Add Archive Selected button

[vanillapie]

I want an "Archive Selected" button. Let me explain:

I want to send a part of a scene to a colleague, current workflow:

-> select everything that he doesn't need

-> delete unused layers

-> archive scene

This can be tedious, especially with large scenes.

PS: it's different from "Save Selected", as I need to export textures included.

[darawork]

Hi, good idea. Autodesks 'Archive' routine is very outdated, and can even lead to zip file corruption on some workstations; if it tries to archive scene elements that are contained in folders that are very long (256 character fields) and then reproduce the folder structure, inside another folder, it might not be able to on the receiving machine. It is a much better idea to save all your project assets into one folder first (or set up a project folder structure upon initial scene creation and store all assets there, which nobody honestly does, ever).

This script has an 'only from selected objects' archival function. I use it all the time: https://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/collect-asset

Regards,

[swayyyne]

I could use that "Archive Selected" feature.
I understand the workaround you offer, but dammmn, I feel like every time there is something missing in 3DSmax, we have to rely on the community to make some home-made script, that eventually is not exactly what we were looking for. A workaround. 3DSmax's workflow is not supposed to be a series of workarounds. It's an expensive software. Can you guys implement the best scripts into the software, so we don't have to open X amount of workaround and use the software itself in the future?

[benjamin4MQAH]

I guess what is really needed is a feature like "pre-flight" in some Adobe products.

It would be a a process that collects (selected) objects and any reference/dependency and packages it into a new project. You can the compress is manually as you like - or it could be an option.

On a side note - any migration of a project/asset would benefit from a feature like this, not just for backups/posterity.

[rode3d]

Here's a free script that helps a lot in that task.

Delete Unselected  (scroll down the page to find it)

It deletes all non-selected objects in the scene, including hidden and frozen ones, leaving just the ones you need. Then you can just use any asset collector tool/script.

[darawork]

Hi,

Just today I was transporting two "File Menu -> Archive..." zipped project files back into work on a USB drive. When I got there I tried to extract. Both Zip files gave the same error of "File Path Too Long". Max had yet again broken the 256 character limiting sound barrier, mainly because it doesn't have a decent fail safe routine to prevent users from creating "Archives" that are over 256 ASCII Character long file names. The in-house routine named willy-nillingly, without warning... File extraction paths so long that they could could attach the Earth to the Sun and back. "Sure, go ahead, that's grand. Create a million character ASCII file path, we'll just zip it right up, no questions asked". (Good luck opening the file later on, at work). I also vote for a long overdue upheaval of the 'In-House' 3DSMax file archival routines. They are currently archaic. Regards