Modeling for Architecture

Converting 3ds Max files to Blender: Practical example

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Allan Brito April 3, 2018

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We often share links to furniture libraries or models that artists eventually post on their accounts at Behance or ArtStation. Before any link appears here in Blender 3D Architect, we make sure it is compatible with Blender.

By compatible, we mean it is in a format that someone with Blender can easily import. Like a Binary FBX or OBJ file. But, sometimes those models will only appear as max files.

Getting max files to Blender is no easy task because it is a proprietary format from Autodesk and only 3ds Max can manipulate the data.

A few weeks we gave a tip about a free service that converts max files to something like OBJ or FBX without 3ds Max. Does it work?

To show you a practical example, I will take a free furniture collection that is only available as a max file. I will use this office collection from artist Roman Levo. Unfortunately, all files in the collection are in 3ds Max format. With materials set to Corona Render.

If you don't have access to 3ds Max, it is virtually impossible to import the furniture files to Blender.

Can we convert the files using the Free Yobi 3D service? Let's give it a try.

Luckily for us, the artist did break the scene into small files. All furniture pieces and objects are individual max files. That is important because the upload size limit for max files in the service is 40MB.

At the converter page, you can choose one of the furniture models and pick an output format. And hit the convert button. Here is my setup for each furniture object:

The conversion process can take a while depending on several factors. Eventually, it may even show a failed message. Not sure how they process that in the background, but trying the conversion for the second time usually results in a successful result. Here is the result page:

You will get a download link by the end. Get the file and import it to Blender.

If you find a 3d furniture model that is not in a friendly format for Blender like FBX or OBJ. Having this option to convert max files without the need for 3ds Max is a great solution.