Flatiron allows baking textures for multiple objects into a single map in a few simple steps. Baking lightmaps or any other type of render elements into large and complex scenes can be done with a few mouse clicks. Flatiron automatically takes care of the unwrapping and packing process and creates UV maps with optimized distribution, yielding much better quality lightmaps. This process minimizes texture seams and image corruption due to stretched pixels, and at the same time keeps the UV area ratio of all objects uniform, boosting the average image quality.

A tutorial video illustrating the workflow and capabilities of Flatiron can be viewed at the video file below.

*** Key features ***

- Simplifies workflow, advanced options available
At minimum, 4 simple operations are necessary for the full unwrapping and baking process from start to finish. Users requiring additional options and fine-tuning of rendering parameters have all the usual render-to-texture parameters from the standard Max built-in “render-to-texture” dialog available.

- Advanced stretch-free automatic unwrapping
Unwrapping algorithm is based on 3d-io’s Unwrella plug-in technology, offering noticeably better results than MAX built-in “Flatten”, when final rendered images are compared side-by-side. The unwrapping process is fully automatic, and at the same time minimizes number of charts, seams and texture stretch.

- High quality packing algorithm
Packing large numbers of chunks for hundreds of unwrapped objects is done with 3d-io’s Unwrella plug-in based UV packing technology. Charts are packed quickly and optimally, yielding high texture space usage, and at the same time respecting user selectable gutter padding and final texture sizes.

Flatiron is compatible with:
    * 3D Studio MAX 9 32 bit
    * 3D Studio MAX 9 64 bit
    * 3D Studio MAX 2008 32 bit
    * 3D Studio MAX 2008 64 bit
    * 3D Studio MAX 2009 32 bit
    * 3D Studio MAX 2009 64 bit