Configuring LightWave's Content Directory

NewTek suggest that you create new Content folders for each project and change LightWave's Content directory as appropriate.

However, I strongly recommend you use a shared drive (I suggest N:) as your content directory, and create the usual subfolders in each (Images, Objects, Scenes, etc.).

Then create subfolders within each of those for your individual projects. My utility Project-Tools will do this for you...

So, if your projects are Buffy, Spiderman, and Star_Wars, you'll have something like this:

I'll call this the "Studio" structure.

At work, I set up all our LightWave content on the N: drive on our main server. At home, however, I simply map N: to the D: drive on one of my PC's which then acts as the server for my home network.

Here's how it's done.

Let's assume we have two PC's, Fred and Barney, on a Windows Workgroup called Bedrock. Each has LightWave 8.5 installed in a folder called D:\LightWave_85 and also has LightWave 9.0 installed in D:\LightWave_90.

We're going to use Fred as our File Server for LightWave, as follows.

1. Right-click the D: drive icon in Windows Explorer (My Computer) and select Sharing.
2. Create a share. You can just call it D or give it a name like NewTek (or anything else you choose).
3. Press OK.
4. On the Windows Explorer menu, select Tools->Map Network Drive.
5. Pick N as the drive letter and \\Fred\D or \\Fred\NewTek as the folder.
6. Press OK and a new window will open with N:\ as its path.
7. Move your LightWave content folders to N:\ or create them if they don't already exist.
   e.g., N:\Images, N:\Objects, N:\Scenes, etc.
8. Open LightWave and select N:\ as your content directory, then exit LightWave to ensure it updates its config files.
9. Switch to your other PC (Barney) and repeat steps 4-6.
10. Repeat step 8 on Barney so it can share Fred's content.

You're done!

You can also use Project-Tools to convert between the Studio and NewTek structures.