Hi Tony, no materials are only written currently to OBJ and LWO file formats.

In general you should try to avoid using 3DS format - it is an obsolete format that actually comes from the old 3D studio MS-DOS version.

It has a lot of limitations in it, things like only support for short 8 character filenames, a 16-bit limit on the number of vertices or faces in a single mesh, no support for vertex normals for having good quality shading, and other stuff like that.

Is there some reason why you are trying to use that format instead of one with less limitations in it?

- Michael