my english is not very well i'm sorry. i read a lots of tutorials and messages about it but these are not useful i think. i've got car models i 3ds format. i want use these cars on my game but i must export models to mdl format??
how can i do this ? i've got 3DS Max 8 and Milkshape...
i don't know UV Mapping , texturing.i don't know anything about 3d modeling.
i'm downloading models from the net. i'm only a programmer.i don't know modeling. Please step by step where i must click?????

in 3ds max models are very good. in MED models only grey. model on my screen but only grey.

You can read 3ds format in MED. But Images must no be JPG. So convert them before and tell MED the proper file names while importing.

thanks Frank but i haven't got jpeg files.i've only one file for each car.(3ds format) i haven't got image files???

There must be an external file for the texture in 3ds otherwise it has no texture. Maybe this file does not have an uv-map at all and only uses materials. Then you have no chance to render it the same way in 3dgs. You could make your own uv-map and bake a new texture with the material though.

thanks frank. but how can i make my own uv-map?:(

Here's a tip...

Get a small stand-alone app called UVMapper. I'm not sure where you can get it, but I'm sure you can do a search for it. If you have 3DS Max, you can export your model to a Wavefront OBJ, load it into UVMapper, then export the UV bitmap. You can use any paint program to draw/paste in the images you want on the UV bitmap. Then just open 3DS Max and reload the 3DS model and use the bitmap as a texture.

I use to do this way back when I didn't know how to make textures. Alternatively, in 3DS Max (all versions) you can convert any model to an editable mesh and select individual polygons and colour them seperately, adding bump maps, transparency, etc.

hey u can use zbrush for UV mapping, texturing, Normal mapping (Normal mapping is an amazing concept in game designing).

there are other standalone plugins and applications like UV mapper, Deep Uv etc.

not sure if this was said, however, in med just go file, import from 3ds. it wont be animated, or skined, but it will be in mdl format.