Autodesk - 3ds Max 2020

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Description

Autodesk 3ds Max® 2020 is focused on delivering you efficiency, performance, and stability that will speed up the content creation process. New feature updates for Autodesk Revit, OSL, SketchUp Importer and the Chamfer Modifier provide more flexibility, better organization of scenes, and faster iteration times. 

Autodesk 3ds Max – product videos

News in Autodesk 3ds Max 2020

Autodesk 3ds Max 2020 comes with a range of new improvments making the workflow even more streamlined. See more news here.

Performance Improvements

Autodesk 3ds Max 2020 performance improvements bring you faster playback speeds and a more responsive application.

• List controller evaluation 15X faster with average weight on or off. NEW IN 2020.2
  
• Viewport Framerate display (FPS) has been adjusted to deliver a more accurate playback performance indicator
• Validity Intervals limits evaluation of unchanged curves and geometry for faster playback speeds
• SetNormals MaxScript function has been optimized to be up to 10 times faster
• Optimizations have been made when interacting with the viewport with multiple grouped objects
• Auto Backup is more responsive to cancel requests from the ESC key
  

Create Animation Preview:

• Creation on local drive is now up to 3 times faster
  
• Allows AVI codec selection
  
• Unlimited capture resolution, based on render settings in lieu of viewport dimensions
  
• Various user experience improvements include;
• "Play when done" is accessible from Preview UI
  
• "Quality" setting is accessible from Preview UI (Nitrous only)
• Default preview filename now matches the scene name by default
• 100% output resolution on by default 
• Default quality setting changed from 16 to 1
• MXS snippet can be executed per frame for custom strings
  
• Filename and MXS snippet values can be specified from MXS command line of Create Preview
• After executing the preview, the time slider is returned to the original starting frame
  

Chamfer Modifier Improvement

• Additional mitering types (patch and radial) NEW IN 2020.2
  
• Full support for vertex chamfering NEW IN 2020.2
  
• The new Fixed Weight Chamfer keeps a consistent chamfer width
  
• Weighted chamfering allows chamfer to be controlled on a per-edge basis with crease weights
  
• New presets allow you to save favorite or default settings
  
• Inset feature adds edge rings to chamfers for users who cannot use smoothing groups, such as models for game engines
  
• End Point Bias: edges that don’t end at a corner terminate on the next parallel edge can bias between the near and far vertex

OSL Shader Support

• Viewport display of OSL Maps has greatly improved
  
• OSL shaders are now automatically converted to viewport shaders
• The GPU driven “Quicksilver Hardware Renderer” now supports OSL Maps
• Extended / Improved OSL Maps:
• Bitmap Lookup: Now supports UDIM textures
• Composite: Now supports blending modes
• 14 new OSL Maps including;
• Color Key: Perform green-screening inside of 3ds Max
• Color Space: Convert colors between RGB, HSV, YIQ etc.
• Halftone:  Screen space dot pattern
• Falloff: Get surface orientation to camera
• Simple Gradient: Generate color gradients
• Simple Tiles: Tile pattern generations with bump, corner roundness, and more
• Waveform: Animate effects in various patterns
• Weave: Can generate basket weave, cloth threads, or even carbon fiber patterns
• Also including UVW MatCap, Normal, Random Index by Number, Tri-tone, Threads and Toon Width
  

Revit Import Improvements

• Combine By options allows you to combine by material more selectively by choosing;
  
• Combine by Revit Category and Revit Material
• Combine by Revit Family Type and Revit Material
  
• Filter dialogue now displays the number of nodes that will be created in the scene’s category or family type
  
• Import Revit 2017, 2018, and 2019 files into 2020 without the need to upgrade (requires Revit Compatibility pack)
  
• IES lights imported from Revit are converted more accurately
  
• Daylight System Update; We removed reliance on Mental Ray, resulting in a better translation. We now leverage the physical sun and sky, where the translation is done automatically without interruption
  

Additional Improvements

Various enhancements have been made to Modeling workflows, Alembic support, IES lights and Civil View.

• SketchUp importer update supports all newer versions of SketchUp files NEW IN 2020.2
• Image based lighting is now automatic when an environment is added. It saves time – no need to add a skylight to have to enable this feature. NEW IN 2020.2
  
• Modeling: Copy + Pasted modifiers now retain their names, scripted booleans preserve materials
• Alembic: Playback controls, custom attributes on non-geometry (such as locators and dummies) are exported, Triangulation is improved on concave ngons
• IES Lights Light rendering is improved
• Civil View  Textures are better rendered and represented in Arnold
• Point Cloud Support for ply and e57 Point Cloud formats

3ds Max to Arnold (MaxToA)

MaxToA integration updates have been made to smooth out workflows with Arnold.

• Export Points can be exported as Arnold point primitives
• New PFlow Instancer node means PFlow instances will render faster in Arnold
• Distribution of the Python API, allowing users to edit, write, render .ass files, without relying on kick only
  

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