3ds Max 2021 dévoilé : quoi de neuf chez Autodesk ?

C’est au travers d’une mise à jour de son aide en ligne qu’Autodesk dévoile les avancées de la version 2021 de 3ds Max. La liste complète des nouveautés est visible plus bas. On notera en résumé :
– Un nouvel outil Bake to Texture, avec support de nombreux moteurs dont Arnold, gestion des texture maps OSL ;
– de nouveaux matériaux PBR et deux nouveaux types de maps pour une meilleure compatibilité avec les workflows temps réel ; on notera aussi la possibilité de glisser-déposer les maps directement depuis l’explorateur Windows ;
– un nouveau modifier pour vos normales qui améliore le shading ;
– de nouveaux shaders OSL ;
– Arnold devient le moteur de rendu par défaut, remisant un peu plus le rendu Scanline au placard ;
– enfin, Substance2 Map est plus rapide que l’ancien Substance map, et s’adapte aux besoins actuels : textures 8k, chargement natif des fichiers sbar sans avoir besoin d’exporter les maps depuis Substance Designer.

Bake to Texture:

– New tool for baking maps and surfaces offers faster performance in a new streamlined workflow
– Extensive renderer support including Arnold
– Error validation and compatible map filtering
– Support for OSL texture maps and Blended Box map
– MikkT normal mapping support.

PBR Materials:

– New PBR materials make the interaction of light with surfaces physically accurate
– The two types of maps, PBR Material (Metal/Rough) and PBR Material (Spec/Gloss), ensure compatibility with any real-time engine workflow
– Drag and drop downloaded PBR maps straight from Windows Explorer into the Material/Maps Browser.

Weighted Normals Modifier:

– The Weighted Normals modifier improves the shading of models by altering the vertex normals to be perpendicular to larger flat polygons
– Generates explicit normals for meshes better and faster than ever
– Weight options include: Area, Angle, and Largest Face
– Full control over smoothing and blending values.

New OSL Shaders:

– New shaders include:
– HDRI Environment controls the positioning and final look of the environment both in the viewport and the final render
– And HDRI Lights lets you place HDR photos of real-world lightsources that dynamically update the scene
– Uber Noise adds complex types of noise such as Perlin, Fractal, Cell, fBm, and Worley
– Other new and updated shaders include Color Correction, Float and Color Curves, plus Camera, Object, and Spherical Projections.

Arnold renderer as default:

– 3ds Max 2021 includes Arnold 6.0 as the default renderer, instead of the Scanline Renderer. And this gives you a modern, high-end rendering experience.
– Supports the new Bake to Texture workflows.
– New AOV workflows.
– Includes new Scene Converter scripts for converting V-Ray and Corona Materials to the Physical Material.

New Substance2 Map:

– Substance2 map is faster than the legacy Substance map.
– Utilizes updates to the latest Substance engine for native sbar loading. And You no longer need to export maps from Substance Designer.
– Supports up to 8k textures.
– Also Supports the renderers included with 3ds Max: Arnold, ART, Scanline and Quicksilver.
– Scripted tools to quickly set up Substances with a particular type of material or to back maps to files.

Outre ces changements du côté des fonctionnalités, Autodesk annonce la correction de bugs, une installation simplifiée, l’enregistrement plus rapide des scènes, un viewport amélioré ou encore le support de Python 3.7.6 par défaut.

Installation
The online and offline installation has been overhauled for a simpler and faster experience.

Scene Converter
The Scene Converter’s new and improved workflow makes creating custom conversion rules easy. Presets are locked and cannot be saved over, and you are reminded of unsaved changes before closing the Scene Converter.

Improved Viewport Settings and Quality
Improvements include:
Viewport Settings can now be saved as presets
Ambient Occlusion (AO) is now always visible when working in the viewport
Progressive Skylight toggles full shadow-casting skylights, providing accurate skylight shadows when enabled or reducing viewport flicker and visual problems in interior scenes when disabled.
Progressive Fade-in Time sets the speed at which certain effects in the viewport such as Progressive Skylight, area light, and depth-of-field are progressively rendered
Roughness support for the Physical Material
Shadows for lights now on by default.

Python 3
Take advantage of the rich set of Python extension libraries and the ability of Python 3 to handle all your algorithms, as Python 3.7.6 is now the default. As it doesn’t support MaxPlus python API, we recommend using the pymxs python API instead. pymxs now supports an improved way of passing arguments by reference to various APIs, a more flexible callback registration mechanism, and better interoperability with MAXScript.

Faster file saving
Saving scene files with a very large number of assets is now significantly faster. Autobackup (Autosave) and Hold are faster also. The more assets a file has, the greater the improvement.

ProSound improvements
Support added for 24-bit WAV files, 88.2kHz and 96kHz sample rates, as well as support for an unlimited numbers of audio clips (previous maximum of 100). An issue was also fixed that caused audio to plat at 50% volume after frame 100.

Chamfer modifier updates
Recent Editable Poly options such as Uniform, Radial, and Patch mitering types can now be set directly from the Chamfer modifier.
Support also extends to the Edge Depth, End Bias, and Radial Bias controls.

Sketchup import improvements
New Sketchup importation options include ignoring hidden elements and preserving layer information.

Over 80+ defects fixed
Over 80 defects that directly affect you were fixed in this release, as well as a large number of defects that affect internal processes.

Une présentation en ligne à suivre ce soir

Un webinaire prévu aujourd’hui (le 25 mars) à 18h heure française reviendra en détail sur ces nouveautés et la roadmap. Voici le programme :

Sujet Up Close and Personal with 3ds Max

Description Join the team behind 3ds Max for a first look at and discussion around recent Max updates. During this 2 hour and 30 minute live stream event, we’ll be joined by guests from Scanline VFX, Ubisoft, and Hoare Lea.

1:00-1:20: Introduction & Updated Roadmap; Nancy LaRue, Industry Marketing Manager with Product Manager
1:20-1:40: Arnold & Physical Material as default, Viewport updates; Zap Andersson, Principal SW Engineer
1:40-1:55: Bake to Texture; Louis Marcoux, Principal UX Designer
1:55-2:10: Modeling Updates; Logan Foster, Product Owner
2:10-2:30: Ubisoft Presentation; Adeline Aubame, Technology Ops Director
2:30-2:50: Hoare Lea Presentation; Karam Bhamra, Associate CGI Designer
2:50-3:10: Scanline VFX Presentation; Joe Scarr, FX Supervisor
3:10-3:30: Live Panel Q&A

2h30 de direct qui vous permettront donc de vous familiariser avec l’ensemble des avancées.

Pour acquérir 3ds Max

Notez que notre partenaire Progiss est revendeur des solutions Autodesk : vous pouvez donc retrouver 3ds Max en location sur la boutique 3DVF.fr, pour des durées de 1 mois à 3 ans, en licence monoposte ou réseau.

Comme toujours, si vous avez des questions, n’hésitez pas à contacter notre partenaire Progiss, par téléphone au 01 49 89 07 90 ou par mail : info@progiss.com
Notez également que l’équipe Progiss est à votre disposition pour vous proposer des présentations des logiciels de la boutique, que ce soit dans leurs locaux (Villepinte, à côté de Paris) ou dans les vôtres.

Quid de l’usage à distance ?

Notez enfin, si votre studio a des difficultés à mettre en place un système de travail distant, qu’un sujet de forum dédié a été ouvert. Les produits Autodesk font partie des outils évoqués, de même que la plupart des solutions courantes du marché.