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Simply copy the following text into your LWHUB.CFG file (Please back it up first if you are not familiar with editing these files) and load LightWave. You may shut down the hub afterward this. Then you can change the RGB values represented in this text to make your own custom look.
BackgroundColor 168 160 144
StateButtonColor 168 168 152
DragButtonColor 156 168 156
ActionButtonColor 156 156 168
DialogButtonColor 152 168 168
InfoAreaColor 152 144 128
InfoAreaTextColor 132 47 67 |
The electronic manual can be found by logging into NewTeks registration site here: http://register.newtek.com/. Click the link for "My Downloads". Once there, scroll down and near the bottom there is a link for LightWave [8] PDF Manual. Click the link and you can download the PDF manual.
If you need access to your user name and password for the registration site, click on the "Forgot your user name or password?" link directly below the "Login" button on the registration home page, or call Customer Service at 1-800-862-7837, Monday - Friday 9:30am - 5:30pm Central Time, and one of our representatives can assist you with that information. |
The following FAQ entry applies to versions 6 and up on the Windows platform, it is written specifically for version 9 so some information may be slightly different to accommodate for other versions.
It can get confusing when you have 30+ seats of LightWave and youre not sure which dongle goes with which License Key. We can hit two birds with one stone if we create a single composite license.key file that we can put on all these computers.
Simply go to C:\Program Files\NewTek\LightWave 3D 9\Programs and locate the file license.key, then right-click on the file to bring up a menu. Choose to Edit the file .If "Edit" is not an option then choose to Open With and choose Notepad, if Notepad is not listed you would choose Choose Program or if you do not have an Open With option then choose Open. From either of these you would have a list of specific programs to choose from, Notepad should be an option, just highlight it and click OK.
You can now begin to type in all of your Permanent License Keys into this one file. Make sure to separate each key with a Return line and do not allow any characters to precede or follow the key. The exception is spaces and only after the key, this is useful because then you can add a comment. To begin a comment you need to type in two forward slashes (//), then the file will know that everything after the two slashes is to be ignored. This is helpful so you can track dongle IDs to specific license keys or users.
You can then save this file and redistribute it to all of your other lab computers that you intend to run LightWave on. |
| You can bring the bring it back using two different methods. One would be to hit the ALT+F2 key(On the Mac the ALT key is the Option key). Or you can hit the keyboard short cut "d" to bring up the display options and remove the check mark from Hide Toolbar. |
| In Modeler make sure that the polygon tab is selected and press "W" on the keyboard. That will bring up the polygon statistics tool. Scroll down and select Surf: then select the desired surface. |
It is caused by the curve type in the graph editor. Simply open the graph editor and if you keep the Incoming curve as TCB Spline, insert 1 at the tension..this should fix the problem and at the same time adds some ease in and ease out to your animation. If you dont need this, after selecting the keyframes change the incoming curve to linear.
There are other ways of doing this as well here is a link to another description.
Discussion Forum
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Windows: for each shortcut you use (whether its Layout or Modeler) we will do the following step.
Right click on your shortcut and choose Properties. In the Target field there should be a path to the appropriate program. Add a -0 after whats written (even if it has quotes) and make sure a space separates the path and the -0 parameter. So a Modeler shortcut for LightWave 9 might look like this:
"C:Program FilesNewTekLightWave 3D 9Programsmodeler.exe" -0
Notice the space between the end quote and the hyphen, it is necessary.
Mac: the following applies for the Power PC versions of LightWave.
Go to your LightWave folder in Applications (LightWave 9 is in the Newtek folder) and open the Programs folder. Inside you should see two files, LightWave CmdLine and Modeler CmdLine, they should each open in TextEdit by default. Once TextEdit is open simply type the two characters: -0 (negative zero as I like to say) and go to File > Save.
For Universal Binary editions of LightWave on the Mac all you need to do is go to Macintosh HD: Applications: LightWave3D 9 and delete, rename or move the file Hub.app (as long as LightWave doesnt see a program called "Hub.app" it wont launch it). |
The following FAQ entry applies to versions 6 and up on the Mac platform, it is written specifically for version 9 so some information may be slightly different to accommodate for other versions.
It can get confusing when you have 30+ seats of LightWave and youre not sure which dongle goes with which License Key. We can hit two birds with one stone if we create a single composite license.key file that we can put on all these computers.
Simply go to Hard Drive : Applications : NewTek : LightWave 3D 9 : Programs and locate the file license.key, then hold down the Control key on your keyboard and click on the file to bring up a menu. Choose to Open With and choose TextEdit (if TextEdit is not an option choose "Other..." and locate TextEdit inside of the Applications folder). First thing you need to do is go to TextEdit > Preferences and make sure that its set to Plain Text in the top-left, if not, set it to Plain Text then close down TextEdit and re-open the file.
You can now begin to type in all of your Permanent License Keys into this one file. Make sure to separate each key with a Return line and do not allow any characters to precede or follow the key. The exception is spaces and only after the key, this is useful because then you can add a comment. To begin a comment you need to type in two forward slashes (//), then the file will know that everything after the two slashes is to be ignored. This is helpful so you can track dongle IDs to specific license keys or users.
You can then save this file and redistribute it to all of your other lab computers that you intend to run LightWave on. |
The T and E keys, usually accidentally pressed in Surface Editor, are easily undone by holding shift and clicking on them again.
For your information, they stand for "Texture" and "Envelope", respectively. |
As long as you know at least part of the name of a tool you can easily search for it using the Menu Editor.
To access the Menu Editor you can go to Edit > Edit Menu Layout... from either Modeler or Layout (shortcut key is simply Option/Alt + F10).
In here click on the Search key and type in part of the tool you're looking for, the search function is not case-sensitive, then click OK. The search function will find the first match for your query, if this is not what you're looking for click on the Search button again. If it is what you're looking for then click Find to locate where the plugin is inside the menu hierarchy. One tool may be present multiple times so you may want to click Find again if you remember it elsewhere.
So if I needed to find the Box Tool in Modeler I'd have to search for "box" (no quotes), but that brings up a BoundingBox tool first. So I search again and find the Box Tool, now if I click Find it will show me this first appears under Main Menu > Create > Primitives. If I click Find again I see it also appears under Left Mouse Button Menu.
About this menu: this is a powerful customization tool LightWave has employed since version 6 and can help you create the work flow you want.
On the left side you have a list of plugins LightWave has at it's disposal, these are classified on type and then arranged alphabetically. On the right you have the menu hierarchy, these are arranged by the different menu types and from there include fully customizable sub-menus.
You can create groups, dividers and even rename current tools to whatever you prefer them to be. To actually change around the menu you can simply select a tool in the hierarchy and drag it to where you would rather it be. You can also delete menus and buttons and drag plugins from the left pane to the right for more control.
Once you're done you can save the configuration out for backup or to load back in on another computer or user profile. If you want to go back to scratch you merely need to choose the Default preset from the top.
You also have the similar ability to customize shortcut keys in LightWave through the Configure Keys menu, accessible through Edit > Edit Keyboard Shortcuts or by pressing Option/Alt + F9 |
LightWave creates and saves the config files when you close the application so if you delete them LightWave will recreate them for you. Here is where they are located for the different Operating Systems.
For Windows 2000 and XP you will find the config files in the C:\Documents and Settings\User Name folder.
The config files are named with a LW in the name and since LightWave 8 will have the version number in the name. For example here are some for LightWave 9.
LW9.CFG
LWEXT9.cfg
LWM9.cfg
LWHUB9.CFG
For Windows Vista
You will find the config files in the C:\Users\User Name folder. They will be named the same as well.
For OS 10.X.X they have a different naming convention since on the Mac they are referred to as Preferences. For the Power PC version preferences are going to be located at Macintosh HD:Users:User Name:Library:Preferences. They are going to be named:
LightWave Extensions 9 Pref
LightWave Hub 9 Pref
LightWave Layout 9 Pref
LightWave Modeler 9 Pref
For the UB version of LightWave they will not have the word Pref or LightWave on them since they are in a folder labeled LightWave3D. These will be in the Macintosh HD:Users:User Name:Library:Preferences:LightWave3D folder.
Extensions 9
Hub 9
Layout 9
Modeler 9 |
LightWave Works with these formats:
Import
dxf,obj,3ds,lwo,ai,eps,
Export
obj,3ds,lwo,dxf,shockwave(this is more of a scene file) |
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How can I change the LightWave interface colors?
