From the course: 3ds Max: Substance to V-Ray Workflows

A note on gamma and units settings

From the course: 3ds Max: Substance to V-Ray Workflows

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A note on gamma and units settings

- If you happen to have your copy of 3ds Max set up in a non default way, then it is possible that you could encounter this Gamma mismatch warning as you work with the provided scene files for the course. The dialogue is Max's way of telling us that the Gamma settings saved in the file are actually different than those currently at work inside the application. To make certain that what you see in 3ds Max as you work with the scenes matches the visual presentation found in these videos, which have been created using 3ds Max's default Gamma options, all we need do each time we encounter the dialogue is select the Adopt the File's Gamma and LUT Settings option and all will be good. If you should go ahead and select the wrong option by mistake, no need to panic as switching Gamma options inside Max is a simple and straight forward process. All we need do is come to the Customize menu, select the preferences option and then in the Gamma and LUT tab of the dialogue, set Gamma to be enabled. Make sure the Gamma value is set at 2.2 and ensure that both boxes in the Materials and Colors section are checked. Another warning dialogue that you could run into is one connected to our system and display unit. So, as a general rule we typically model our scenes to scale using the metric system in Max, specifically in the case of this course, centimeters. If you have 3ds Max set up to use it's units default then, you will run into this error. Thankfully, the fix again is simple in that all we need do is choose the Adopt the File's Unit Scale option. Now unlike the Gamma choices that we have looked at, the consequences of making the wrong choice here can be a bit more significant given that choosing the Rescale Objects option can oftentimes lead to some fairly serious scene anomalies. To reiterate then, the units option that we always want to choose whilst working with the scene files for this course will be the Adopt the File's Unit Scale. Once we have done that we will of course need to remember when working on projects of our own, assuming we don't want to work in the metric system, that we will need to open the unit settings dialogue, go into the System Unit setting and switch that back to using 3ds Max's default option of inches. Also setting the display units to whatever option we're most comfortable with. If we follow through on these instructions, then everything from the exercise files download should work just fine for us.

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