for installation instructions.
DAS_Noteworthy 1.2 November 17, 2013
A 3ds max macroscript tool for storing notes or logs about the Max scene. Creates a dialog box where you can enter information. The dialog can be re-sized allowing you to keep a running log of scene notes that can be accessed later by any user or from any copy of max with the macro installed. Great for communicating scene changes/updates between team members or keeping a log of your own activity to reference later.