LATE BREAKING NEWS Thank you for purchasing Extreme 3D. Extreme 3D is the most powerful 3D solution for graphics and multimedia. This file contains important information about using Extreme 3D. Information in this file supplements and supersedes information in the Extreme 3D documentation. For more information about this version of Extreme 3D, go to the Explore section of Extreme 3D Access and click "Troubleshooting." NOTE FOR USERS OF MACROMODEL Installing Extreme 3D does not upgrade MacroModel. Please keep your MacroModel installation intact and install E3D into a different directory. WINDOWS INSTALLATION NOTES Installing onto a Windows NT system If you are using a non-standard shell under Windows NT, you might experience problems running the Extreme 3D Access application. If this happens, install Extreme 3D by running SETUP.EXE directly from the E3D directory on the Extreme 3D CD. If you are unable to run the Extreme 3D Access application, refer to the NT_INFO directory for important news and additional information. Installing Extra Components If you would like to install Video for Windows, Win32s, or QuickTime, these components are available from the UTILS directory on the Extreme 3D CD. Each component has a separate SETUP program. If you are a user of Windows 3.1, Extreme 3D requires the Win32s component to be present on your system. When installing onto a Windows 3.1 system, the Extreme 3D installation program automatically detects if Win32s is not present or if a previous version is installed, prompts you to install Win32s, and launches the Win32s installer during the Extreme 3D installation. When installing QuickTime, you must not overwrite existing files. Choose Skip instead of Replace if prompted. Viewing Correct Icons If you are using a Windows 3.1 system and did not install Win32s before installing Extreme 3D, icons for Extreme 3D are not properly displayed. You can choose the correct icons using the Windows Properties dialog box. From the Program Manager, select each item in the program group and choose Properties from the File menu. MACINTOSH INSTALLATION NOTES The version of MoviePlayer included with Extreme 3D requires at least QuickTime 2.0. If you have a prior version of QuickTime, you can either upgrade to version 2.0 or later or use a version of MoviePlayer that is compatible with your version of QuickTime. We recommend using version 2.1 or later. Contact your software vendor for the latest versions of system software. Missing frames in files played by MoviePlayer (all versions) might be the result of MoviePlayer failing to warn you that it doesn't have enough memory to load/play the movie. If you increase the memory partition of MoviePlayer (movie size plus 400K), it should play fine. EXTREME 3D ACCESS APPLICATION NOTES On a Macintosh, you must have at least one system font installed in order to correctly view the text in the Extreme 3D Access application. If you choose to bypass the Extreme 3D Access application, you can install Extreme 3D by choosing the E3D Installer from the E3D folder on your Extreme 3D CD. The First Look, Explore, and Inspiration sections of the Extreme 3D Access application contain movies. On some Windows systems, after playing several movies correctly, a movie might be displayed incorrectly as a black screen. If this happens, quit the Access application. When you re-launch Access, the problem should be solved. The Launch Extreme 3D command in the Launch section of the Extreme 3D Access application might work incorrectly on some systems. If this command does not launch Extreme 3D, quit the Access application and launch Extreme 3D from your operating system. MEMORY AND PERFORMANCE If you encounter problems while loading a scene or during rendering, you may need to increase the amount of memory available to Extreme 3D. On a Macintosh, increase the minimum and preferred memory size using the Get Info dialog box for the Extreme 3D application. If you need to exceed the amount of RAM in your system, turn on virtual memory. On Windows systems, increase the amount of virtual memory. Refer to your operating system documentation for information on how to do this. USING MACROMODEL MODELS MacroModel files open in Extreme 3D with windows set to 8-bit color depth. To take advantage of Extreme 3D's 32-bit rendering capabilities, set any open windows to 32-bit color depth by choosing Window Setup from the Window menu after opening the MacroModel file and before you begin working. Lights brought in from MacroModel files lose their names and are named Default Light. Their position and orientation information is reset to default values. You might want to make note of your lights' position and orientation values in MacroModel in advance and then reset your lights using those values once you have brought the file into Extreme 3D. EXTREME 3D ON NON-US SYSTEMS When using Extreme 3D with a French keyboard, numeric menu shortcut keys are unavailable. When working in Windows, it is recommended that you avoid using extended characters (upper-ASCII characters including accented characters) in directory or file names, or during installation. When using a non-US version of Windows, it is strongly advised that you do not install any of the optional components located in the UTILS directory. Installation of these components, particularly the Win32s component, might result in damage to your system. COMPATIBILITY WITH OTHER PRODUCTS If you are a user of Control Strip on the Macintosh, you might notice that Control Strip partially obscures the Extreme 3D tool space and status bar. If this occurs, you should use the Control Strip control panel to hide Control Strip. In order to use Type 1 fonts in Extreme 3D, you must have ATM installed. We suggest using the latest version. On Windows 95 it is best to use version 3.01 or later. ATM is not supported by Extreme 3D on Windows 3.1. The TGA files created in Windows by Extreme 3D do not contain the necessary file type information to be recognized as TGA files by some Macintosh applications, (for example, Adobe Premiere). You must manually specify their file types. Extreme 3D does not support JPEG-compressed PICT files. RENDERING INFORMATION If objects in the foreground of a rendered scene have missing polygons, you can adjust the view scale and camera distance to correctly display them. Decrease the scale value for the view using the Views browser. This will increase the apparent size of the objects. Then move the camera farther away from the scene until you achieve the view you want and can successfully render your scene. Using the Hidden Wireframe render style on objects that are placed against a dark background causes the objects to render as flat white. If this is an undesired effect, lighten the background color until you get the effect you want. Distributed Rendering When rendering in a distributed rendering environment, make sure you have sufficient disk space on your distributed rendering server before submitting a job to it. When rendering in a distributed rendering environment, Extreme 3D displays the message "Writing complete" before any texture maps used in the scene are transferred. It might seem as though your system has hung until they finish transferring. When you submit high-resolution rendering jobs on network operating systems that only support 8.3 file naming conventions, use job names that are unique in the first 8 characters. Final Render Settings There are two settings that interact when you render an image: the Final Render Size field of the Render to Disk dialog box (which specifies the output image size) and the Quality field of the Final Render Setup dialog box (which specifies the degree of anti- aliasing Extreme 3D will use). When you render an image, Extreme 3D multiplies the largest side of the Final Render Size field (for example, 4090 for an image that will be output to 4090 x 2731) by the Quality setting (for example, 4 for a 4 x 4 setting). The result of this multiplication cannot exceed 16,384. If it does exceed this number, Extreme 3D reduces the Quality setting automatically, without displaying a message. The maximum Final Render Size value for a PICT file on a Macintosh is 4090 x 4090 pixels. A file of this size has a maximum Quality setting of 4 x 4. The maximum Final Render Size value in Windows is 8192 x 8192 pixels. A file of this size has a maximum Quality setting of 2 x 2. ANIMATION INFORMATION When using the Repeat Track command to perform cyclic animations, make sure the beginning and end frames are equivalent. This will prevent drift. When cycling multiple tracks per object, make sure the tracks are of equal length so the actions are synchronous. Since Repeat Track is performed from the first keyframe, also make sure that the keyframe is at time 0. You may have to cut the first key, set time to 0, and paste. Each track is limited to 10,000 keyframes, so use repeat track accordingly. When using the Repeat Track dialog box, do not enter a negative number in the Number of Times to Repeat field. The minimum number of times to repeat a track is 0. When you render an animation that contains visibility changes in a distributed rendering environment, each station in the distributed rendering environment must have the Animate Visibility Changes preference checked. This preference is not saved with the file. The Animate Visibility Changes checkbox is located on the Animation page of the Preferences dialog box. Extreme 3D does not retain the state of the animation toggle (the red button on the animation controls) across scene changes. Check the state of this toggle before making changes. When you animate objects with large polygons that have texture maps, you might see the texture map shift during the animation. To avoid this, subdivide the object into smaller polygons by increasing uniform smoothing or adding control points. GENERAL INFORMATION On a Macintosh, the extension Open Transport Library version 1.07b1 might cause Extreme 3D to fail on launch. If you update this extension to the minimum level Apple suggests (Version 1.08) or to the most recent (Version 1.1b9c2) the potential problem is eliminated. All objects, including profiles, construction objects, the working plane, light objects, and the camera object, appear to have all the attributes listed on the Info page in the Objects browser. Because these objects can't have mapping attributes, they show random and sometimes blank mapping types. If shadows display jagged edges, you can adjust your spotlight to a more direct angle, add more spotlights closer to where you want the shadows, or use the Final Render Setup dialog box to change your Quality setting to Best (8x8). If you attempt to create a watch link relationship in which a parent watches a child, Extreme 3D displays a "Watch Link cycle detected" message. Because the watch link would require the parent to reorient if the child moved, the child would then move again (since it is a child of a rotating object). This would cause the watch link to update again, in a cycle. A parent object cannot watch its own child. In the Adaptive Smoothing dialog box, you can hold Option (Macintosh) or F3 (Windows) while choosing OK. This causes Extreme 3D to cascade the change you make to a parent object to its children objects. Extreme 3D does not support the use of alternate decimal separators in numeric fields. For example, you cannot use a comma instead of a period as a decimal separator. If you attempt to use an alternate decimal separator, Extreme 3D might generate unexpected results. Using .DXF Files When importing DXF files, the source DXF file must contain the appropriate end of line characters to be interpreted correctly by Extreme 3D. On a Macintosh, each line of the DXF file must end in the carriage return character (ASCII 13). In Windows, each line of the DXF file must end in the carriage return line feed characters (ASCII 13 ASCII 10). When you import a DXF file, Extreme 3D assumes that all polygons on a given layer of the source DXF file should be combined to create a single object. If you know this is not the case, you can hold Option (Macintosh) or F3 (Windows) while choosing File/Import/DXF. This causes Extreme 3D to separate objects based on polygon location. Extreme 3D assumes that each group of contiguous polygons should be combined to create a separate object. Using .TEX Files When using preexisting texture maps (.TEX) files in Extreme 3D, copy or move them into the Scripts/Materials folder or directory. Then restart Extreme 3D and the texture maps will appear in the list of loaded textures. Although .TEX files can exist in any directory, Select Catalog will not load them unless there is a material saved in the same directory or in the active document which calls for the texture. In this way, Select Catalog can be used to repair a model that has missing .TEX files. The name that appears in the loaded textures lists does not always correspond to the name of the file. The name that appears in Extreme 3D is contained in the .TEX file and is not derived from the filename. DOCUMENTATION CORRECTIONS Using Extreme 3D Pages 445, 446 -- The information that choosing Three-Quarters from the View menu displays the scene in -30, -30, 0 orientation is incorrect. The exact orientation values are -33.6901, -25.6589, -16.1021. This sets the view to a three-quarter angle. Page 481 -- When rendering to AVI, the Windows Video Compression dialog box appears on all Windows systems except Win32s (Windows 3.1 with the Win32s component). On Win32s systems, the only available AVI compression is Cinepak Codec with a 75% compression quality data rate, so Extreme 3D uses Cinepak and bypasses the dialog box. Extreme 3D Help Three-Quarters topic -- The information that choosing Three- Quarters from the View menu displays the scene in -30, -30, 0 orientation is incorrect. The exact orientation values are -33.6901, -25.6589, -16.1021. This sets the view to a three-quarter angle. OTHER SOURCES OF INFORMATION Refer to the Source and Center area of the Extreme 3D Access application for information about contacting Macromedia and obtaining additional late-breaking news.