Gentlemen,I'm coming along great with GMAX but have run into a snag. I have a sidewalk/ramp that needs to be illuminated at night. I'm missing something about materials that would allow an object not to darken at night. Help is appreciated.

Gmax lighting isnt supported within flight simulator. What you can do it one of 2 things..1. create a texture and apply it within gmax2. use effects to simulate night lighting(fs2004 only)Dave

I'm aware that GMAX doesn't work at illuminating objects in FS2004. I also know the drill to use a XXX_LM file to look like an object is illuminated. For some reason, that does not work with the box I am working on. The mystery continues.

Make certain you have checked off the Has Nightmaps option while exporting the file via MakeMDL.exe...

Bill,Thanks for the tip. It worked once. I thought I'd made it to Heaven. Unfortunatley, not. I cranked up MakeMDL and went to options and checked the Nightmaps option. It worked once. Then back to square one. To summarize and air problem, I create a simple box, create a material to cover box. OK so far. Then I select one polygon to afix a BMP file to with diffuse. OK so far. It seems to be problematic when I check night illumination and afix a XXX_LM file to that. Ideas are GREATLY appreciated.

Another sidebar to previous message. MadeMDL was locking up. I went back into material editor and changed the night illumination file to match the diffuse file. Now it compiles but sign does not show up at night. :-(

Thanks for the help. It had been awhile since I had done the night lighting thing. I got crossed up on the material editor. Once I settled in that the basic file was the diffuse and the night time file went with the Ambient material and ended with _LM then it all works fine. I am still sketchy on what the night illumination button is for if ambient works.