[Closed] Billboards from all bitmaps in a folder

I am working on a script to build image planes from tif files (could be anything with an alpha). I have learned and pieced it together from several other scripts. You can see I’m using VRay. That part should be easy for anyone to adopt to their own renerer.

I had it working and created 100 billboards, but after restarting max, the script no longer works. I had help from our scripting guy along the way but he has gone home. I obviously had defined some global that it still was using… but now I can’t remember what it was…

I’m sure it is something simple.
(I can’t include the full path here, subsituted part of it. I also tried to shorten the indents to make it read better here)

files = getFiles "\\\\--UNC_Path\\resources\\materials\\images\\People\\RealWorldImagry\\urbanmoods\\32bitTIFimages\	emp\\*.tif" --will be variable later
   (for f = 1 to files.count do 
     (  
 local theMap = bitmap 10 10 color:white      
      theMap.filename = files[f]
   					
   				
    -- Get the ratio of the bitmap and set the length and width acordingly
   	 local planeRatio = (theMap.width as float)/(theMap.height as float)
   					
    (
     local theLength = 68 --will be variable later
     local theWidth = theLength*PlaneRatio
    )
   		
    --Set naming
   	local refPlaneName = (getFilenameFile theMap.filename)
   							
    --build material 
   	local matName = (getFilenameFile theMap.filename)
   	local theMaterial = VRayMtl()  name = refPlaneName
   	theMaterial.texmap_diffuse = Bitmaptex bitmap:theMap name:(refPlaneName + "_Diffuse")
   	theMaterial.texmap_diffuse.coords.blur = 0.01 
   	theMaterial.texmap_opacity = Bitmaptex bitmap:theMap name:(refPlaneName + "_Opacity")
   	theMaterial.texmap_opacity.rgboutput = 1 
   	theMaterial.texmap_opacity.monooutput = 1 
   	theMaterial.texmap_opacity.coords.blur = 0.01 
   	showTextureMap theMaterial theMaterial.texmap_diffuse on 	
   						
    --build plane 
   	local refPlane = plane name:refPlaneName length:theLength width:theWidth lsegs:1 wsegs:1 mapCoords:true
   	refplane.material = theMaterial 
   	refplane.realWorldMapSize = off 
   	refplane.lengthsegs = 1 
   	refplane.widthsegs = 1 
   								
   --position the plane
      in coordsys (transmatrix refplane.transform.pos) refplane.rotation = (eulerangles -90 0 0)
      ResetXForm refplane ; CollapseStack refplane
      refplane.pivot = [(refplane.max.x+refplane.min.x)/2, refplane.min.y, refplane.min.z]
      refplane.pos = [0,0,0]
    )
   )

I get the error:

#("\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl400.tif", "\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl401.tif", "\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl402.tif", "\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl403.tif", "\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl404.tif", "\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl405.tif")
   -- Error occurred in f loop; filename: C:\Program Files (x86)\Autodesk\3ds Max 9\Scripts\UserScripts\MyTools_BitmapPlanesFromFiles.ms; position: 817
   --  Frame:
   --   theMaterial: VRayMtl:VRayMtl
   --   planeRatio: 1.33333
   --   refPlane: undefined
   --   refPlaneName: "peopl400"
   --   name: "peopl400"
   --   matname: "peopl400"
   --   theLength: 68
   --   thewidth: 90.6667
   --   f: 1
   --   called in anonymous codeblock
   --  Frame:
   -- Runtime error: Assignment failed, the bitmap should be saved first, BitMap:\\--UNC_Path\resources\materials\images\People\RealWorldImagry\urbanmoods\32bitTIFimages	emp\peopl400.tif
   OK
   

Any help would be primo,

Thanks,

Jonah