Using Polygon Cruncher for Lightwave

Using Polygon Cruncher for Lightwave

Installation

In order to install Polygon Cruncher :

Run Setup.exe.
Select Polygon Cruncher and select Lightwave plugin for Polygon Cruncher.
Install Polygon Cruncher in the Lightwave modeling plugin directory (generally \Program files\Lightwave\Plugins\Model).

Adding the plugins in Lightwave

Once installed, plugin must be recognized by Lightwave :

Run Lightwave.
Add Polygon Cruncher plugin using Add plugin function (cf Lightwave documentation). The plugin name is:
- PolygonCruncher6_50.p for Lightwave 5.5 or 5.6
- PolygonCruncher6_60.p for Lightwave 6.x, 7.x
- PolygonCruncher6_80.p for Lightwave 8.x or more
Load an object.
Run Polygon Cruncher which is in Custom menu or Construct/Additional (V7.x) or Utilities/Additional (V8.x) menu. You can also use Edit plugin to assign a shortcut key to Polygon Cruncher.

Choose the optimization mode

Interactive optimization of the current scene

Depending of your choice, Polygon Cruncher get the objects from the curent, active or all Lightwave layer and displays them in Polygon Cruncher's visualization window.

You can select the layer to optimize in the Polygon Cruncher object list. You can also choose a material to optimize for a given layer.

UV texture and vertex colors settings are set back into Lightwave once optimization done. Polygon Cruncher for Lightwave also try to keep:

Weights maps
Morphs maps
Sets (points selection)
Parts (polygons selection)

Batch processing

Select Optimize a set of files to display the batch processing dialog box.

LightWave might display dialogs while performing a batch processing. This can occurs when LightWave can't find a texture file.

Check Validate LightWave dialogs automatically during batch processing if you want to validate automatically these dialogs and avoid batch processing interruption.

Note: when this option is checked and when LightWave can't find the file for a texture, the reference to this texture will be missing in the optimized file. In this case, use the material editor to set back the texture file for materials in optimized files, or leave Validate LightWave dialogs unchecked.

Notes about Polygon Cruncher for Lightwave

Batch processing is not available in Polygon Cruncher for LightWave 5.x
You do not have access to the texture and vertex colors settings if you are using the plugin with Lightwave 5.x or 6.x. These features are only available under Lightwave 7.x, 8.x or more.

Desinstallation

To uninstall Polygon Cruncher, use "Add/Remove programs" in the Windows control panel.