How to Decimate Mesh in Autodesk 3ds Max

This guide is part of the RapidPipeline 3D Plugin Actions Knowledge Base. It shows how to Decimate Mesh on Autodesk 3ds Max; if you'd like to know more about it, please check out the following links:

• Learn more about the Decimate Mesh
• Learn more about Autodesk 3ds Max

1. On the Menu Bar, click on RapidPipeline and choose Load Plug-in.
2. Select the model you want to optimize (if no selection is made, the whole scene will be processed).
3. Inside the plugin window, choose the action Decimate Mesh.
4. Press the Run button. :::tip Decimation actions by default use a deviation target. When the Deviation Percentage is more than zero, the Face Target will act as an upper limit for the face count, instead of acting as a forced target. Increasing the Deviation Percentage will allow the optimizer to go lower when possible. However if you simply want to reach an exact face target, the Deviation Percentage should be set to 0. :::

• Use the 3ds Max plugin
• Run "Decimate Mesh" action
• Examine the results

This tutorial shows how use the RapidPipeline Processor plugin in 3ds Max to simplify the geometry of a model with the “Decimate Mesh” action.

For more information see the 3ds Max plugin Documentation. The Add-On runs on a powerful 3D data optimization and automation toolset, for more about this see the 3D Processor Reference.

The asset used in this tutorial (https://skfb.ly/6VnPP) by Belzar Sirus is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

The shoe input model

The shoe after the optimization

Here is a preview of the processing´s output: the input shoe (top) has about 150K faces while the output (bottom) has been reduced to 50k faces.

1. Select the model you want to optimize (if no selection is made, the whole scene will be processed).

1. Inside the plugin window, choose the action Decimate Mesh.

1. Press the Run button.

The Decimate Mesh action opened in the plugin

To fully check the topology optimization, enable “Edged Faces” from the Viewport Shading drop-down menu, so you can see a wireframe view of your models.

“Edged Faces” option in the Viewport Shading drop-down menu

Wireframe inspection of input

Wireframe inspection of output

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