file recovery

[Largo39]

the only way i know is to hopefully try and merge the scene with another one and take all the elements. make sure you have multiple FILES as well as save often. also try to look in your autoback folder and see if it made a backup (sometimes that gets corrupted too but its worth a shot)

[osseuslabyrint]

your a genius!

thank you very much

[Bobo]

Couple of notes on backups and saving in general.

1. Each time you save a scene, Max first renames the latest version of the file to "MaxBack.bak" and moves it in the AutoBack folder before writing the new MAX file. This means that even if you are saving to the SAME file name (which you should avoid if safety of content is important), you still have TWO versions of the file - the last saved (which might be corrupted), and the previous one in "MaxBack.bak". Rename the "MaxBack.bak" to "MaxBack.max" or something else with .max extension and try to load it - it might be working...

2. It is a good idea to do incremental saves. Instead of pressing Ctrl+S and overwriting the same file (actually, creating a "MaxBack.bak" from the old one and writing a new one with the same filename :)), you could go to File>Save As... and press the [+] button to automatically increment the file number.
Here at Frantic Films, we always name files with suffix "tk100" etc. (Where "tk" stands for "take"). Each time you make a change, incrementing the file name gives you a new take like tk101, tk102 etc. When a BIG change is made, you can increment the major versions to something like tk201, tk202 etc., so at the end of the project you have a complete set of dozens or even hundreds of iterations. You can always merge an older part from a previous take if something was changed and 10 days later you or somebody else decided to revert to the old version of the object...

3. You can set your Ctrl+S and File>Save function to automatically increment on save by checking Customize>Preferences>Files>Increment On Save. Each time you save the file, a NEW file with incremental number will be written, thus never overwriting the previous file (just like in 2.), but without the need for a trip to the Save As menu...

4. If you like 2. but dislike 3., you can assign your own shortcut to the Command "Save Incrmemental (+)" found in the Customize>Customize User Interface dialog. This way, you can decide when to increment and when to overwrite the existing file by executing the corresponding keyboard shortcut...

Bottom line: Harddisk space is cheap - you can never have enough backup files! :)

[Largo39]

excellent post. thank you. definitly something i need to do (having a few runs with corruption myself sadly)

[Taoizm]

I really like the script "incremtal save" Espicially since I deal with Xrefs on a regular basis having a stable core filename really helps. Plus with the backups being tucked into a subfolder my root DIR doesn't get all cluttered up.

This MacroScript is a replacement for the save function. It saves incremental file versions while keeping the name of the latest, most-up-to-date version always the same as the original file. This is good for XRef'ing (or batchfile processing) because the filename does not change. Just add it to your File menu and/or define Ctrl+S as shortcut. Works for 3dsmax R5 and R6 New: Old file versions will now be saved to a subdirectory; invoke macro with ALT pressed to access parameters You an find it about halfway down the page here: http://breidt.net/scripts/index.html

[woodyradica]

Thanks guys this thread has just saved me redoing hours of work......

[KRZ9000]

over the last months i had terrible times with corruped files....im now in the stage there i save a file to a new increment ,..reset the scene and test load the file:) .....crazy yeah but i got so paraniod about this topic because of dozens of hours wated with corrupt files.

i will test this incremental save-script and hope my wories ease the comming days!:)

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