Autodesk Introduces 3ds Max 2019.2

Autodesk has released 3ds Max 2019.2. Here’s what new with 3ds Max 2019.2.

Since Autodesk's introduction of fluids natively into 3ds Max 2018.3 Update, the company has updated this built-in solution with more features, based on much input from the beta community.

With fluids, render multiple cache files at once or individually. Image courtesy of Autodesk.

The new Fluid Loader is an object that makes it easy to load and manipulate fluid simulation data. With the Fluids Loader, users can load cached fluid simulations, adjust the transform of the sim, offset the playback, assign materials and render the sim.

There is added support for rendering fluids data channels such as Vorticity, Density, Age, etc. with Arnold. Users can adjust the meshing parameters for liquid and foam of a loader and the render settings such as data channels mentioned. They can reuse simulations and control each playback independently.

When working with complex simulations, there are many emitters, colliders, and motion fields. This can make iterating on fluid simulations cumbersome, so there's now an added ability to disable and enable emitters, colliders, motion fields, etc. for faster, more finely controlled sims.

Open Standards Alembic & OSL Improvements

Alembic support has been updated to version 1.7.5. Alembic UV export is now compatible with Maya by default. Support for instances allows files to be much smaller while maintaining complexity and can improve export speed. There's a tree-view arrangement and ability to search in the Alembic Inspector Window.

The OSL editor now displays line numbers. In the OSL editor, the “Compile” shortcut is changed from Ctrl+S to F7 and Ctrl+S is now “Save.” The OSL editor now highlights matching brackets, e.g., if the cursor is on a left parenthesis, the matching right parenthesis is highlighted.

Arnold 5.2 Update

Arnold 5.2 delivers several usability and performance enhancements, plus new features to improve workflows. Texture Baking is now supported with the render-to-texture workflow. Shade enhancements include a new Cell Noise shader and new Sheen function in the Standard Surface shader to render cloth-like microfiber materials or the peach fuzz. RGB clamping in clamp shader can now be configured to either a scalar or color mode. Edge detection can be controlled in Toon Shader using the STRING type user data, toon_id. The stability and usability of the high-quality Noice denoiser has been improved. GPU memory consumption of the fast NVIDIA OptiX denoiser has been greatly reduced.

Autodesk Drive

Image courtesy of Autodesk.

Autodesk Drive is a cloud storage solution that allows users to securely store, preview and share  your 2D and 3D design data. It supports 60+ types of Autodesk and 3rd party files for viewing and organizing, preserving local storage where users only download when needed.

Community Updates

Autodesk is committed to responding quickly to 3ds Max user feedback. This release includes over 70 fixes, many of which were submitted by the 3ds Max user community at 3dsmaxfeedback.autodesk.com. Track View and Scene Explorer panels are now windowed again. Data Channel can now output vertex alpha. For Projects workflow, users can have more than 60 paths associated with a project. A new 3ds Max security tools set offer protection against the CRP and ALC 3rd party scripts. Shared Views now export Autodesk materials and V-Ray Materials with textures. Decimal separator now identified in Windows regional setting. MaxScript operations on the Skin Modifier no longer require objects to be selected.

Sources: Press materials received from the company.