V-Ray 3.50 beta 1 available for download

[vlado]

Hello,

The first beta version of V-Ray 3.5 is now available for download. There are a few important things about it that we would like to get your feedback on. See the changelog in the next post for more information on the rest of the changes.

0) Beta 1: These are NOT the final V-Ray 3.5 builds and we will continue polishing the new features until the official release in January.

1) Online licensing: This beta includes an updated version of the V-Ray license server that can work both with dongles and with online licenses. As part of the beta testing process, we are providing up to 5 online licenses for every existing customer for the duration of the beta. You can sign up for the online licenses here: https://www.chaosgroup.com/beta_forms/max

The V-Ray installation includes the license server and will install it if you choose the option for a local license server. If you need to download the online license server on its own, you can do so from our website: https://download.chaosgroup.com/?product=48

2) IPR (interactive production rendering): This beta includes the ability to use the regular V-Ray renderer in interactive mode. The current implementation in this first beta is focused on allowing interactive changes to materials and lights. While it will respond to some geometry changes in the scene, modifying geometry while rendering may be somewhat unstable. This is already improved for beta 2. Interactive rendering can be enabled through the button in the V-Ray VFB or through the MaxScript commands vrayStartIPR() and vrayStopIPR().

3) Resumable rendering: Resumable rendering is supported for the progressive sampler when writing any type of output and for the bucket samplers when writing .vrimg files. This is already improved for beta 2 where we support resumable bucket rendering for any type of output.

4) Adaptive lights: This feature can be enabled from the "Advanced" view of the "Global switches" rollout. We are currently exploring the behavior of the algorithm to choose an optimal number of adaptive lights based on the total number of lights in the scene. In the final release this feature will be enabled by default and should not require any user adjustment. Depending on the scene, we have seen between 2x and 3x render speed increases for scenes with many light sources.

5) VRayMtl now implements a "glossy Fresnel" option. This option is enabled by default for new materials, but when loading older scenes it is left disabled for compatibility reasons.

6) V-Ray RT has two important improvements: one is the ability to render directly to Oculus Rift/HTC Vive, and to intercept input from the X-Box controller that goes with the Oculus Rift. You can bind various MaxScript commands to the X-Box controller inputs. I posted more information on how to get it up and running here:
http://forums.chaosgroup.com/showthr...t-and-HTC-Vive

V-Ray RT also has a number of options in the VFB right-click menu - i.e. the ability to select objects and materials directly in the VFB, to set the DOF focus distance, to navigate the camera etc. We still need to change the mouse cursor for the different modes.

7) V-Ray GPU has a number of improvements which are listed in the changelog, including support for shadow catchers, the stochastic flakes material and others.

For beta 2, there are a number of improvements planned for all of the above, as well as several additional features which we will announce as we get there.

Best regards,
Vlado

[vlado]

Here is the changelog:

Build 3.50.01 (beta) (16 November 2016)
==============

New features:
(*) V-Ray: Enable usage as an interactive production renderer (IPR);
(*) V-Ray: Enable the resuming of bucket renders from raw .vrimg files;
(*) V-Ray: Enable the resuming of progressive renders;
(*) V-Ray: Experimental implementation of adaptive lights;
(*) V-Ray: Optimize GI rendering;
(*) V-Ray RT: Support for direct output to Oculus Rift and HTC Vive;
(*) V-Ray RT: Object picking in VFB;
(*) V-Ray RT: Enable "Set focus distance" in the VFB for the selected camera;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Aerial Perspective support;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for matte materials shadow catcher;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for the VRayStochasticFlakesMtl material;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Initial implementation for on-demand mip-map texture in production rendering mode;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Less CPU memory usage when rendering scenes with many textures;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Less GPU memory usage when rendering scenes with many textures;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Implement support for Render mask;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for velocity render element;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Better handling of geometry and materials updates during ActiveShade;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Add "Low GPU thread priority" option;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for additive mode of the VRayBlendMtl;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for transparency for the layers of the VRayBlendMtl;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Add support for VRayAtmosphere render element;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Fixed differences in lighting between V-Ray RT CPU and GPU;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Fixed differences in texture blending between V-Ray RT CPU and GPU;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for Irradiance Map from file;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for VRayRenderID, VRayObjectID and VRayMtlID render elements;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Implement ground projection of VRayHDRI;
(*) VFB: Implement hardware acceleration support for lens effects;
(*) VRayMtl: Implement "Glossy Fresnel" option;
(*) VRayALSurfaceMtl: Include alSurface shader port for V-Ray in the installation;
(*) VRayProxy: Support for user property tags in the proxy file name;
(*) VRayScannedMtl: Add ability to capture and render the back lighting;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Add a render preset for Maya Fluids vdb;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Support for Cap Mesh mode in V-Ray RT;

Modified features:
(*) V-Ray/V-Ray RT: The progressive sampler should finish the current pass when the given "Render time" is surpassed;
(*) V-Ray: Add control for panoramic pole merging for stereoscopic rendering (V-Ray RT MaxScript properties .top_merge_angle .bottom_merge_angle);
(*) V-Ray/V-Ray RT: Draw the alpha channel during the undersampling phase of the progressive sampling;
(*) V-Ray: Dome light minor speed optimization;
(*) V-Ray: Display warning when "View navigation" in ActiveShade is selected without looking through camera;
(*) V-Ray: Increase the tooltip display times in the render settings;
(*) V-Ray: Remove the interpolated reflections/refractions options;
(*) V-Ray: Set the default value for the dynamic noise threshold for the progressive sampler to 80;
(*) V-Ray: Use adequate precision for render elements (full/half precision) in OpenEXR files;
(*) V-Ray: When using a dome light, matte objects have visible outlines unless GI environment is overridden with zero;
(*) V-Ray: Bundle License Server with the installation instead of the vrlservice.exe;
(*) VRayMtl: Make the GGX BRDF the default one and turn on glossy Fresnel by default;
(*) VRayMtl: Move the "reflect on back side" option in the reflection section of the Basic rollout;
(*) VRayMtl: The anisotropy controls should be disabled when the BRDF is set to Phong;
(*) VRayProxy: Allow for the viewport preview to be overridden by another .vrmesh or Alembic file;
(*) VRayProxy: Add rendering support for Mudbox exported .vrmeshes with Level-of-Detail;
(*) VRayProxy: Interpolate geometry data for heterogeneous Alembic files with velocity channel;
(*) VRayProxy: Optimized the preview read and update for animated proxies;
(*) V-Ray RT: Apply resolution changes without restarting the rendering;
(*) V-Ray RT: Add "Select object" and "Get object material" right-click options in the VFB;
(*) V-Ray RT: Add UI mode views switcher for V-Ray RT between Default and Advanced views;
(*) V-Ray RT: Make V-Ray RT to take the render state of the Laubwerk trees options, not the viewport;
(*) V-Ray RT: VFB output file paths are not exported in .vrscene file;
(*) V-Ray RT: View navigation in ActiveShade VFB is too fast;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for the directionality attribute of the VRayLight in Plane mode;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Ability to load precalculated Irradiance map GI cache files;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Changes on materials with baked texture to be updated quicker;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Faster rendering of materials with bump maps;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Faster rendering with Bitmap output curves;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Faster rendering of rounded edges texture;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Print the message about not having OCL devices env var as a info, not warning;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Print the OpenCL Driver version in the log;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Print warning when there is a render element that's not supported on the GPU;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Print warning when max sample level is set to 0;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Raise the number of rays per pixel when the number of active pixels is too low;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Solid reflective material getting alpha dropouts;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for UVW coordinates type in VRaySamplerInfo render element;
(*) VFB: MaxScript commands to show/hide history and color corrections panels of the VFB;
(*) VFB: Contrast curve should be applied in sRGB color space;
(*) VFB: Change the default values of the Lens Effects;
(*) VFB: Improve history images saving speed;
(*) VFB: Move the history image compare buttons from the main toolbar to history toolbar;
(*) VFB: The button for showing the messages log should bring the messages window to the front;
(*) VFB: White balance should be applied before exposure;
(*) VRayClipper: Optimize plane clipper with empty exclude lists;
(*) VRayDenoiser: A warning should be printed when the VFB is disabled;
(*) VRayDenoiser: Check the sampler settings before starting a render and warn if incompatible;
(*) VRayHDRI: Add a MaxScript parameter for axial rotation;
(*) VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: Enable support for multiple include paths in OSL;
(*) VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: Speed up the texture sampling in OSL;
(*) VRayScannedMtl: Add ability to render licensed materials (library licenses);
(*) VRayScannedMtl: Add support for Nitrous viewport preview;
(*) VRayStereoscopic: Add new fragment merge mode, where fragments are merged by render ID and z-depth;
(*) VRayTriplanarTex: The "blend" and "scale" parameters should be animatable;
(*) VRayToon: Add an option to exclude an object in the V-Ray object properties;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: High-DPI support for the render curves and gradients;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Improve the motion blur for atmospherics;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Improve the velocity voxel preview;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Optimize rendering with emissive lights, Ray-Traced self-illumination and complex geometry;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Respect the maxRenderThreads setting in V-Ray during rendering;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Support V-Ray's per-object motion blur duration override;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: When several points on diagram are selected, right click on one of them should affect all points;
(*) vdenoise.exe: Add abort on OpenCL errors;
(*) vdenoise.exe: The noise level channel can also be named "VRayNoiseLevel";
(*) V-Ray Toolbar: Creating VRayFur from the toolbar button should select the newly created fur object;
(*) V-Ray scene converter: Added an option to convert only selected objects;
(*) .vrscene exporter: Renderer settings of V-Ray RT as production renderer are not exported;

Best regards,
Vlado

[vlado]

And the bug fixes.

Bug fixes:
(*) V-Ray: Crash on loading scene after rendering with time stamp;
(*) VRaySamplerInfo: Crash when rendering an object with changing topology and VRaySamplerInfo render element with Forward/Backward occlusion type;
(*) DR: "Failed to delete server scene file" DR warning appears but the file has been deleted successfully;
(*) VRayGLSLMtl/VRayGLSLTex/VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: GLSL and OSL plugins crash Max when the error message contains %;
(*) VRayOrnatrixMod/VRayHairFarmMod: Hair tessellation segments are not calculated correctly for orthographic views;
(*) Hair&Fur: Invalid geometric normal (000) for "HairVrShadeable" warning with Hair and Fur;
(*) VRayLight: Light portals appear noisier than rectangular lights due to undersampling;
(*) MultiMatteElement: Opacity is not working with MultiMatteElement;
(*) V-Ray: Remove the "(notUsed)" from the imageSampler_renderMask MaxScript properties;
(*) VRayFastSSS2: Render to texture crashes with VRayFastSSS2 material;
(*) VRayDisplacementMod: Rendering an animation with 2D displacement with VRayHDRI map with values greater than 1.0 causes the object to disappear on the second frame;
(*) V-Ray: "Tiled texture cache set" message is flooding the log when using Slate Material editor;
(*) V-Ray: Unwanted GI caustics with refractive materials with "affect shadows" enabled;
(*) V-Ray RT: Composite texture with Output map on reflect and diffuse gives a different than production render result;
(*) V-Ray RT: Crash with Particle Flow and motion blur when sliding the time during ActiveShade session;
(*) V-Ray RT: Crash when there are materials with very long names and special characters;
(*) V-Ray RT: Effect ID of VRayMtl is not exported;
(*) V-Ray RT: Excessive progressive sampling AA filter memory consumption with ActiveShade rendering and render region;
(*) V-Ray RT: Exclude lists of VRayDirt don't work with HairFarm;
(*) V-Ray RT: Exporter doesn't resolve light cache file paths;
(*) V-Ray RT: Exporter is missing some of the VRayMtl and VRayFastSSS2Mtl features;
(*) V-Ray RT: Isolating geometry in a scene with duplicating nodes names and handles produces WndProc error with out of process rendering;
(*) V-Ray RT: Invalid geometric normal warnings with VRayLight and stereo cube camera;
(*) V-Ray RT: "Static geometry" of VRayDisplacementMod is not exported;
(*) V-Ray RT: There is no motion blur on VRayFur when applied to a geometry with a modifier;
(*) V-Ray RT: Motion blur samples are not applied to animated VRayPhysicalCameras unless they are set locally;
(*) V-Ray RT: Not all supported image filters are exported;
(*) V-Ray RT: Not exported opacity texture correctly if names are the same with other textures;
(*) V-Ray RT: Not updating the IFL sequences properly during time slider change;
(*) V-Ray RT: V-Ray trace sets are not exported;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Auto update bitmaps is broken with in-process rendering;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Crash when reading from large, 8k+ textures;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Crash when switching Noise coordinates to "Vertex color channel" while rendering;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Crashes on scenes containing textures with elliptical filtering;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Crash with motion blur and Material IDs set;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Different texture output with Color Map and tweaked Output Amount;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Different bump compared to CPU with Mask map;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Difference in shading VRayDirt in VRayTriplanarTex;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Different indexes of Ornatrix hairs on each frame;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Flicker when rendering animation with Backburner/Deadline with lights with include/exclude lists;
(*) V-Ray GPU: GGX BRDF produce noise in Object ID render element in CUDA;
(*) V-Ray GPU: IES lights with invalid paths to files sometimes are rendered wrong;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Incorrect sun position when using VRaySun/Sky with specific procedural color correction textures;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Mapped masks of Composite map don't work;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Material shader tree does not reflect the materials changes in ActiveShade in all cases;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Out of process V-Ray RT rendering crashes on frame change in a scene with duplicating nodes names;
(*) V-Ray GPU: "Random by Render ID" mode of VRayTriplanarTex is not applied in bump;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Render elements does not respect the transparency of materials;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Render server crashes when rendering animation with lights with include/exclude lists;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Undersampling artifacts occur on the bottom and right edges of the region during ActiveShade session;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Using excessive host mem when there are a lot of textures in the scene;
(*) V-Ray GPU: VRayColor2Bump in base material of VRayBumpMtl deactivates VRayEdgesTex;
(*) V-Ray GPU: VRayLight type Disc produces different lighting when textured;
(*) V-Ray GPU: VRayZDepth "clamp zdepth" option has no effect;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Wrong blending between texture and color in Falloff texture;
(*) V-Ray GPU: Wrong lighting with max ray intensity set to 1;
(*) VFB: Artifacts appear on the render channels dropdown control after show/hide history;
(*) VFB: color correction controls disappear and lens effects settings are misplaced if scrolled down and resized;
(*) VFB: Enabled color corrections cause major UI slow downs in ActiveShade mode;
(*) VFB: Incorrectly resized when loaded a scene and the side panels have been open;
(*) VFB: Raw output image file extension is not persistent;
(*) VFB: Render channels dropdown box progressively diminishing its height;
(*) VRayBlendMtl: Appears invisible in the viewport set to realistic preview;
(*) VRayBump2Normal: Bump map slot is not updated when plugging/unplugging a map in Slate Material Editor;
(*) VRayClipper: Artifacts with animated object;
(*) VRayClipper: Exclude list is not considered for generating VRayEdgesTex round corners;
(*) VRayClipper: Generates artifacts on excluded objects with VRayFastSSS2/VRaySkinMtl;
(*) VRayClipper: Generates darker result when clipping VRayFastSSS2/VRaySkinMtl in Raytraced mode;
(*) VRayDenoiser: Falling back to CPU with very wide images;
(*) VRayDisplacementMod: Crash in View-dependent mode in orthographic views;
(*) VRayDisplacementMod: Crash with object-based VRayFastSSS2;
(*) VRayDisplacementMod: Setting 2D displacement resolution to 1 crashes 3ds Max;
(*) VRayDisplacementMod: Subdivision displacement in View-dependent mode is not calculated correctly for orthographic views;
(*) VRayGLSLMtl/VRayGLSLTex: GLSL crashes when compiling embedded shaders;
(*) VRayGLSLMtl/VRayGLSLTex: The BRDFGGX plugin and the GGX mode of BRDFVRayMtl produce different results;
(*) VRayFur: VRayFur does not generate proper defocusAmount render element with motion blur;
(*) VRayHDRI: Displaying parameters in the Compact Material Editor reinitializes ActiveShade rendering;
(*) VRayHDRI: Elliptical filtering is very slow with displacement;
(*) VRayLight: Crash when changing type in creation mode;
(*) VRayNormalMap: Faceted results on subdivided meshes;
(*) VRayOrnatrixMod: Hair does not render when loaded through an XRef object;
(*) VRayOrnatrixMod: Hairs get occluded when light, camera and hairs are linked to an animated object;
(*) VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: 3D noises appear as stripes;
(*) VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: Incorrect rendering of V-Ray OSL shaders when part of a VRayBlend material;
(*) VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex: Preprocessor-only output is polluted with diagnostic messages;
(*) VRayProxy: "Automatically create proxies" loads vrmeshes very slow;
(*) VRayProxy: Incorrect normals geometry with mirrored transformation;
(*) VRayProxy: Loading a specific Alembic file with particles crashes 3ds Max;
(*) VRayProxy: NaN pixels with in the VRayRawShadow and VRayRawLighting render elements;
(*) VRayProxy: Slow down when loading Alembic files with many meshes in 3ds Max 2017;
(*) VRayProxy: Visibility lists are incorrectly refreshed;
(*) VRaySamplerInfo: Multi-sampled motion blur produces artifacts on animated proxies;
(*) VRaySkinMtl: Doesn't work with the Vexus material from John Martini;
(*) VRaySky: Deleted VRaySun still appears in the VRaySky;
(*) VRaySky: Find VRaySun from an XRef'd scene when using VRaySky;
(*) VRayStochasticFlakesMtl: Does not appear in the Material Editor when V-Ray RT/GPU is selected as render engine;
(*) VRayToon: Black color in Width map produces artifacts in the RGB and render elements;
(*) VRayTriplanarTex: Crash when connected to bump slot through VRayNormalMap;
(*) VRayTriplanarTex: Invalid bump normals warnings when source texture returns zero UVW coordinates;
(*) VRayTriplanarTex: Normal maps are not rotated properly;
(*) VRayTriplanarTex: Wrong tiling when plugged into bump map slot;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: 3ds Max crashes when playing animation with Time Bend Controls mode set to Loop;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Artifacts with Grid-based Self-Illumination;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Bucket artifacts with a moving grid using Phoenix Light Cache together with motion blur;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Different render result when rendering on CPUs with different number of cores;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Each time a render diagram is expanded or collapsed, it is fitted again;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Emissive lights are calculated in V-Ray RT even when the Fire channel does not exist;
(*) VRayVolumeGrid: Geometry behind simulator occludes render elements;
(*) V-Ray Light Lister: Rows are overlapping;
(*) ply2vrmesh.exe: Node transformation is applied only to the vertex channel but not to the normals channel;
(*) vdenoise.exe: Crash with 8K OpenEXR files;
(*) Installer: Help button opens the system browser rather than default browser;
.... (post is too long)

Best regards,
Vlado

[NicoC]

WOWOW you guys rule I can't wait to put my fingers on it !
Little question: is it possible to use both V3.40.03 and v3.5 beta on one workstation ? I don't want to use beta renderer in production ... I'm pretty at ease with ini tweaking and things like -p -i commands, but that would mean v3.5 beta can be installed only with dropping files, not with an installer, right ?

Thanks !

[vlado]

Little question: is it possible to use both V3.40.03 and v3.5 beta on one workstation?

Only in different 3ds Max versions, or if you install to some temporary location first to extract the files and follow the instructions in the docs, but that approach has some limitations:
https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/...trary+Location

I don't want to use beta renderer in production...

A very smart thing to do

Best regards,
Vlado

[NicoC]

Only in different 3ds Max versions, or if you install to some temporary location first to extract the files and follow the instructions in the docs, but that approach has some limitations:
https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/...trary+Location
Vlado

Thanks a lot, Vlado !

[Raph4]

A lot of improvement for GPU/RT.
In the futur, possible IPR for GPU also ?

[anthonyh]

hi,
a new license server is listed in the vray install but the separate link is to the one we already have installed 3.05.03 ?

[vlado]

a new license server is listed in the vray install but the separate link is to the one we already have installed 3.05.03?

You can just use the version that is included with the V-Ray installation itself, it will work fine. If, for some reason, you want to download the online license server separately, make sure it is version 4 as on the attached picture.

Best regards,
Vlado

[instinct]

Congrats to the team! Another big one!

[Syclone1]

This is awesome, thank you

[anthonyh]

sorry, i meant i can only see the old 3.03.03 version listed on that link. i can`t see 4.1 to download, it`s not there for me.?
thanks
anthony

[vlado]

sorry, i meant i can only see the old 3.03.03 version listed on that link. i can`t see 4.1 to download, it`s not there for me.?

Then it would be best to email our support guys at support@chaosgroup.com - they will help you out.

Best regards,
Vlado

[chriserskine]

dose this work in active shade? and with the vive output?

(*) V-Ray GPU: Support for Irradiance Map from file;

[vlado]

dose this work in active shade? and with the vive output? (*) V-Ray GPU: Support for Irradiance Map from file;

I can see where you are going with this Will make sure it's possible in beta 2, right now it looks like for ActiveShade we reset the GI engine to brute force. As you pointed out however, it can be very beneficial to have a precalculated irradiance map there.

Best regards,
Vlado